Owner: Blogger Buster URL:http://www.bloggerbuster.com Join Date: Fri, 15 Jun 2007 14:34:13 -0500 Rating:0 Site Description: Blogger Buster provides a lighthearted look at blogging hints, hacks, tips and tricks for bloggers across all platforms. Site statistics:Click here
Free PageRank display button for your blog 2007-09-12 16:54:00 Many blogs and websites show off their PageRank
with a button
like this:You can use this free tool to generate your own PageRank button display which updates dynamically each time your PageRank is updated, so you can always be sure that your correct ranking is displayed.
To use this free tool, simply enter the full URL of your blog and click "Check PR. Your blog's current PageRank will be displayed, along with a selection of buttons you can choose from to display in your site. When you click on a button style, the code will be generated for you to copy and paste in your blog where you would like the PageRank display button to appear.Create your free PageRank Button DisplayWhat is PageRank?Google PageRank results from a "ballot" among all the other pages on the World Wide Web about how important a page is on a scale of 0-10. A website or blog with a high PageRank is considered more important than one with a lower PageRank. Read more about PageRank on this post.(At present, Blogger
Tic Tac Three Column Template (Blue) available to download 2007-09-12 13:39:00 As requested by a few people now, I have modified the Tic Tac Blue template to add a second sidebar. Here is a screenshot for you:
You can see a demonstration of this template in the Tic-Tac Three
column demonstration blog. You can download this template using the link below. This is a zip file which contains the XML file for this template.Download Three Column
Tic Tac template (blue)To use this in your blog, you should extract the XML file from the zip folder and save it to your computer. Then go to your Blogger dashboard, and click on Template>Edit HTML. Near the top of this page you will see a link where you can upload a new template from a location on your computer. Browse for the saved template file and click "upload". This will then install your new template in place of the old one.All the images used in this template are hosted by Blogger Buster. You do not need to upload them to your own hosting providers.You are free to modify this template as you wish, however I do ask t Read more:available
All about blog feeds (part 4) 2007-09-11 13:28:00 This is the fourth and final installment of a short series of posts written to help you achieve a better understanding of your blog feeds, and how you can use them. In this post, I will explain how you can use services like FeedBurner and AddThis to syndicate your blog feeds and attract more subscribers to your blog.
Services such as Feedburner and AddThis aim to help you publicize your blog feeds, and make them more readily available for readers to subscribe to. If you use Feedburner to syndicate your feeds, for example, you can offer your readers the option to subscribe to your blog feed as a daily email digest, which for those unacquainted with feed readers may well be a pleasant and accessible option!How FeedBurner worksFeedBurner is probably the most popular feed management system to date, and is completely free to use. Many services are offered to members to help publicize and optimize your blog feeds, and attract more readers to subscribe to them.To create your own free Feed
All about blog feeds (part 3) 2007-09-10 16:33:00 This is the third installment of a short series of posts written to help you achieve a better understanding of your blog feeds, and how you can use them. In this post, I will explain about the "Label" and "Per-post" feeds, and how you can create links to these feeds in your blog.
The URL required to find the feeds for Labels and Per-post comments are very different to those we used to find the blog-wide posts and comments feeds, and require a full post to discuss them! Rather than using the blog's url, we need to use the blog's unique identification number, and in the case of per-post comment feeds, the unique post identification number.About Label feedsLet's begin by looking at the format of the Label feed url:
http://www2.blogger.com/feeds/[yourblogID]/posts/[feedType]/-/[labelName]
First we notice that the feed URL is located at "www2.blogger.com", and that the feed is located by your blog's unique identification number. Notice also the "/-/" section: this is what defines th
All about blog feeds (part 2) 2007-09-09 11:14:00 This is the second installment of a short series of posts written to help you achieve a better understanding of your blog feeds, and how you can use them. In this post, I will explain how to find the main posts and comments feeds and how to make them available for your readers to subscribe to them.
