90 Blogger Read More/Post Summaries - The Best News Yet!

One of the functions most voted for in Blogger's recent Product Ideas forum was the ability to summarize blog posts on non-item pages.

I've written about a few different approaches to this, but these methods were never so easy to implement.

Luckily I came across this tutorial from Quite Random which offers the simplest - and most useful - method of displaying post summaries automatically for our Blogger posts, complete with a thumbnail from images used in our posts.


This customization is very easy to implement (there are literally only two steps) with very little editing of the template required. I installed with immediate success on several templates to test it out, and with only a little tweaking on one of my most customized designs.

In short, this is a fabulous implementation of post summaries for Blogger. Be sure to pop over to Quite Random to check out this post and learn how to install this hack for your own Blogger blogs.

However... This is not my only source of good news regarding post summaries for Blogger!

The Blogger team are in the process of implementing this function in Blogger! Or at least, I'm pretty certain they are.

Take a look at this screenshot which was taken from a clean installation of Minima (a default Blogger template) on a new blog (click the image for a larger version):

These tags look suspiciously like tags which could be used for implementation of post summaries. What's more, it seems we can choose whether or not to summarize our posts, and also the text used for the link to read the full article.

I can't say for sure when this implementation will become available, though I believe this will first be rolled out into Blogger in Draft so any issues can be resolved before the summaries become available to us all.

There's not yet been any mention about this on the Blogger in Draft blog, Blogger Buzz or even by the team on Twitter, but since this code is now appearing in new templates I'd guess this will become available in the very near future.

Stay tuned, I'll get more news about this as it happens and will (of course) explain how to use summaries in customized templates too.

This is a feature I'm very excited to know is in progress, so if anyone does have any news to share, please let me know!

90 Comments:

9 June 2009 20:41 Gosip said...

Yeah!!.. Im looking for this hack and now i found it with a good news for blooger.. Thanks.

9 June 2009 20:50 CJ said...

This hack has been around for a long time-- what is so much better about this?

9 June 2009 21:12 gosip said...

the better is... we dont need to use js query anymore.. so our blog loading a little bit faster.. i guess!

9 June 2009 21:21 Zixpk.com said...

Personally I like my blogs implementation of the continur reading link :)Check out my blogger blog!!

http://www.zixpk.com/

9 June 2009 23:07 Alvaris Falcon said...

Wow, great to see a new code appeared in Blogger template! Finally we got something new to enjoy and play with! :D

P.S. Welcome back Amanda, we miss you so much! ;)

9 June 2009 23:20
Anonymous said...

Fine, but we need some much more important stuffs, like a real sitemap, free access to robots.txt, duplicate content fix, and individual metatags for each post.

These (simple) improvements would boost our traffic and reduce the enourmous gap between Blogger and Wordpress SEO.

Maybe Blogger Team doesn't wish this (to avoid server overload?)...

9 June 2009 23:22
Anonymous said...

(sorry for my bad English)

10 June 2009 01:35 BudiTyas said...

Seem that many tutorial about post summeries will be expired soon, .. LOL

10 June 2009 02:17 Zychr said...

Nice discovery back there.

10 June 2009 03:01 Carlo said...

I would rather see REATED ARTICLES implimented. The current hack for that is pretty clunky..

Carlo
www.vmwareinfo.com

10 June 2009 05:52 SirAdib.com said...

Well, not really looking forward to this since I feel that expandable posts suit my blog just fine. But just in case I'm making new blogs for me or other people, might come in handy.

10 June 2009 07:02 Padma said...

Hi,

I came across this blog while searching in google, regarding a new problem in my blog . It is a new blog named www.worldhealthcare.info It was fine all these days. Suddenly, my blog post area started to be displayed as black. Since my text color is also black, it gets hidden. I do not know how to set it to its original color. I changed all the colors using "Fonts and Colors".. Still it doesn't get reflected in the post area. please take a look at my blog and help me out. world health care.

Thanks,
Padma

10 June 2009 08:18 Pradeek said...

Cool, been searching for this.Thanks.

