Darnell Clayton » Blogger

I’m (slowly) Moving My Life Off Of Google’s Servers

darnell — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 15:16:00 +0000

I love Google! I really do! Never has one company had so much impact upon my life (for the positive) and I doubt I’ll find another that will.

So why am I migrating away?

Answer: it isn’t wise for me to put all of my eggs in one basket.

On the rare occasions when Google was down/inaccessable, 90% of my geek life suffered sending me into nerd panic mode.

After much internal debate I have been slowly moving my life off of Google’s servers & choosing alternatives.

Here is my list thus far (with reasons to boot):

Blogger.com –> WordPress (self hosted)
• Reason: wanted anti-spam comment protection minus the word puzzles. Also plugins & pages were a plus.

Picasa Web Albums –> Facebook
• Reason: Much more interaction with friends, plus the fact that Facebook is much more mobile friendly (at least for the iPhone, Blackberry & Palm Pre).

Google Voice –> Skype
• Reason: Skype is an actual stand alone phone service, where Google Voice just rediects. Both are cool though!

Google Checkout –> PayPal
• Reason: PayPal is a lot more flexible. & I like their guarentees better.

Picasa (Destop Software) –> Paint.NET
• Reason: Paint.NET has a lot more features. Microsoft really needs to hire this guy.

That is it thus far, but I am going to be seeking out more alternatives (as the competition has drastically improved in the last few years).

Other Google services I’ll probably never leave (like YouTube, Gmail, Google Chrome, Google Reader, Google Earth, Google Calendar, Google Analytics, AdSense, Google News, etc.) while others I might consider (replacing Google Docs with Zoho, & Google Search with Bing).

And for you Android fans out there, I’m probably not going to use those phones (& before you whine about openess, the iPhone is only a jailbreak away).

If anyone has other suggestions for Google alternatives, feel free to let me know in the comment section below.

– Posted from my iPhone

Blogger Vs WordPress (And Why I Choose Both)

darnell — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 05:42:00 +0000

I hate to dissappoint the fan boys and girls on both sides of the fence, but this is not a post bashing one side or the other.

Rather it is simply my reflection of two of the most popular blogging services, Blogger (as well as it’s eternal beta Blogger in Draft) and WordPress.org (not to be confused with WordPress.com, which I would not recommend using due to it’s limitations, which I’ll explain below).

Where WordPress Excels

What I love about WordPress can be summed up in one word: design.

You’ll won’t find a larger collection of beautiful themes outside of this platform, which probably explains why do many Blogger themes are imported from WordPress.

While there are plenty of free WordPress themes out there, I would recommend purchasing a premium theme (like Elegant Themes which is inexpensive).

Another thing I love about WordPress is that it is comment friendly. Instead of using CAPTCHA’s or weird puzzles, WordPress users can use Askimet (spelling?) which uses geek magic to decipher between the spammers and the humans (WordPress.org users I would recommend using WP Spam Free which is better–and free!).

These anti-spam plugins keep make the WordPress commenting design much friendlier–unless of course you are a spammer.

Last but not least the ability to add pages is a plus, which allows you to create an “about me” section, making your blog much more professional.

Where Blogger Excels

Owned by Google, Blogger is the most popular blogging platform online. If I could sum up Blogger in one word, it would be this: freedom.

When it comes to posting media content (whether images, video or iframe documents) Blogger has IMHO no close rival. Users are allowed to embed content from anywhere, without the fear of it being blocked due to “security reasons” (which is why I don’t use WordPress.com).

You can also embed content from Google Docs, a feature I found to be lacking in WordPress (both of them).

Over in the Blogger in Draft arena, users can easily adjust the position of the image within the post by simply dragging it, a feature that makes “dressing up” the post all the easier.

This one feature saves me a lot of time, as I don’t have to muck with the code in order to find the perferct picture placement.

Users can also upload video directly into Blogger, without the need to upload it on YouTube or elsewhere, which is great way to keep the video on your blog instead of infront of the public masses.

Last but not least Blogger’s widgets make it very easy to add, adjust or remove content from your blog, without the need to enter within the admin arena.

Conclusion

While I could have mentioned other items (like WordPress Plugins or specific Blogger widgets), these above pretty much sum up the major differences between the two.

Since neither WordPress or Blogger are meeting my complete needs, I’ve decided to use both platforms until one of them steps up their game. I already have 8 blogs (4 on Blogger, 2 on WordPress.com and 2 running WordPress.org on my own server).

Both WordPress and Blogger are excellent services, although if you are short on cash I would recommend using Blogger (as you can blog on your own domain for $10/year) although if you prefer to host you own blog on your own server, I would suggest using WordPress.org.

–Posted via iPhone

Blogger In Draft Plus Google Chrome Equals Fail Whale

darnell — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 00:59:00 +0000

Wow, talk about weird. Basically in Google Chrome (version 2.0.160.0) if you open up a previous post within Blogger in Draft (to edit), it “reinterprets” all of your previous text.

Example: Here is a post from one of my demo blogs of what your article should look like when logging into Blogger.com (in gChrome) when trying to edit a post.

And here is what it looks like in gChrome through draft.blogger.com:

I’ve tested other browsers (Firefox and Opera) and none of them are showing the same error.

Hopefully Google can take a look at this and fix it before they release 2.0 to the masses.

iBlogger Test

darnell — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 03:44:00 +0000

Testing out a new iPhone blog app for iBlogger.

This new version seems to have fixed most of the bugs (I still found a few, but they were nothing major).

The only thing lacking is image uploading, which is a deal breaker for blogger blogspot blogs.