Your main posts and comments feeds are the easiest feeds to find, and are also the feeds which Bloggers are most familiar with. By default, Blogger publishes these feeds in Atom format.These feeds are found at the following URLs (where YOURBLOG is replaced by the name of your blog):
For the main posts feed: http://yourblog.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/defaultOr if you are publishing to a custom domain: http://www.yourdomain.com/feeds/posts/default
It can also be found at: http://yourblog.blogspot.com/atom.xml
For the main comments feed: http://yourblog.blogspot.com/feeds/comments/defaultOr if you are publishing to a custom domain: http://www.yourdomain.com/feeds/posts/defaultYou can change t
All about blog feeds (part 1) 2007-09-07 16:22:00 This is the first in a short series of posts written to help you achieve a better understanding of your blog feeds, and how you can use them. In this first post, I'll outline the basics of blog feeds, the differences between Atom and RSS feeds and an explanation of the different feeds available from your Blogger blog.
What is a blog feed?Your blog feed is a machine readable version of your blog posts and comments. Blogger publishes this XML file to allow further syndication of your blog; that is, readers are able to "subscribe" to your blog and receive updates via a feed reader each time you publish a post.Your blog feeds are published in two formats: RSS and Atom, which I will explain in more detail further down the page. Take a look at this short video first, which explains RSS (the most commonly known format) in plain English, as this will give you a great understanding of what blog feeds are all about:
Click To Play So what is the difference between Ato
Enable per-post comments feeds 2007-09-06 17:40:00 For a while now, I've been wondering how to enable the feed link for per-post comments in order to allow readers to subscribe to the comments for a particular post they are interested in. From what I'd read in the Blogger help groups, the only method was to create a link for each individual post including that particular post's ID number. Which would have been very tedious! However, today I finally figured out a much simpler methos, so you can simply add a bit of code to your post footer which will easily enable your readers to subscribe to the comments of a particular post of interest!
To create the link which will enable readers to subscribe to the comments of a particular post, you will need to ensure you have enabled post pages in your blog settings. If you haven't already done this, go to Settings>Archiving in your Blogger dashboard and set "Enable post pages" to "yes".Next, find this section in your Blogger template:
<p><data:post.body/></p>
Just after t
How to manually install Haloscan comments and trackbacks (for customized templates) 2007-09-05 06:51:00 Haloscan provide an excellent commenting and trackback service for bloggers. While Blogger blogs are supported by this system, the install
ation wizard will not work for customized templates, even those which have a few lines of Javascript included! Haloscan commenting and trackbacks
do work in customized templates, but you will need to install the nescessary code manually. Unfortunately, Haloscan do not provide any support (yet) for manual installation of commenting and trackbacks in Blogger templates. So here is a tutorial of how you can manually install Haloscan's commenting and trackback features in your own Blogger templates.
Please note: this is a tutorial for installing both Haloscan commenting and trackback functions in your Blogger template. If you wish to only install Haloscan trackbacks (as I have done in this blog), please take a look at this post instead.Here is a tried and tested method for installing Haloscan commenting and trackback features in your blog. Be sure to
More site changes (and opinions needed!) 2007-09-04 17:49:00 As many of you will have already noticed, I have recently created a new site for Bloggers: Blogger Buster Tools. This sub-domain features loads of useful tools for bloggers, so please take a look if you haven't already visited!I will shortly be redesigning the header for this blog to include a button link to this great resource site to replace the "about" and "contact" buttons. I also have another idea which I would greatly appreciate your opinions on...
As I now have quite a selection of templates available for download, I am considering creating a new blog hosted on a sub-domain of Blogger Buster to showcase only the templates. I think this will make it much easier for you all to search through templates by theme. It will also make it easier for me to provide the templates as text files which you can copy and paste. This new blog will be available from this main site, and also on it's own sub-domain (something like templates.bloggerbuster.com). Of course, I will still announce Read more:changes
"Gourmet Menu" themed template available for download 2007-09-04 17:27:00 I have just finished work on a rather interesting template
called "Gourmet Menu", which you can see as a screenshot below:
This is a food themed template, featuring a complementary label cloud and customizable fonts. You can preview this template in action on the Gourmet Menu Demonstration Blog. All images are hosted by Blogger Buster, so you only need to install the XML template.You can download the Gourmet Menu template using the link below. This download is a zip file, which also includes a help file to assist in customizing the template.Download Gourmet Menu Template hereYou are free to modify this template as you wish. However, I do ask that you leave the credits intact within the XML template. Please do not redistribute this template without credit to the original author. A link back to Blogger Buster is always appreciated!For more free Blogger templates, be sure to visit the Blogger Templates section of this site.Technorati Tags: blogger+templates | downloads | food+theme
Read more:available
Free Tools for Bloggers! 2007-09-02 13:27:00
For the past few weeks I've been working on a great new resource site for Bloggers: Blogger Buster Tools
! I'm happy to announce that the site is finally online and available for use, with a great variety of tools to help you make the most of your blogs. Resources include:
RSS Button maker
Pagerank checker
Blog/News Headlines widgets
Color CalculatorMore tools will be added to the site as I am able to develop them.