10 June 2009 11:57 DarkUFO said...

Amanda, any news if this will just hide the text or will it actually only load the summary. Ie will main page of a blog actually load any quicker?

10 June 2009 13:22 Amanda said...

@CJ - The new hack is much easier to use because the posts are appended automatically (adding the span tags around text to be hidden using other hacks is a real pain!). It's also very easy to install and doesn't impact on loading time.

@Zixpk - Your design is wonderful :) I think it's changed since the last time I checked? Love the recent posts thumbs near the top!

@Alvaris Falcon - I've been playing with the code and noseying around but haven't yet stumbled upon the proper implementation. Probably this will roll out for groups at a time, rather than across the board. It's good to be back :) Been very busy with work and family, but will try to get into a better routine and post more regularly.

@Anonymous - we do have access to a sitemap for Google Webmaster tools and such (yourblog.blogspot.com/atom.xml). It's also possible to build a custom sitemap (tutorial in progress). Access to robots.txt is problematic as this would mean we'd have access to Blogger's servers. It is possible when blogging via FTP though and is not an issue for most Blogger users.

Does Wordpress have individual metatags for each post? With a lot of hacking it would be possible for Blogger (or a more simplistic version could offer metatags based on labels for each post). This is something I haven't looked into myself.

Duplicate content may be an issue for any blog (WP, Typepad, Blogger, MT), even those which feature true summaries on the home page. I've never really thought of this as a problem though.

@BudiTyas - That depends on how functional Blogger's implementation will be. Judging by the code so far, we may or may not be able to implement conditional extras depending on whether this is a summary or post page. Quite Random's hack enables conditional thumbnails, which is a feature many of us really enjoy for our designs.

@Carlo - There's a few different solutions for related posts so clunkiness depends on which you're using (and how you want it to act). Personally I'd prefer elated posts based on keywords rather than tags ;)

@Padma - It looks fine to me just now. I suspect the issue may have been because background images weren't loading. Do you host your own images for the template?

@Dark UFO - Looking at the code so far I imagine a section will be hidden rather than omitted altogether. But I've not yet been able to implement this or see the JS used for the hack. It may be a true summary for posts. Perhaps the team are working on this now. As soon as I know I'll be sure to post about it :)

10 June 2009 13:49 ramaraobobby said...

thanks for sharing this update.
Proud to be your subcriber.

Regards,
ramaraobobby
http://twitter.com/ramaraobobby

10 June 2009 14:02 Carl Jordan said...

I have been using a great template designed by ChiQ Montes for Wordpress and converted to Blogger by BloggerTricks. Check the credits at the bottom of my blog if anyone wants the links to them. My summaries are arranged into individual boxes with thumbnail photos. I love it. Click my name to link over to my blog.

FYI Amanda, I have been having problems opening your blog in Explorer, it aborts and will not open it. Works fine in Firefox though.

10 June 2009 16:43 Padma said...

Sorry, I had posted my site link wrongly.. it is

www.worldhealthcare.info

10 June 2009 16:47 rudy azhar said...

oke amanda your posting is very good, and i'll be waiting your next article

10 June 2009 23:35 العاب Ų“Ł…Ų³ said...

thanks for sharing,I'm grateful to you.

11 June 2009 07:21 Shubham NeO ©® said...

Now here is the real ques, I saw this hack on other sites and implemented this long ago, but the real problem ( for which I was unable to find a solution ) was with my feeds. Can I implement the same outlook of expandable post summaries with image thumbnail on my feeds? I use feedburner and although it has option of summary burner, it truncates all images, and does not allow HTML.

Any work around for this would be just out of this world. Thanx Amanda. Love your blog.

