Yesterday I got a nice email from Sue who is very glad I set up a mirror blog on Blogspot. Sue says her Google News Reader reads the Blogspot version of Blog much better than it reads the Yahoo 360 version. Google owns Blogspot so I guess that's why their news reader works better for it. Not being familiar with news readers I asked Sue about them and this is what she said:
"...this software allows me to subscribe to blogs and it appears on screen similar to a Window Explorer screen. The left side - a thin tall pane - displays the name of all the blogs I've subscribed to. When I single-click on a blog name on the left, the right side pane displays the most recent feeds - just the posts, without the blog headers or lists of links folkes may have created. One cool thing it does is that it'll bold the name of those blogs who've updated since I last viewed them thru the Google Reader software. So no more checking on blogs just to find they've not been updated! Streamlines my blog checking. Isn't modern technology wonderful?! The only drawback seems to be that those blogs on typepad or yahoo only display the text of the entries ... I have to open those blogs in my browser to access the pictures. "
I asked Sue for further clarification about how the Google Reader looked. Here's what she said:
"Think of your blog as twofold - the "shell" and the "meat." The shell generally includes a header (where many include a pretty graphic to remain at the top of each page), footer (many include copyright notices at the bottom ... and many blogs automatically include navigation here - the "prior posts," "home," and "newer posts"), and extras - here it's totally up to the user what they want to include but most include navigation links USUALLY at the sides (lots of blog software allows for links to recent posts; lots allow for labels so readers can, for instance, search for all "woodlawn" posts; etc) - but blog software can also allow the user to insert special html coding or javascript so the blog owners can insert their own slide shows or video, counters, guestbooks, etc. The content of the shell shows up on every page. Then, there's the "meat" of the blog - your posts. What you see within Google Reader is the posts themselves in that right-hand side pane - without the part of the area I've noted as within the shell. IF you include a link within your post, it's still treated as a link and is clickable. Also, the name of the blog itself is a link that you still have the option to click on to open. I love the Google Reader and would recommend it to anyone who has bookmarked blogs they read on a regular basis!"
If you are interested in using Google Reader, here is what I found out about it from Google:
http://www.google.com/reader/view/?hl=en&source=en-mmm#directory-welcome-page
Some other needle bloggers at Yahoo 360 are setting up mirror sites on Blogspot as well. Some of them are finding that Blogspot versions of their pictures are better than on Yahoo 360 and others find the opposite. I guess this has to do with how we make our photos and how we export them to each blog. Plus your own monitor may well display some things better than others. So experiment and see where you like the postings best. For now I plan to post everything to both blog sites. I prefer Yahoo 360's features, but it is bug-ridden and I feel I have to have a backup plan.
Sue, thanks very much for helping me understand how Google News Reader works. Hope someone finds Sue's information useful.
Main blogging site--
http://blog.360.yahoo.com/chillyhollow
No comments:
Post a Comment