I finally got an opportunity to work on customizing my Beta Blogger template - No where near done but I am much closer than I was yesterday.
The two things that were toughest was trying to figure out what I was doing and then doing it.
As soon as you go to customise your template it automatically removes everything that was not "original" on the template you first signed up with on the original Blogger.com site.
Any special things you may have added, Sitemeter, Haloscan (with ALL past comments), links to favorite sites, Blog Explosion, Blog Soldiers, Blogmad, The list goes on and on.
The two things I wanted to first correct was Haloscan and Sitemeter.
Sitemeter was easy. I could have put it on the sidebar but I wanted it on the bottom outside of the box provided.
**** Be sure to Backup / Restore Template and download it to a safe place on your hard drive. **** (I actually went a step further and saved my entire blog month by month to a special folder by right clicking on the monthly archive link and clicking 'save page as'.)
I opened two windows to the Edit Template. - One of the two windows I clicked on 'Classic View' and the other I clicked on 'expand widgets'. This gave me access to the old HTML and the new template.
I was able to quickly cut the Sitemeter code from my old template and it took 3 tries to find the spot I wanted it to go. Right after 'footer-wrap 1> way, way, way near the bottom. - Saw there was a similar line with a number 2 in it so I duped the line so I now have footer wrap 1, 2, & 3... - Guess I'll see how that works later
The preview, clear edit and save template buttons work real good. I know because I used them a lot.
The Haloscan was a bigger problem. First the connection to past comments was deleted so they appeared lost. They were not however. They were just waiting at Haloscan for the connection to be inserted into the new template.
Beta-Blogger inserts all the info you need to use their commenting service and gives no clues as to how to remove it and make Haloscan work. Remove it you must or people will be given two choices as to where to leave comments...
The Haloscan boards had a good piece on it. Googling the right searchwords brought me to The Logical Philosopher's posting and whose instructions worked wonderfully. I would drag the instructions to this posting but it is just as easy for you to click on the link. - Give him a "Howdy-Howdy Hi" in his Haloscan comments if you find his work helpful...
I'll post more on this tomorrow. Some of the stuff I just cut and pasted into a HTML friendly box Beta Blogger provides. I'll be working on it some more then. I want to change the background picture and add some links to the blog surfing shops...
- I would like to leave tonight with this quote from the Logical Philosopher concerning the move to Beta-Blogger-Beta:
"For those already on Blogger wanting to do it: FOR THE LOVE OF ALL BLOGS THAT ARE HOLY - WAIT!!"
P.S. Thanks to Cary Cartter of It's Obvious for the help with where to put the background instructions. He didn't know it but I knicked the code & gathered the position from his Blogsite...
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