On a more positive note, Google/T-Mobile launched the G1, which is a HTC Dream phone powered by Google Android.

While I probably will not exchange it for my iPhone, it does make a nice gift for my GSM friends.

T-Mobile G1

Blogger Fix: Inserting Star Ratings (For Custom Templates)

darnell — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 18:43:00 +0000

While it’s awsome to see Google unleashing new features within Blogger, if you are unable to implement them within your own blog, you may find yourself catching the dreaded “Google Derangement Syndrone” (aka GDS) where every other phrase is “Google is so Fraking stupid” (or something like that).

In order to avoid this contagious disease (which first broke out in Redmond, WA), you need to find solutions to problems–and today’s problem is implementing the star rating system within your customized Blogger blog (aka BlogSpot).

After logging into your blog, first click on Layout, then Page Elements.

Then scroll down to the Blog Posts page element, and click on the Edit link.

A new window shold appear. Next, check mark the Show Star Ratings box…

…then scroll down and rearrange where you want the star ratings to appear.

Save your changes, then click on the Edit HTML section (which should still be underneath the Layout tab).

Next you need to BACK UP YOUR TEMPLATE! I would recommend either copy & pasting your entire code within Google Docs or Note Pad (highly recommended) by clicking on the Expand Widgets Template box…

…then holding the Ctrl button while pushing the letter “A“, then the Ctrl button again while pushing the letter “C” and once over into Google Docs or Note Pad push the Ctrl button and the letter “V“.

You can also just simply download the template to your computer as well by clicking the Download Full Template link underneath the Backup / Restore Template section.

After backing up your template, scroll down towards the bottom left of the screen and hit the Revert widget templates to default link.

A “questionnaire” should appear (note: hey that rhymed!) informing you that this will change all of your widget changes, although your data will be safe.

Simply click the OK button to continue, then save the changes to your blog.

That’s it! Now you should have the star ratings system in your blog.

You will also notice a few changes with your blog layout, which you can easily correct since you wisely backed up your template (if went against my advice, then you are a ~~fool~~ person who doesn’t like taking my advice).

If you still have any questions, feel free to comment below. Enjoy!

Update: Inserted image for clarity.

Update 2: Also, for those of you trying to get the comment form working, Amanda has provided an excellent solution over here.

Has Google Finally Fixed The "404 WWW" Error?

darnell — Sat, 06 Oct 2007 18:51:00 +0000

Okay, I previously wrote about the “404 WWW” error in blogger here and here, but it looks as if the Blogger team has created an “automatic redirect” which means these hacks are may be obsolete.

I’m testing this out on my personal blog here first, and if successful I’ll do a write up for everyone else.

Warning: This site may get buggy real quick!

Update: Complete horror! I have sent in a trouble ticket to Google about this. So far it works for new custom domain bloggers, but leaves those who have previously registered as…well…screwed.

Sigh…I guess I expect too much from Google.

Updating Weblog…

darnell — Tue, 18 Sep 2007 02:33:00 +0000

Although I love the space theme of this web journal, I am trading it in for a new…more “Mac” like skin.

If all goes well, I’ll post a video to celebrate. If not…well–there’s always tomorrow.

Stay tuned!

Note: This site may look ugly for twenty minuets. Relax, I’m just adjusting the curtains of this site.

Update: The site is now live and alive! (well, 99% at least)

Now all I have to do is upload a video on the next post (to celebrate the redesign).

How You Know When Google Is Listening To You

darnell — Tue, 24 Jul 2007 00:39:00 +0000

So I have been testing out a new feature from Blogger in Draft called Video Upload, and I recently posted a suggestion to Google about adding a status bar so that people will know how much of their video has been uploaded (so they won’t freak out).

Well, it looks as if Pete from Google (I’m assuming its Pete) took a few minuets out of his time to read my comment and to my surprise I discovered this today while uploading a video on blogger:

And people wonder why I prefer Google over the competition?

Video: Second Helpings, And Blogger In Draft

darnell — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 03:58:00 +0000

For those of you who don’t know, Google has released a new feature enabling users to upload videos to their blog (for free) turning every blog*spot blog into a potential video blog (or vblog for short). Here is my take on the issue, plus some boring thoughts from my life.

Note: Don’t mind the ugly mug, as I forgot to shave.

After thoughts: Although this feature is great, I just found out it could take a while for the video to upload.

Google has started a blog (Blogger In Draft) where you can post feedback on this feature via the comment section, a rarity for a Google Blog (something they really needs to change).

~~Update: There seems to be a bug in the video that makes it automatically play in IE (all versions). It will be removed until Google can fix this error. Sigh…and it was almost a dream come true.~~

Update (6/20): Google seems to have fixed the “video in IE” problem. Thanks Google!

Upgrades Are Good

darnell — Sat, 03 Feb 2007 22:31:00 +0000

Very, very good.

(Blogger Help Group) We’ve been giving you warnings. The signs have been there. Preparations have been made. Now, it’s time!

That’s right, it’s time to embrace the new version of Blogger! Starting today, a small percentage of users who log in to an old Blogger account will be required to move to the new version. This involves moving your current Blogger account to a new or existing Google Account. After the move, you will need to log in to Blogger with your Google Account username, which is always the email address associated with your account.

I guess this means adjusting several blogs (finally) as well as closing down a few others. Right in time for the super bowl too!

To those of you who kept emailing me about my earlier post, it seems as if Google is correcting the mysterious error, slowly but surely. I’ll be checking on your domains, and if need be, help out where I can.