Book Lovers - Download a Free Blogger Template and Kickstart a Year of Classic Literature

Demo | Download

For the past few months I've been working on a literary side-project: Harvard Classics 365, through which I'm producing eBooks and a daily updated blog of classic literature for daily reading throughout 2014.

I realise that Blogger Buster readers may find posts about literature a little "off topic".  To appeal to all +Blogger  users, I've created a free template for everyone to enjoy, and would appreciate any support from those who are interested to help launch my literary project on Kickstarter.

Free Blogger Template - Responsive Portfolio

Demo | Download

For those looking for a beautiful responsive template for their Blogger site, look no further!

Responsive Portfolio is a free, professionally designed template for your Blogger site with many useful features. Developed for those who want to showcase their portfolio, it includes the ability to display a jQuery carousel, and the whole template adjusts according to the size of the device it is viewed on.

Features of this template include:

• Fluid width and responsive image size
• jQuery carousel which can be placed anywhere in the template (or even in a blog post!)
• All fonts and colours can be changed using the Blogger Template Designer
• Elegant design and classic layout
• Plenty of room for all of your widgets

Take a look at the demo site and resize your browser window to see how the template responds, or simply download Responsive portfolio to begin using this template right away!

View Demo | Download this template

Setting Up WWW Custom Domain on Blogger (Updated for 2013)

Having spent a little time away from blogging, I recently discovered that properly setting up custom domains with Blogger has changed a little. I realised that some of my sites were no longer reachable at their "naked" domain (as in bloggerbuster.com, without the www), and that setting up a new custom domain now requires verification.

Unfortunately the current instructions on Blogger Help don't quite cover all of the steps required to set up a custom domain, so for those of you who may need help I'll clarify the full process here.

Happy New Year!

Wishing all Blogger Buster readers a very happy start to the New Year!

Finding and Installing Unofficial Blogger Templates

In addition to the numerous templates provided by Blogger, you can find hundreds (if not thousands!) of Blogger templates created by independent designers. From simple, customisable designs through to industry-specific layouts and obscure themes, there is something to suit every taste and circumstance.

This post outlines the basics of finding and installing unofficial Blogger templates, both free and premium designs, so that you may enjoy changing the appearance of your Blogger site as often as you like!

The Blogspot 100 - Top Blogger Sites of 2012

As a dedicated Blogger enthusiast, I'm very interested to learn more about the sites hosted on Google's free blogging platform.

So I decided to find out which popular sites are powered by Blogger to build upon the list curated in 2008 in order to find the most popular Blogspot sites (including those which use custom domains).

After gathering a huge amount of links to sites hosted on Blogger (whittled down to 350 for the final analysis) I set about scoring and ranking each site according to the following criteria:

• Pagerank
• Inbound links
• Alexa Rank
• Facebook shares
• Twitter Mentions
• Google+1s
• Google Reader feed subscribers

With the exception of Pagerank, these sites were scored in relation to each other, with each element scored on a scale of 1-350. Data for these rankings were gathered between July and August 2012.

Alexa ranking was scored first as this value is unique to each website. In instances where sites had an equal value to another, scoring would secondly depend on this Alexa score in order to give each site a unique score.

Pagerank for each site was allocated as Pagerank*10, where 0 is the lowest score and 100 (PR10) was potentially the highest.

The total possible score for each website is therefore on a scale of 6-2200.

In order of total score, here are the most popular Blogger powered sites for 2012:

1. Postsecret 

Score: 2131
PostSecret is an ongoing community art project where people mail in their secrets anonymously on one side of a homemade postcard. It began as an experiment on January 1st 2005, and has gained a worldwide following through the weekly updated website, book releases and exhibition tour.

All About Blogger - Infographic!

After curating DailyGraphics.info for quite some time, I was disappointed at being unable to find an infographic celebrating my favourite blogging platform. So I decided to create my own!

For your enjoyment, here is my "All About Blogger" infographic. It is a rather large image which is best viewed at full resolution, so you ma want to click the graphic and view in the lightbox mode or right-click to save to your computer.

Feel free to share this infographic if you like it! Since this is the first information visualisation I've designed, I appreciate your comments or suggestions for future (Blogger-related) designs.

Alternative Lorem Ipsum Generator - It's Adventure Time!

If you've been reading Blogger Buster for a while, you may have noticed my affection for quirky filler text generators which I use to quickly add content to Blogger template demo sites.

As a side project, I decided to code my own filler text generator, based on dialogue from my favourite animated series, Adventure Time. Check it out at http://filler-text.blogspot.com - you can generate a full page of content (including headings and lists); a number of paragraphs, and even placeholder images based on various Adventure Time episodes. 

It makes a great alternative to Lorem Ipsum text and best of all, it's powered by Blogger!

Visit the Adventure Time Filler Text and Random Image Generator

Incipient - A Free Responsive Blogger Template

Incipient is a free responsive template for Blogger, which offers a simple layout which adjusts according to the size of the screen it is viewed upon.

Fully customizable through the Blogger Template Designer, this simple design is suitable for a wide variety of blogs and is fully gadgetized.

On wider screens, the template expands to the width of the screen, including a right-aligned sidebar and two widget sections in the footer. For smaller resolutions, the template adjusts and sidebar gadgets appear beneath the main posts section, while the footer gadgets widen to the width of the screen.

View the live demo or read on for screenshots and installation details.

How to add Google+ Updates Gadget to Blogger

As yet, there is no official "widget" or RSS feed which we can embed in Blogger to display a stream of our recent posts on Google Plus.