You can find a complete list of available tools on site. I will be adding new tools and resources as they are developed, which I will announce both here and on the Blogger Buster Tools site. If you find Blogger Buster tools useful, please help generate awareness of this new blogging resource by Digging the site, telling your friends or linking to the site from your blog.If have any suggestions for future tools, please let me know by leaving a comment below or sending me an email.Technorati Tags: blogging+resources | tools | widgets | pagerank | rss | images
Blogdire - A new blog directory 2007-10-01 14:48:00 Today I received news of a new blog directory: Blogdire. This directory is free to use and it's quite simple to add your blog to this directory too! Also included is a blog search engine for you to search other blogs for the posts you like.
There are several qualities I like about this directory, most notably the inclusion of recent posts from random blogs on the front page, which link to the blogs quoted and thus help provide more exposure. Also Blogdire uses a tagging system to help you find blogs of interest (or to help readers find your blog) complete with a tag cloud which helps us to understand the most popular tags currently available.To submit your blog to Blogdire, simply visit the home page and click on the "Add your blog" link near the top right of the page. Then fill out your details, including your blog URL and description. The instructions state that you should include a button link in your blog to ensure your listing is successful, but this is a small non-intrusive
Free SEO stats display box - my birthday gift to you! 2007-09-30 05:40:00 I discovered a free online tool which allows you to display a box like this in your blog, featuring Pagerank, Alexa, MSN, users online and many more SEO
stats!
To create your own, simply visit this page on MyPagerank.net, input your website details and choose the stats you wish to display. You will then be given the Javascript code to place in an HTML/Javascript widget in your blog, as well as a preview of the widget.
As you can deduce from the title, today is my birthday. While I'd hoped to post something great for you all in honor of this day, I have to admit, this wasn't the gift I had hoped to post on site today... I had actually hoped to have the new site template ready instead, though unfortunately I came across too many setbacks and it's still not ready yet :(The good news is that the extra time I'm taking over the design will make it even better once the whole thing is done! So far, I've created a whole new Web 2.0 style design which should load faster and be much easi Read more:birthday gift
A new style of AddThis widget now available 2007-09-28 10:38:00 I'm sure you all know how useful I find the AddThis
social bookmarking widget
by now. Well, the makers have created a new version which features a drop-down menu when your mouse hovers over it. Try it here is you like:
To install this new version of the AddThis button, you will need to have an account with AddThis as the Javascript includes your unique username in order to function properly. Of course, the service is still free to use though!This new style of AddThis button can be installed by visiting this page in the AddThis blog. Simply log in using your username and password (or create a free account if you don't already have one set up). On the next page you can choose your button style: this new version is lower down the page. Don't worry that it currently says "TypePad and Blogger widgets coming soon" as you inly need to copy the Javascript widget into your blog template, which should be present in the iframe below.If you already have an AddThis button in your templat Read more:available
Download the "Shinobi" template 2007-09-28 04:39:00
Here is a new template
I've been working on for a while now: the "Shinobi" (Ninja) template. This template features a unique "Web 2.0" style theme including inline comments. Take a look at the screenshot or preview the blog in action on the Shinobi Template demonstration blog. Read on for more details and to download the XML template.
The Shinobi template features:
Unique theme with rounded corners and ninja-style header.
Inline comments on post pages, so readers can leave their comments without having to leave the page.
Complementary label cloud.
