Podcasting with Blogger Part One

I really wanted to include a section on the Enclosure link feature of Blogger in the Blogger:Beyond the Basics book, but ran out of space. Now I can take the time to give you all some extra info on how to use Blogger to promote and share your podcasts.
Setting Up Podcast Hosting
You still need to have somewhere to host your podcast. There are a lot of places to do this, and with regular web hosting packages running as low at $5 a month, you may want to consider just uploading the podcasts to a file folder. The big issues for podcasting are going to be:

• Bandwidth - As your podcasts become more popular, regular downloads from a growing audience can eat up the amount of file transfer bandwidth you have. Monitor bandwidth usage closely.
• Storage space - Podcasts are a minimum of 5mb on average, taking up as much as 20mb for a long podcast. Do some math based on how often you will podcast, and how long you expect each episode to run
• Finding a good place to host a podcast - and preparing to move if your audience outgrows the location. There are many choices out there.
  
• Gathering the right equipment and resources - If you're new to podcasting, check out http://www.podcast411.com/ for lots of tips
• Distributing your podcast - Podcastpickle (http://www.podcastpickle.com), Podiobooks (www.podiobooks.com), and of course iTunes are popular places to share your podcast with others. These distribution sites can also help grow your audience, since they are popular destinations.
  
• Providing production notes and info on the individual podcasts and getting feedback - This is where Blogger comes in. You can use Blogger to link to your podcast files (one post for each episode) then include production notes about the episode, such as an overview of what the episode was about, who was involved, that sort of thing. It is also another way to promote the episode, since it will be crawled by search engines.

Blogging your podcast
Now that we have all the prep work done, lets use Blogger to share our podcast.

1. To create a blog post for an individual podcast episode using Blogger, first login to Blogger and click the "Create" menu option under the Posting tab.
   
2. Type the title of your post, then enter the link to your episode by clicking "Add enclosure link" under the Link field.
   
3. You will need to type the URL (path) of your podcast episode. Then enter the type of file it is in the Mime Type field. You can add additional episodes to a single post by clicking the "Add enclosure link" text link.
   
4. Type your production notes in the Compose content box, just like you would normally do for a standard blog post.
   
5. Add some labels to your post to make it easier to find
6. Set the posting options for your post. Click the Post Options text link located below the content box. You can set Reader Comments to allow/don't allow, manage Backlinks settings for the individual post, and the time for your episode, if you want it to appear at a certain time.
7. Publish your post and let the fun begin.
   

Blogger: Beyond the Basics at a discount

Want hundreds of pages of tips, tutorials, and worksheets about advanced Blogger techniques at a discount? Blogger: Beyond the Basics is now available for preorder from Packtpub.com in e-book (under $23) and paperback format (under $32) They are both discounted 20% for early birds.

If you like to read books for free and then tell people what you think about them, you can also sign up to be a technical reviewer for Packt. It's fun, easy, and you get to read books before they are published.

Edit: Anyone who read the post earlier - The wrong book prices were on the Packt site. That's what I get for eagerly posting about it first thing in the morning.

If you'd like to review the book, I'll give the first three people who email me a free copy. Be sure to list your mailing address.

What's in a blog name?

While editing chapter 9 of the Blogger book, it struck me just how crucial good names are for a blog. Whenever I browse Blogger's blogs of note, it is the titles of the blogs that grab my attention first.

What is the key to a successful blog title? The title of your blog should explain the purpose of your blog clearly, but be short enough to type manually into a browser window and catchy enough to remember. One of my favorites is Cooking with Amy. She clearly describes the experience potential readers can expect when they visit her blog.

If you chose an awkward name for your blog, or if your blog URL no longer really fits, you can still edit the blog title and description. Changing those two items will also increase the chances of people finding you when they perform a search, and potentially improve your search engine rankings if the new title and description more closely match what your blog is about.

Changing the Background color of a widget

Do you have a widget on your blog you want people to notice? Want to add a little extra flair to your blog with different background colors? It is really easy to do. In this article I'll show you how to apply a background color to individual widgets using a little css.

First, you need to find the unique id of your widget. Each page element in Blogger has a unique id, usually a combination of letters and numbers like this: Profile1.
Find the widget ID
You can find the unique ID in your Blogger template.

