Ask MetaFilter posts tagged with blogspot

Please Help me with my Blogger Blog and Custom Domain

andoatnp — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 13:26:09 -0800

Why might my Blogger blog not be working with my custom domain and how do I fix it? Four days ago, I set up a blog at CUSTOMDOMAIN.blogspot.com and I own the url CUSTOMDOMAIN.com from GoDaddy. I followed the instructions here from Blogger so that people who visit the Custom Domain would see me Blogger blog. When I visit CUSTOMDOMAIN.com it just shows the godaddy.com parking page without the content from my blogspot blog.

In order to set up the domain I own with the blog I created a CNAME record for the domain (screenshot here, does this look right?) and changed the setting in my blogger setting panel to indicate that it is a custom url that I am using. I'm reasonably certain that I did everything in the blogger side ok, because when I visit CUSTOMDOMAIN.blogspot.com it redirects to CUSTOMDOMAIN.com, but with just the empty godaddy parking page.

Is there something I did wrong or something that I can fix so that my godaddy.com domain works with my blog?

Also, is it possible to set up a Google Apps account and then transfer this domain that I have purchased to that account so that blogger is handling both the domain and the blog? I see where I can purchase a new domain with Google Apps, but can I transfer one that I already own?

Also, I emailed godaddy tech support, and they sent a reply saying that it didn't look like a problem on there end.

Is there a way to show all my blog posts?

jejune — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 07:46:42 -0800

Is there a script that will show summaries of every post from my blog, using a feed from a Blogger blog? I use this widget to display the first 100 or so characters from each post from a feed of my blog. When you copy & paste the code from that webpage into a Blogger blog post, it displays headings from your blog posts along with a summary for each one.

But the problem is that there's a limit: it only displays your 25 most recent posts. Is there any kind of widget that will show all the posts, with no limit?

It would be sufficient if there were a script that would let me specify: "Display posts #1-25," then separately, "Display #26-50," etc. That way, I could just combine them.

Time to Pimp My Blog

davidstandaford — Thu, 22 May 2008 19:23:33 -0800

Suggestions for what additions, widgets, extensions, interactive doodads to include on a blogger/blogspot blog. Looking for input from both blog writers and readers. As a side project, I've been keeping a blog where I post one YouTube video per day on a narrow theme. I was wondering if there is anything I should add to the blog (hosted on blogger) that will either be a help to me or that my readers would appreciate.

Currently I have: Contact information, a blogroll, categories for the posts, the blog archive, adsense, and subscription/RSS information.

Things I'm considering: "claiming" the blog on technorati and integrating with that service, setting up a mybloglog account to track my visitors, and a shoutbox that people could leave sitewide comments on.

Is there anything else I'm forgetting/missing? Should I try to find a way to make it easy for people to delicious/digg/reddit my posts or the blog?

What are the little extra features on a blog that you really like to see included?

Daily Blogger Post of All my Twitters

davidstandaford — Thu, 01 May 2008 20:36:33 -0800

Is there a way to automate a daily post to a blogger blog with all my twitter posts of the last 24 hours? I have searched and found a bunch of ways to install a widget/badge to my blogspot blog that will be constantly updated with all of my daily twitters, but that is not what I am looking for.

I would also like there to be an automatic post to the blog itself each day that includes all of the twitters. Can blogger do this in any sort of automated fashion?

It seems there are plenty of solutions on wordpress, but none for blogger. Any help would be appreciated. Thanks!

MORE INSIDE, PLZ

[NOT HERMITOSIS-IST] — Thu, 01 May 2008 20:17:23 -0800

How can I make blogspot have [more inside]? Does blogspot allow you to create an "extended" version of your post, like MT and others? I can't figure out how to do this. I have some ass-long posts coming up and I'd rather not lay waste to the whole front page.

What do I have to do to be able to do a "more after the jump"?

Perhaps I could have searched better to find out. I'm still riding on the excuse that I just had my wisdom teeth out, I'm cranky, sore, and dizzy on painkillers.

Thanks, gang.

Can't modify - or even find - my Blogger blog.

gottabefunky — Thu, 17 Apr 2008 15:32:36 -0800

I have a Blogger blog that I set up a while ago but never put anything on. Now I can't modify it at all, even though the URL is "taken" - by me. I set up a blog (juliansmith.blogspot.com) a while ago but never
posted anything to it.