You can download the XML template using the link below:Download
the Shinobi Blogger Template (Zip File)Included in the zip file are both the XML template and a help file with details of how the template can be installed and configured. If you would also like to copy over your widgets from your existing template, please refer to this post which explains the whole process.All images used in this template are hosted by Blogger Buster, so y
Making your links more interactive with Snap-Shots 2007-09-27 16:45:00
While researching design techniques for new templates, I discovered Snap-Shots: a way of making your links
interactive by displaying previews of websites, video, RSS feeds and audio as the readers mouse hovers over them. Although I've seen this on other sites before, I never realised this service was free to use, and also that it barely impacts page loading time at all.Here is a preview of what Snap-Shots can do for your blog. Read on if you'd like to know more!
Snap-Shots creates a pop-up preview of whatever content your link points to. You can use this to display previews of websites, videos, recent RSS entries and even audio if that is what your link points to.Installation is really easy, especially for Blogger blogs. The process can be summarized in four steps:
Head on over to Snap-Shots and click on the "get started" link.
Choose your color scheme, pop-up size and upload your logo if you would like this to be displayed too. You can also set advanced options, such as wether
Two new search widgets for your blogger blogs 2007-10-11 10:09:00 Here are two new search widgets
for your Blogger blogs:
A posts/label search widget, which can be used to limit results and be styled to match your blog template (from Dig 'n' Share Blog)
A multiple blog search widget, to search posts, Google Blog search and Technorati (currently being developed by myself)Here follows an explanation of the uses for both search widgets, with the link for David's blog search, and the widget code for my "multiple" search widget.
Dig 'n' Share Blog Search WidgetDavid of Dig 'n' Share emailed me with the details of this new blog search widget yesterday. It works by using two search forms to search either posts or labels for the given search text, and can limit the results which are displayed in the page so you don't end up with a huge page full of search results!This widget is particularly advantageous for blogs which use a lot of labels as "tags" for posts (indeed, Blogger labels are classed as "tags" by Google, Technorati, Del.icio.us and the
Free Web 2.0 design tools for your blog 2007-10-10 06:17:00 "Web 2.0" design
has recently become very popular. Reflective logos, striped backgrounds, vivid badges and gradient buttons are among these new design features, and are fast being integrated into blog design. Here is a selection of free online Web 2.0 design tools to help you give your blog more of a Web 2.0 appeal.
Fresh Badge GeneratorCreates great Web 2.0 style badges with many options for customization (I used this tool to create the logo at the top of this post in under 1 minute!Stripe Generator 2.0Generates striped backgrounds for your blog or website. Choose colors, styles and even gradients. Create this as a tiling image too!Tabs GeneratorThis generates navigation tabs with choices for gradients, border, width and fonts. Easy to use, just create your tabs and right click the resulting image to download.Web 2.0 Logo CreatorCreate a reflective header for your blog! You can also choose to add a logo, change gradients, background color, etc.Web 2.0 logo creatorAnother free logo
How to create a table of contents page for your blog 2007-10-09 03:44:00 Until recently, I used Beautiful Beta's excellent "Table of contents" hack for this blog. This technique loaded the table of contents above other posts, and was accessible from a link in the sidebar. The only downside of this hack is that it significantly slows blog loading time, especially when your blog has more than 100 posts.For the new template, I have modified this hack to show the table of contents for Blogger Buster on a post page instead. In this post I will explain how I did this.
Beautiful Beta's TOC hack requires two components. There is the code which calls the contents of your blog, and provides a link in the sidebar:
<div><a href="javascript:showToc();">Show TOC</a><br/><br/></div>
<script src="http://home.planet.nl/~hansoosting/downloads/blogtoc.js"></script>
<script src="http://YOURBLOG.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default?alt=json-in-script&max-results=999&callback=loadtoc"></script>
And the div element wh Read more:create
How to create a calendar widget for your blog 2007-10-08 08:43:00 In this template, I use a calendar style widget
to display the posting date of my posts. This style has recently cropped up in many Web 2.0 style Wordpress blogs, and is easily reproduced in Blogger layouts blogs too. Here I will show you how to create
your own calendar widgets to feature at the top of each post.