1. Login in to Blogger, Click Layout, and selecting the Edit HTML sub tab.
   
2. Click the "Expand Widget Templates" checkbox.
   
3. Scroll down the template until you see the widget's tag. Here is the profile tag for example:
4. Now that you have the id, you are ready to style it with CSS.

Styling the widget

1. Scroll all the way back up to the styles area of the template. look for the #side-wrapper style, and position your cursor just after the closing bracket } of that style.
2. Create a new div style for your widget. Type the pound sign # then type the widget id Profile1, then an opening bracket. Click the enter key on the keyboard, then add the background-color attribute: background-color:#ccccff; It can be any color you like. Hexadecimal format is the most flexible way to declare a color. This will put a blue background color on your profile. Type a closing bracket }
   
3. You should now have a new div tag style for the specific widget. It should look like the example below:
   #sidebar-wrapper {
   margin-$endSide: 14px;
   width: 240px;
   float: $endSide;
   background-color: $mainBgColor;
   display: inline; /* fix for doubling margin in IE */
   word-wrap: break-word; /* fix for long text breaking sidebar float in IE */
   overflow: hidden; /* fix for long non-text content breaking IE sidebar float */
   }
   #Profile1{
   background-color:#3399ff;}
   /* Headings
   ----------------------------------------------- */
4. Save the changes, Clear your browser's cache, (ctrl + f5 on a PC) then view the changes. You can now change the color anytime by editing the style you just created in your template.
   

Can't Scroll on Blogger Layouts page

Multiple reports of the Layouts page editor not allowing users to scroll have been posted to the Blogger Help Groups recently. Blogger has reported the issue resolved as of today. Clear your browser's cache (ctrl + f5 on a PC), close your browser, then re-open it and login to your blog. Please report any continuing issues to http://knownissues.blogspot.com

There does seem to be an unofficial limit on how many page elements you can stuff into a sidebar or other section of a template before it breaks the visibility of the Layouts tab screen.

Why can't I scroll my Layouts screen?
Blogger code issues - There was an issue with the scrollbars that was fixed today. The knownissues.blogspot.com blog had the following update:
--------------------

Since 2/12, the Layouts page elements editor has not had scrollbars around the wireframe template. Until this is resolved, you can often scroll wide templates by clicking and dragging on empty space.

Nevertheless, we encourage template designers to use the body#layout CSS selector to add CSS styles that adapt templates to the editor.
Update, 2/29: The Layouts editor now expands to the size of the template. — latest update on Friday, February 15, 2008

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Browser updates can cause temporary problems
It can be related to how different browsers display information. IE6 appears to display a full scrollbar, while recent updates to FireFox seem to be causing display issues. Find out how to compress your layout

Custom Templates may break the Layout Editor
Making custom changes to your blog template can cause issues with the layout editor. Blogger controls the layout and look of the administration screens using CSS. Be careful when adding new CSS styles or code to your template.

New Year, New Blog?

Did you start the year off with a resolution to share more stories with friends or get more news out to your customers with a company blog? Keeping a blog only takes a few minutes a day, but being consistent with it is tough. I just came off of a long break myself. I spent the time working on the Blogger book from Packt due out this Spring, working on a few hobbies, and even spending quality time with the kids.

This week I'm working on a chapter about bringing in additional revenue with your blog. I'll walk you through how to set up Google Adsense with your blog, give you tips on setting up the ads for maximum impact, and provide resources for additional revenue opportunities.

Readers Rule

I have a confession. I love the Head First book series. I love it because when I read the books, they make me feel like it is all about me, the reader. I Rule!

Guess what? That is totally the goal of Bates and Sierra. They take conversational writing to a whole new level. They never forget that it is always about you, the reader. Not them, not a sacred principle of programming, the person reading the book.

It's easy to get caught in writing mode, to forget the book is a two way conversation. My role as a writer is to be your guide, to make suggestions, give hints, to say, "Hey look at that rockin' widget! Let's make it even better!". That's what it's really all about.

My goal for the Blogger book is to give you the tools and know how you need to make your blog a success. You can take or leave whole sections of the book. That's OK. I'm trying really hard to fill the book with stuff you'll want to try. It's not really a book about beefing up Blogger. It's about making your Blogger blog kick ass.