Shubham Gupta
www.techquark.com

11 June 2009 10:40 TiPS-BoX said...

hi Amandafirst of all we missed you soo much really
about the trick i know it is cool i was already created one similiar to it but i did a little trick n it, i modified ReadMore button with cool mouse hover effect if any one want to check it here

Stunning Automatic Tumb With Cool ReadMore Button Effect

about this post doesn't count at all this is an ol trick and we were waiting so long we want some this new Amanda

i was in love to see in blogger a cool bookmarking box like in cool wordpress sites something like that
Here
or Here

plz Amanda if you have some free time coul you twist ustrick like this it looks so pretty and unique

11 June 2009 12:22 Amanda said...

@Carl Jordan - Thanks for letting me know about the IE issue. I knew there was a problem opening pages which had the comment box installed, but had hoped this was fixed. Anyway I'll look into it and see what I can do.

@Shubham NeO - There isn't much we can do to offer summay feeds with thumbnails to subscribers. But if you'e hoping to use a summary displayed in you blog it may be possible. I think Google Code has a script you could use for this purpose?

@Tips-Box - I love the bookmarking boxes you linked to in the comment. I was working on a similar concept not long ago for my other blog which displays bookmarks above the posts, but think it may well be a good idea to create something stylish beneath posts for Blogger. Does anyone else want me to create a tutorial for this? If so I'll et started this weekend and post for next week :)

11 June 2009 15:33 Andrew said...

The link you posted does not allow customization of the number of characters to show on the main page for each individual post, but for all. Also, you cannot make a post fully available on the main page.

Here is a better "post summaries" hack: http://webupd8.blogspot.com/2009/04/blogger-read-more-post-summaries-fix.html

11 June 2009 18:03 Luth Textile said...

Thanks for the tips.. Its very usefull..
Im tring.. Thankx admin..

12 June 2009 02:47 TIPS-BOX said...

@Amanda Wow your new blog looks great, that why we were missing you
and thank u so much for supporting the idea, hope guys read comments to know about it

12 June 2009 23:04 nick@podxies said...

Nice to see you back online... hope you managed all right with your trials n tribulations...

13 June 2009 08:34 Nguyen said...

Please help me. The picture is OK but the text is not on the same line. It drop down. Any body can help me?
My blog is: Vietnamidolfan.blogspot.com

13 June 2009 12:10 Plethoras said...

Hello Amanda.
At first.Sorry but my english, I'm spanish speaker.

I was surfing the web and found the WP-Cumulus for Blogger that I've to say, I liked very much so I used it.
Now I have a question for you because I can't use the 'target' attribute with WP-Cumulus, so please tell me if you can help me with that.

Thank you very much

13 June 2009 21:20 buwel said...

nice tutorial.

13 June 2009 22:15 harry seenthing said...

is cool articles my friend

15 June 2009 01:21 Matt said...

Superb blog Amanda. Blogger Buster has been my bible while I set up my first blog.

I have followed this hack for post summaries at Quite Random, but I had the problem that the thumbnail does not float left like it should. I am using your halo_01 template. I think you have had a similar problem judging from your comment posted on Quite Random. One of your nice plain and clear explanations of how you solved this with “span” tags would be wonderful please. An example would be ideal. Assume I know nothing about HTML.

15 June 2009 05:01 One-4-All said...

thank amanda... I have used it...and it work.
but i not use for my current blog. i used it in my template design blog.

best regard
One-4-All

15 June 2009 09:46 Amanda said...

@Nguyen and Matt - You're right, this is an issue with certain templates (particularly heavily customized ones).

I did find a workaround which involves editing the JavaScript file to add span tags around the image tags.

The script I'm using for my other blog now works just fine, but I'm having a few issues with my file hosting at the moment, and need to transfer some files over to a different server.

Once I've done this and ensured the files are readily available I'll post a quick tutorial for implementation using my modified script. Hopefully later today (or as soon as I've completed transfer of these files).

15 June 2009 20:40 msplash9 said...

hi blogger buster,

i need your help friend...is there any way to create an a-z index list for a blogger...Like this site..http://oneclickmoviez.com/a-z-index-2/

i ve tried to use a recent post widget for creating an index ..But it can display only 25 recent posts...


Is there any way to display post header only when we search?

I need your help friend...How can i create an index list...?