Now I can't do anything to it. I type in that URL and just get the
blogspot top bar ("next blog," "dashboard," etc.) above a blank white screen.

The blog doesn't show up on my dashboard, but when I try to create it, it says "that name is taken." Of course it is - by me! But how do I get to it to modify it?

Can a blogger ID specific readers by IP address?

Locative — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 22:50:32 -0800

Can a blogger tell that I am reading their blog by my IP address? I read a Blogger/Blogspot blog in my Google Reader feed. Can the owner of the blog tell that I am reading it by my IP address?

A while ago, I subscribed to the blog of an eccentric friend of a friend for the lulz. This blogger just fired off a post saying that she knows who is reading it because of the IP addresses, and called out all unauthorized readers as "stalkers." I'm a little creeped out, since I didn't really want this blogger to know I was reading her posts and want to avoid any drama. Is it actually possible for a blogger to ID specific readers by IP address?

Apologies for my ignorance, but my understanding of how IP addresses work is that (unless you are mathowie caliber) a person can only find out a region and city from an IP address, but not a specific name. Wouldn't someone have to petition a ISP to find out a person's name?

Thanks in advance, and further apologies for a question that I'm sure is quite basic.

Posting One Thing to Many Blogs?

davidstandaford — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 23:56:19 -0800

What is the best way to share my blogging when I have different friends on myspace, livejournal, blogspot, facebook. etc. I currently have a myspace blog, a livejournal, and a blogspot blog where I triple post my content. I also sometimes will write facebook notes with the same post.

I'm wondering if people have advice about how to streamline this process and have one application do this for me. Either XP or OS X is a possibility. Is there an easy (free?) way to write something once and have it show up everywhere?

Secondly, does anyone have any experience with trying to integrate multiple blog services into one location. Ideally, the people who like to read me on facebook or myspace or livejournal would all just visit a single blogspot blog and make things easy for me, but I'm not sure they actually will (and these are people who don't know what RSS readers are). Checking their livejournal friends page is probably easier than clicking over to my own separate blogspot blog once a week (if they remember), so I want to keep all the readers, I just don't like having to triple post what I write in all those places.

How can I get rid of a Blogspot spam blog?

Locative — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 03:05:15 -0800

How can I get rid of a Blogspot spam blog? A year ago, I had a blog related to my professional interests set up on on Blogger. I posted a while, but eventually deleted it. It was not at all popular and used a very obscure address (i.e. obscureblogname.blogspot.com). A few months ago, I Googled myself and in the results found an old link to my blog from a prominent blogger in my field (from when the blog was still active). Since the link was dead, I didn't care -- until I realized that the same URL is now being used for one of Blogger's many spam blogs.

Essentially, I don't want people (especially prospective employers) Googling me and finding a link to a blog full of debt consolidation crap. I tried asking the prominent blogger to take down the link, but he never replied. I have flagged the blog, but it remains up months later. Is there anything I can do to expedite the removal of this blog from the site? Thank you!

Best Way to Organize/Display a List of Online Resources

andoatnp — Mon, 18 Jun 2007 13:54:05 -0800

Hosted (free?) CMS to contain a directory of online resources and organizations for a college student population. Is there something better than blogspot for what we are doing? Also, is there a way to allow people to rate each post? At work we are trying to create an online guide to showcase all of the online resources that our student population might be interested in. At the moment, we've been playing around with blogspot, where each organization gets it's own post, and we use tags to build a structure to make it easier for people to find what they are looking for. This isn't what blogger was actually built to do (we're not trying to blog) and I'm wondering if there is something as simple to use that would allow us to make this information easy accessible.

I haven't entirely ruled out using a wiki site, but I feel like it would be overkill for what we want. We are only going to have three people editing it and we want the display to be as simple as possible. Also, I'm not sure wikis would let us use tags the way we would like to and have people able to comment on each organization (i.e. post) the way you can with a blog.

Blogspot can do almost everything that we need, except I don't know how to do a rating system along with the tags, which we would like. Is there some type of plug-in/widget, service that would allow us to give people the opportunity to rate each post? Something like the 5 star system that all the video sharing sites have, but instead for individual posts on a blogspot blog?

