Breaking the Mold

I firmly believe if you are going to blog you should have a layout that really represents you.  That means either putting the time into ’shopping’ for that perfect, ready-made template, or being willing, as I am, to tamper with the template until it is exactly the way you want it.

Tampering, of course, leads to breaking.  There is nothing like putting a few hours into the code and then – ta-daa! – a blank page from a broken script, open tag or bad reference.

But if you persevere, you will end up with a blog that suits your idea of perfection when you look at it.  (Filling it with posts worthy of being read is another matter entirely!)

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CBox Widget

I’ve come to realize what a wonderful widget a chat box is. Maybe even a must-have for blogs using EntreCard – for droppers like me who don’t *want* to drop and run, but can’t think of a comment worth posting on some one else’s blog.

You can get one here if you don’t already use one.

I added mine today here with a link at the top for easy access for all you EC surfers.

Template Challenge

I found a template I really like, and put a lot of work into it yesterday … And it needs a lot of work. Unlike other templates, I can’t just use Blogger’s drag-and-drop GUI to arrange the modules. I have to go into the code and move things. So I’m also getting a crash course in JS and a refresher in CSS.

The really fun part is, half of the documentation comments are in Portugese (the native lingo of the adapter) which I don’t read as fluently as Spanish … sigh … so I’m getting some edumacatin’ in that too.

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Blogger Templates

This blog’s first anniversary is coming up, and I’m contemplating a layout change …

And as I was browsing the interwebs I found this great site, so I figgered I’d share. :)

Blog Templates

Site Tweaks & Additions

This was to be my day of rest, but apparently I didn’t know what I was talking about.

But that’s okay! Good stuff happened.

A tale of tweaks

I learned HTML and CSS by taking webpages apart and then trying to put them back together. “Oops, I guess that code was important” was a common utterance. :)

Javascript was too much for me though. I’m not a designer, just a hobbyist, and there seemed to be no reason to work so hard on a webpage.

But today I realized I really, really wanted a three-column layout for this blog. I really like the template design, though, and it even came “out of the box” in a color scheme that pleased me. I didn’t want to have to start over. I wanted to just add a column.

Easier wanted than done. But I did it! All by myself, even. Usually when I have computer trouble of any kind, I’ll e-tap an online friend who’s a whiz with this stuff and cry on his shoulder. Then he tells me how to fix it and everyone is happy. But today I wad determined to puzzle out the arcane coding myself and get that column in.

The end result isn’t as polished as what I started with, naturally, but I am happy with it for now. After some more practice I’ll make it sparkle.

So in my new column (on the left, there) you’ll see some buttons and badges and things. Having considered some off-hand advice from my good friend Sheta, I decided to go ahead and get a bit more serious about blogging.

More about those programs …

Sheta is participating in Entrecard, and had made up some nifty badges – the “Dare to be Different” one – so I decided to join the fun. It’s free and easy to sign up, and you get exposed to a lot of neat blogs, as well as getting exposure for your own.

Blogged.com is a rating site. My personal blog merited an 8.3, Great, and I’d really like to see this one inch higher than a 6.4. So do me a solid and vote there, ‘kay?

I also signed up for Feedburner, along with their email-update service. That’s another cool, free webtool. Who doesn’t like free? Not only will they “burn” your blog feed, they make it easy to make sure the webcrawlers find it and keep it current. They also provided the active headline generator over in the right sidebar. Tech toys are so much fun. :)

As I sign up at more places, there will be more buttons, badges, widgets and updates.

It will be an interesting journey.