16 June 2009 07:36 aR said...

Thank you Amanda. Glad to see you again.
Thanks for sharing this tweak. You are right. This javascript will be popular in near future.

16 June 2009 13:48 casual cutie said...

thank's for sharing, great post!!

18 June 2009 08:28 Mickey said...

Hello!
Your blog is very useful for me.

Can u tell me how to add "Read more" on my post?

Thanks!

18 June 2009 12:37
Ankit said...

@Amanda

how did you do that home page adsense..
I also want to display adsense just below the first post only..

20 June 2009 10:33 Albanicus said...

Thanks for the tutorial.

Albanicus from www.blogalit.com

20 June 2009 13:54 iren said...

Hi! Your blog is simply super. you have create a differentiate. Thanks for the sharing this
website. it is very useful professional knowledge. Great idea you know about company
background. Customized application development

20 June 2009 16:38 العاب said...

This is great news. i used one of the hacks provided on an earlier post .it worked like magic with firefox but when it came to IE it did not work at all. This may resolve my problem.;)

23 June 2009 18:11 Noni said...

nice for share this article....

23 June 2009 23:38 All You Need Zone said...

Hi,
You have a very nice site with great information.
for more check out................
A.S.
www.allyouneedzone.blogspot.com

24 June 2009 03:45
Anonymous said...

This is a great feature, but I will like to know, is it possible to feature the video I posted in the post in the summary?

25 June 2009 01:31 Ruri Andari said...

this great article. thank...

25 June 2009 15:45 Aileen said...

It's a good hack! :) But the problem with it is that it might expand the side images too much or contract it too much. ;/


www.i-am-aileen.blogspot.com

25 June 2009 17:42 Gafarudin said...

good news..., thanks then...
http://download-for-free-ebooks.blogspot.com/

26 June 2009 08:36 kraloyun said...

nice tutorial. good news to bloggers. thats what i'm looking for. Thank you Amanda.

29 June 2009 22:47 teratips said...

nice I'll visit this blog
Money blogging Tips
http://www.teratips.com

2 July 2009 15:51 fo2sh said...

very nice tip
thnks
pay a visit to my blog
http://ps-galaxy.blogspot.com/

3 July 2009 13:57 Stop Dreaming Start Action said...

Great Share...
Wish you luck amanda..!

7 July 2009 18:58 Admin said...

I maked translate for blogger in my blog..Read more (devamını oku)

8 July 2009 06:55
Anonymous said...

Shubham NeO ©® said...

Now here is the real ques, I saw this hack on other sites and implemented this long ago, but the real problem ( for which I was unable to find a solution ) was with my feeds. Can I implement the same outlook of expandable post summaries with image thumbnail on my feeds? I use feedburner and although it has option of summary burner, it truncates all images, and does not allow HTML.

Any work around for this would be just out of this world.

Ohh there is a way to display feeds including thumbnails. Try to play with the "blog list" feature. Go to: >>> widged page >> add gadget >>> blog List >>>> checkbox "Thumbnail of most recent item"

And your done!

18 July 2009 01:23 Julong said...

Its nice blog.I like marketing.

24 August 2009 21:45 Anand said...

thanx for this and congratulations for ur 10,000 subscription... proud to be one amongst them :)
keep blogging :)

30 August 2009 12:02 Oyunlar1 said...

thank's for sharing, great post!!

27 November 2009 09:48 aziz said...

thnks for sharing great information. but i am second time failed to add read more option for my blog: www.masoodownload.com

16 January 2010 03:36 Automobiles on world said...

thanks for sharing, i add to my blog..
very nice
Gallery Cars

9 March 2010 15:25 rufflemedia said...

Hi Amanda
Can you help me with my problem...
Once I've implemented the automatic post summary code, how do I then add numbered pages to my blog? Do the two codes conflict? I've tried many times and numbered pages just won't show up whilst I have automatic post summaries added!
Thanks so much
Ruth

24 March 2010 06:42 BloggerGeeze said...

Try this new way of putting Read More or any text you wanted for the jump-text.