[Right now we have the blogspot site up with the framework in place and lorem ipsum text for the organizations. Is it kosher to link to the site so people can have an idea of what we are trying to accomplish?]

Blogspot Frustration!

goalyeehah — Fri, 18 May 2007 16:08:49 -0800

Blogspot is driving me crazy! I need help from seasoned vets. I am working on a friends blogpage.

I am trying to signup to blogspot groups for some tech questions. His confirmed e-mail address is rejected. So is mine. What gives?

The questions that I wanted to ask are these:

How do you enter a large block of e-mail addresses to be notified of new posts?. What I see only allows one address at a time.

Is there a lag time for changes once they are confirmed?. I noticed that no notifications were sent out with a recent post after I added the addresses. I also noticed that there was a 4-5 day lag on some changes I made in the comment section. Is this common.

Getting Blogger To Release Unused Blog Name

JamesMessick — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 05:39:21 -0800

Is there any hope of getting Blogger/Blogspot/Google to free a blogspot name? Is there any hope of getting Blogger/Blogspot/Google to free a blogspot name? Someone created a blog in 2003 with a name I want and has never posted, and I can't figure out how to contact this person. I only want it for hobby purposes, but if they never used it and probably aren't planning too....

Blogspot Barf?

davidmsc — Mon, 23 Oct 2006 16:59:21 -0800

A friend asked me to create a Wordpress-powered site on her newly-acquired domain, and wanted me to import all of her Blogger entries that are hosted on Blogspot. No problem! Except... I tried a shortcut, instead of following WPs recommended method, and it apparently has backfired on me. My primary concern was to NOT lose any of my friend's entries during the import process. So I cleverly (riiiight) directed Blogspot to publish all of her entries to a NEW Blogspot URL, which I easily typed in the Settings area.

Her original Blogspot site: http://example.blogspot.com
My "backup" site: http://examplebackup.blogspot.com

See how clever I was? That way I knew that her original site would remain untouched. So I carried on with the import, directing WP to import all entries from the examplebackup.blogspot.com site. The import was completely successful, and her new domain is now fully-loaded with two+ years of entries.

Now comes the weird part: she asked me to post on her Blogspot site that she had moved to a new domain and remind folks to change any bookmarks, feeds, etc. But when I went back into Blogger and tried to "write" to the original http://example.blogspot.com site, it just wouldn't work - the service just told me that THAT name was already taken! So somehow the act of publishing all of her entries to a NEW Blogspot address left me unable to write to her OLD Blogspot address. WTF?

And now comes the REALLY weird part: if someone tries to visit her original Blogspot site, they are redirected automatically to this weird page-- which yields search results for tractor parts!

I am baffled - how could a URL that ends in "blogspot.com" be redirected to a funky search? But more importantly - do any of you kind folks know if there is any way that I can make an entry to her original Blogspot address to let folks know about her new site?

Whew. Very much appreciate any tips or insight.

Blogger New Post E-mail Notification?

Roach — Mon, 16 Oct 2006 17:53:17 -0800

Automatic E-mail notification of new post in Blogger? It's tough to search for answers when one of the key terms is "Blogger".

I loosely administer a group (family) blog with roughly 50 members on Blogger. Sometimes we get 3 or 4 posts a day, and participation skyrockets. If 5 or 6 days go by without a post, the NEXT post receives very little interest.

Everyone has been encouraged to make visiting the blog a part or their daily Internet routine, but many of the (family)members are over 50.

I can't find any way to activiate email notification for each member when a new article is posted. There seems to be nothing in the limited Bloger FAQ either.

Does anyone know of a simple way to implment this? I mean, new members are ADDED based on their email address!

Blogspot, BlogTHIS!

jak68 — Tue, 23 May 2006 07:05:22 -0800

Why does Blogspot's "Blogthis" work fine when I click on the example link at blogspot.com 's help section, but not when placed as a link in my favorites folder? My pop up blocker is off. my IE Security is at Medium. I am logged into my blogspot blog. I also downloaded and tried a right-dick script for it- no luck. I don't even get the Pop up Javascript window for it. Absolutely nothing happens. Yet, when I click the link ("drag this to your links bar") at the site, it pops up immediately. Why, oh why!