Luckily, Google+ to RSS offers a free service enabling us to generate an RSS feed for our personal profiles and pages which we can add to a simple Feed gadget in Blogger.

Take a look at the sidebar to see this technique in action and read on to find out how to add a Google+ updates gadget in your own Blogger site.

Lucius - A Premium Blogger Template

Lucius Template is a premium design for Blogger which offers a simple layout and powerful customisation features.

It is incredibly easy to set up, requiring no special configurations or third-party scripts, and is ideal for freelance promotion or to serve as a business website.

Take a look at the demo site for Lucius Template, or read on for screenshots and more details.

For a limited time, Lucius Template is available for the reduced introductory price of $2.95!

Connect Your Blog to a Google+ Page

If you log into your Blogger dashboard today, you'll notice a new Google+ tab which can be used to integrate our blogs with Google+.

For some time, we have been able to link our blogs with a personal Google+ profile. Now we are also able to connect to a Google+ page for business, organisation or brand!

If you haven't already connected your Blogger site to a Google+ profile, go to the Google+ tab in your dashboard and click the button to upgrade:

Page Navigation with Arrow Keys in Blogger

Navigating between pages using the keyboard arrow keys is a very useful feature. It saves time scrolling down the page to find links to the next page in a site and is very intuitive for visitors.

In this tutorial, I offer a very simple Blogger template hack which can be used to navigate between newer and older posts on any page where the "blog pager" is present (including index, search, archive and item pages) using the left and right arrow keys.

Try out this functionality on my latest Blogger template release and read on for details of how to add this function to your own Blogger-based site.

How to add a music player in Blogspot

Since this archived post was written in 2007, web design and Blogger templates have changed immensely. The development of HTML5 and <audio> tags enable us to add music to our Blogspot websites and posts far more simply, and with improved control.

In preparation for explaining how to podcast with Blogger, this tutorial explains how to easily add an HTML5 mp3/audio player to your blog posts or layout. No JavaScript, Flash or plugins are required, and with a fallback for older browsers which don't support the player.

I've even created a simple form to generate basic tags for you! Adding music to your Blogspot site has never been so easy!

Blogger for Beginners - Free eBook Guide (PDF)

New to Blogger? Need to know the basics of Google's blogging platform to start your first blog?

Blogger for Beginners is a free guide for those new to the Blogger publishing platform. From creating your very first blog through to customising the appearance of your site and publishing feeds, this ebook covers all the basic knowledge you need with detailed instructions and full colour screenshots.

Download Blogger for Beginners (PDF)

How to tell if a website is powered by Blogger

Since we can completely customize the appearance of our blogs and use custom domains, it is not always easy to tell if a website is powered by Blogger. Having looked at hundreds of websites while researching for the Blogspot Top 100 list, I've discovered a few methods to discover if a website is built on the Blogger platform.

For those who would like to know if their favourite blogs operate using Blogger, here are some tips to help you find out.

Add a Facebook Invite Friends Link to your Blogger Site

Over at 9Lessons I read a very helpful tutorial to add an "Invite your Facebook Friends" link to a website. I was able to modify this in order to add to a gadget which now appears in the sidebar on all pages of Blogger Buster (beneath the Facebook Like box).

If you click on this link, a box will appear on the page enabling you to invite chosen friends from your Facebook profile to visit Blogger Buster.

In this simple tutorial I'll explain how you can add this functionality to your own Blogger powered blog.

Is Opera incompatible with Blogger?

In recent days, those using Opera to maintain their Blogger sites may have received warnings that their browser is not compatible with the platform:

According to The Register, Blogger appears to operate "just fine and dandy" when using Opera 12.0 for Mac, but after dismissing the message it re-appears.

The alert box is banished if Opera changes its user-agent string - the line of text the browser sends to a server to identify itself - and pretends to be a build of Chrome.

Back in August last year, Blogger Buzz posted details of browsers which would be supported by both Blogger and other Google platforms:

Beginning August 1st, we’ll support the current and prior major release of Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer and Safari on a rolling basis. Each time a new version is released, we’ll begin supporting the update and stop supporting the third-oldest version.

An Opera spokesman has told The Register that this is assumed to be an error and that there is discussion with Google about fixing the problem.

Are you using Opera? If so, please let us know if you've been affected by this message. Your comments and opinions are most welcome.

What are the top Blogger blogs of 2012?

Back in 2008, I posted the top 50 Blogger powered blogs - the result of extensive research and analysis into blogs hosted on the Blogger platform.

I'd love to update this list for 2012 to include the most popular and influential sites hosted on the Blogger platform.

Can you help by recommending your favorite Blogger-powered sites?

Atticus One Page Portfolio Template for Blogger - Now Available

View Demo | Buy Now

I'm very excited to release my new Premium Blogger Template: Atticus Portfolio!

Designed as a "one-page" portfolio website, this template includes many unique features, including a slideshow which can be configured via a simple gadget and automatic lightbox-enabled thumbnails to show off your work!

My main consideration when designing this template ws to ensure that anyone would be able to use this template quickly and easily, with no requirement whatsoever to edit the HTML or add custom CSS. In the process I learn discovered several new techniques for designing intuitive Blogger templates and am very pleased with the final result of this design.

Currently priced at only $2.95 for a limited period (the regular price will be $5.95), Atticus Portfolio is robust, responsive and well worth a look!

Take a look at the demo site and scroll down to discover more about the features of this stylish new Blogger template.