This Blogger hack uses a combination of javascript, CSS and some slight modification to your template to display the date a post was published over a calendar-style background. There are only three main steps to change your date header to a calendar widget, so don't worry if my explanation seems rather complicated! Here is what you should do:
First, go to Settings>Formatting, and change the date header format to YYYY-MM-DD like this:
This enables the script we will be using to correctly parse the date header format.
Next, go to Template>Edit HTML and ensure you have checked the "expand widget templates" box. Now, find the <data:post.dateHeader> section in the pos
Inline comments for classic Blogger templates 2007-10-08 07:33:00 After posting the hack for inline comments in Blogger
layouts templates, I was asked if the same is also possible for classic html based templates. The answer is "yes" it is certainly possible! So for the benefit of those using classic Blogger templates (non-layouts) I will explain how to edit your template to feature inline comments on post pages.
The hack for inline comments in classic templates is perhaps a little simpler than for layouts templates, and is very easy to do. Also it is possible to preview the changes with classic templates (including seeing your post pages) so that you can be sure the inline comments act correctly before saving your template.Here is my step by step guide:
First of all, make a back-up of your template by copying the whole of your existing template into a text editor. This is just a precaution in case you make a mistake and need to restore your template at a later point.
Next, go to the settings section of your Blogger dashboard and click on "Commen Read more:Inline
Blogger Buster in Beta! 2007-10-07 05:53:00 Most of the work on the new look BloggerBuster
site is now complete. Luckily the shift didn't take quite as long as I thought!There may still be a few minor errors and I am now checking the whole site to see what may need adjusting. Please do let me know if you discover something wrong with this new template!If you experience any major difficulties in using the site today, please email me on amanda [at] bloggerbuster [dot] com and I'll try to help you out as soon as possible.Why "Beta"?I'm launching the new site in Beta for at least a week or so until I am sure there are no flaws in the design, missing links, script errors and such. As I'm sure you will understand once you've seen some of the changes, the new template is a major reconstruction for the whole of Blogger Buster, and it will take some time to perfect everything.I do appreciate your patience during this time, and will soon provide a full explanation of all the changes I am making.Hope you enjoy the new look Blogger Bu
What is Atom/RSS? 2007-10-06 09:29:00 Would you like to keep up to date with the latest content at Blogger Buster? There are a number of ways you can subscribe to receive news of the latest updates to the site, and the main ones used by Blogger Buster readers are the Atom and RSS feeds.
What is Atom/RSS?Atom and RSS are both a similar technology which was developed to help people receive automatic updates of their favorite websites.Although there are some differences between the technology of Atom and RSS, they both do essentially the same job: they fetch updated content from your favorite sites in a format you can easily read in a feed reader.A better alternative to bookmarking.Before Atom and RSS were invented, web users had to bookmark their favorite sites instead, and return to the bookmarked sites manually to see if anything had been updated. This creates more work for you as the reader, and means you could easily miss new content if you forget to check your bookmarks. Also, it can be complicated trying to keep tr
Create "Wordpress" style pages for your Blogger blog 2007-10-04 09:52:00 A few people have asked how I created "Wordpress
style" pages which are accessible from the header section. Since I will be making much use of these pages in the near future, I thought it best to explain how Blogger
users can create their own blog pages.
Wordpress blogs can include blog pages; these are often used to provide an "about" page or contact information. Such "pages" are separate from the main blog: they do not appear on the main page or archives, and links to these pages from within the template are usually created dynamically. However, updates to Wordpress pages are still included in the blog's feed.Although Blogger does not currently use blog pages in the same manner as Wordpress, we are still able to mimic this in our blogs with a little effort.The blog pages you see in my blog are actually regular blog posts which I have make links to from within the template itself. This is how you can create your own:
If you haven't already done so, change your "Enable post pages
Why the new Blogger Buster site will be a much better resource for Bloggers! 2007-10-03 06:31:00
A few readers have asked me when the new BloggerBuster
template will be uploaded, and what features the new site will have. So I thought it was about time I explained more about the new Blogger Buster site, and why it's taking so long to get it all ready!