Boot a Blogger Blogspot Blog

chase — Sun, 08 Jan 2006 09:25:59 -0800

How do I achieve shutting down a Blogger Blogspot blog? I have been a Blogger user since July 2001. My Blogger username is ontask. I have my own domain name of ontask.net, so I post directly to my own website. I have just discovered, that back in September of 2004, a Blogspot blog was created with the blog name and URL of ontask. Apparently, there are no restrictions to setting up a Blogspot blog using a Blogger username that is not your own.

This is causing brand confussion and difficulty in syndicating my Blogger account content to other locations.

In particular, on SuprGlu when asked for my Blogger username, instead of being able to import my Blogger content, I am getting the Blogspot blog of ontask content [2]. (SuprGlu is another one of those new Web 2.0 sites that has popped up. I created a Suprglu account in order to evaluate and review the service.)

I've written an email to Google and to Blogger explaining the situation. I guess I'm feeling unhopeful and just need to rant.

I realize that my blog content is not currently really exciting... but I hope to improve the quality such that I can build traffic. I suppose my main problem is that I am passionate about the discussion of how to improve consistant Internet identity. This recent discovery certainly makes the issue of Internet identity personal.

Any advice or comments on how to cope with this situation? Would I have any legal rights to the use of my Blogger username in other areas in the Blogger system? Should I just shrug and say, "C'est La Vie?"

Is Blogspot serving invalid XHTML?

Tuwa — Sat, 05 Nov 2005 11:14:13 -0800

Blogspot automagically codes line breaks in XHTML form, so I'm trying to get my site to validate as XHTML 1.0. Parts of it fail to validate, but they're all parts that expand from strings in the Blogger template. What am I doing wrong? How do I get these parts to validate? Going to the validation results for my page you can see that the same errors present themselves over and over:
there is no attribute "location.href".
an attribute value specification must be an attribute value literal unless SHORTTAG YES is specified.
NET-enabling start-tag not immediately followed by null end-tag.
end tag for element "a" which is not open.

These all expand from this part of the template:
<MainOrArchivePage><BlogItemCommentsEnabled><a href="<$BlogItemCommentCreate$>" <$BlogItemCommentFormOnclick$>><$BlogItemCommentCount$> comments</a></BlogItemCommentsEnabled> |
which is, in turn, the part that puts the number of comments between the permalink and the linkbacks on each entry.

Is there anything I can do to get this part to expand to something that's valid XHTML?

I'm not finding any solutions in my searches, though I'm quite likely using all the wrong terms. And I've written Blogger support, but I've written them before and I know how that goes: you might as well write it out, roll up the paper, tuck it into a bottle, and toss it into the sea.

Question number 13093

dhartung — Fri, 17 Dec 2004 10:26:00 -0800

Blogspot harassment. Anyone have any experience? Google's support response was less than helpful. [mi]

How does Blogger generate income from Google?

brownpau — Wed, 15 Sep 2004 11:45:24 -0800

Now that Blogspot weblogs show a navbar instead of Google Ads, and without a Premium version, how does Blogger generate any income for Google?

Is There Something That'll Autopost My del.icio.us Links to Blogspot?

feelinglistless — Sun, 12 Sep 2004 10:17:29 -0800

This may be a pipedream, but is there a site out there which will allow me to automatically post a batch of links which I've collected on something like delicious to my blogspot weblog? [In a similar fashion to the way kottke includes his quick links with the main body of his weblog] I'm thinking of a similar protocol to flickr were I give them my blogger login details and all I have to do is click a post button and its all done for me...

Movable Type-Friendly Webhost for $0-5/mo., Apache Preferred?

scarabic — Wed, 21 Apr 2004 15:58:55 -0800

Can anyone recommend a decent web host whose cheapie package will support the cgi magic that is Moveable Type? I'm about to start a new Moveable Type blog and I'd like to host it in the $0-$5 per month range. I don't need a lot of web space. I don't want to use Type Pad's "Basic" service, because of the features it lacks. Is there a MT-equivalent of Blogspot? Apache on *nix would be preferred.