I have created a friendly tutorial for Blogger expandable post summary, it is new functionality added to the blogger editor. You can head on to this link article: New Expandable Post Summary from new Blogger Editor

11 September 2010 00:14 azbood said...

How to remove blogger favicon? for my blog
http://ayy-haga.blogspot.com

8 October 2010 09:18 GAMES DIDI said...

the better is... we dont need to use js query anymore.. so our blog loading a little bit faster.. i guess!

4 December 2010 17:28 Barang Unik said...

Aw, this was a really great post. In theory I'd like to write like this also - taking time and real effort to make a good article... but what can I say... I procrastinate alot and never seem to get something done.

22 June 2011 19:25 porn said...

very nice..

13 September 2011 06:03 Mobile Phone said...

Cool, been searching for this.Thanks Amanda

13 September 2011 06:05 Kanker said...

thanks for sharing this update.

14 September 2011 17:53
Anonymous said...

Thank you for sharing to us.there are many person searching about that now they will find enough resources by your post.I would like to join your blog anyway so please continue sharing with us. Agen Bola Bola Tangkas Casino Sbobet

14 September 2011 17:57 Singapore Travel said...

I must admit that this is one great insight. It surely gives a company the opportunity to get in on the ground floor and really take part in creating something special and tailored to their needs.
chinese new year 2012
mid autumn festival 2011
hungry ghost festival 2011
Malaysia travel tips

21 September 2011 18:04 Dave said...

I really agree with the facts that you have shared on this post. An interesting topic like this really enhances reader's mind to have more effective decisions over a certain issue. penis enlargement penis enlargement pills VigRX Plus

1 October 2011 21:10 mobile phone comparison said...

hmmm.. this time I agree with you

10 October 2011 18:02 Professional Indemnity Insurance said...

nice tutorial. good news to bloggers

15 October 2011 07:30 Professional Indemnity Insurance said...

Cool, been searching for this.Thanks

15 October 2011 15:18 natural pet food said...

I have enjoyed this post. Its an informative topic. It help me very much to solve some problems. Its opportunity are so fantastic and working style so speedy. I think it may be help all of you. Thanks a lot for enjoying this beauty blog with me. I am appreciating it very much! Looking forward to another great blog. Good luck to the author! all the best!

24 October 2011 14:30 Business And Finance said...

Nice to see you back online...

25 October 2011 18:42 Business Online said...

Thanks a lot for enjoying this beauty blog with me

25 October 2011 18:45 Free Downloads Games said...

nice I'll visit this blog

4 November 2011 03:32 Business And Finance said...

we need some much more important stuffs, like a real sitemap, free access to robots.txt, duplicate content fix, and individual metatags for each post. Thanks for the info Business Financial Beauty And Fashion

6 November 2011 16:02 wine aerator said...

Excellently written article, if only all bloggers offered the same content as you, the internet would be a much better place. Please keep it up! Cheers.

9 November 2011 01:34 Life Stlye said...

thank's for sharing,

8 December 2011 11:35 maƧ izle said...

tum maclari canli izle lig tv izlemenin keyfini cikar

24 December 2011 07:39 cheap ugg said...

Cheap UGG Juan Chi, ex microscopic truth.

cheapest uggs ever Side is a good name, the three brothers must like it. ty31sdf

cheap uggs for women However, with what they do, then turn, then, to learn gardening, and cooking card, or a picnic? It is not equivalent to nursing home life, only more sad when healthy and strong.

where to buy uggs cheap Juan Chi was calm reply: "Because we greedy, what we want to have."

www.cheapestbootsshop.com I knew the feelings you are a liar, I scare the fish, drank fragrant casket, eat fruit, go no it anyway.

Post a Comment

Browse through the Archives

All existing posts are still available to view while I'm working on the site, albeit seen in a much simpler interface. Feel free to browse through the archives to find tutorials, templates and articles to help you build a better blog:

Blog Archive

© Blogger Buster 2010 Home | About | Contact | Hire Me