A better
Blogger resource!While I strive to feature posts and resources which are of benefit to all my readers, I feel that the current template is lacking in clear navigation. So, I am currently redesigning the whole site to ensure that you can easily find the posts, tools and templates you need. When the work is complete, you'll find all of my blog posts, tools and templates are part of the same site, with clear navigation and improved search functionality too!What the new site will look likeHere is a small screenshot of the new site template for you (click the image for a larger version).When complete, you'll find the whole site will have this same theme making it easy for you to get from one area to another using the navi
How to control the number of posts displayed in label pages 2007-10-03 05:35:00 By default, the 20 most recent posts
are displayed on label pages (ie: when you click on a label link in the sidebar. If there are more than 20 posts assigned to a label, then at the bottom of the page you would also find links to next and previous pages.Recently a reader asked how it is possible to change this, particularly in regard to label clouds. So in this post, I will explain the methods for changing the number of posts displayed, for both default label lists and label clouds too.
To change the number of posts shown on label pages involves editing your template and adding some code which controls the number of posts displayed. It is always good practice to make a full back up of your blog template before making any modifications to the template, so be sure to have done this before implementing this hack!The process is different depending on whether you use a default label list or a label cloud to display your labels, so I will explain each of these separately for you. For de
My sincere apologies for interruptions to your templates! 2007-10-02 07:55:00 If your template suddenly stopped displaying images properly, please accept my apologies! While configuring the new Blogger Buster site, I accidentally made the templates folder unavailable (which is where most of the template images are stored). Be assured this will all revert back to normal within a couple of hours and I promise your templates will work properly again very soon!
Problems uploading your images to Blogger? Here's a temporary solution 2007-10-17 11:57:00 It seems that many Blogger
s are currently unable to upload images to their blog posts. This problem is currently being investigated by the Blogger team, and while we are told that a solution is "imminent", this is still causing many problems.Usually when this problem occurs, you will receive an error message and error code which you can report to the Blogger Team on this thread in the Blogger Help Forums.Until the image upload problem is fixed, you may want to consider uploading your images to a free hosting site, and link to these from your blog posts. While this is hardly ideal, I have found this does bypass the problem and displays images correctly. Here's how you can link to externally hosted images in your blog posts.
Upload your images to a free image hosting serviceThere are dozens of free image hosts to which you can upload your images. Perhaps the most popular of these free services are Photobucket and Imageshack, though you may easily find other services by performing a
Creating a contact form for your blog with WebFormDesigner 2007-10-17 05:47:00 Contact forms can add a professional look to your blog, while offering an easy way for your readers to get in touch with you. An added benefit is that your email address will be disguised, so you can be sure your inbox is kept spam free.Most contact
forms rely on PHP or Perl scripts to send the data to your email address. This can be awkward for Blogger users, since we cannot host such scripts in our blog. But with WebFormDesigner, you can create and use contact form
s in your Blogger blog, as demonstrated on my contact page. Here is an explanation of this great free service.
Contact forms allow your readers to send you an email directly from your blog. The details of the contact form (eg: the reader's name, email address and message) are then sent to your email address. When using contact forms, your email address is kept hidden and is not included in the source code of the page, which prevents spam-bots from discovering your email address.While you could write the code for your c Read more:Creating
Create screenshots for your blog easily with this free tool! 2007-10-16 05:51:00 Screen shots are an excellent way to illustrate a post, especially when explaining how to use a website, or to demonstrate a new template. All of the screen shots featured in this blog were created using ScreenHunter: a free program which allows you to take pictures of the screen you are working on, and save them directly to your computer. This works on all Windows operating systems, including Windows 98/NT4/ME/2000/2003, XP and Vista.
I've been using ScreenHunter for a few years now, and have found this to be the easiest screen capture facility to use. Best of all, it's free for unlimited personal and business use! There is no expiration date, nor is this trial software.You can download your free copy of ScreenHunter 5.0 from the Wisdom Soft website using the link below (scroll down the page a little to find the correct download):Download WisdomSoft ScreenHunter 5.0 FreeInstalling ScreenHunterOnce you have downloaded the ScreenHunter program, you can easily install the software Read more:free tool
Recommend Site To A Friend
