The Blog Settings Page Jul 28th, 2015   [viewed 2221 times]

Header Preview

At the top of the page is your header preview. This is what the header will look like on every page of your blog.

Header Editor

Directly under that is the editor where you can make changes. Note the "Update Preview" on the right end of the editor. At any time, just click "Update Preview" and your changes will appear in the header. The editor takes some getting used to, but it's better to have a good grasp of how it works since the same editor is used for creating articles.

One trick: I have found that when adding images, selecting the image and tapping either the left or right arrow keys on your keyboard allow you to do a word-wrap or have your text fully formattable to the side of the image. If you discover some good tricks, please share them in the comments section.

Image Upload

The next item below is the image upload area. Here you can upload any image you like, then drag-and-drop or copy / paste it into the header. The header is 1024 pixels wide, so sometimes it's easiest to simply create an image with text embedded (with PhotoShop or The GIMP... or even MS Paint), upload it, and drag it into the editor. (See lowadobe.com as an example)

Styling

Choose style elements and perhaps alter the colors of your blog here. If you're a css wizard and want to add a customized style sheet for your blog, just send us the file at SpeakFreelyForFree@gmail.com. Also, remember to let me know if you want to make it available to everyone or keep it just for your own blog.

Comments

Most bloggers and blog readers love the comments section. And, of course, everyone has their preference. Currently Free-Blog has six choices for comments systems:

  • Disqus - This is the comments system I've seen in most blog systems. Requires a Publisher Account and some setup, but feel free to use our account (freeblognet) as long as you're using a free-blog.net subdomain (like myblog.free-blog.net). We don't moderate comments, though. disqus.com
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  • SolidOpinion - A comment system that self-moderates. SolidOpinion facilitates logging in using a wide variety of Social Media platforms and treats comments as a game of up- and down-voting, blocking, link sharing, and other elements. solidopinion.com
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  • Facebook - Facebook doesn't require any kind of account, but only Facebook users will be able to enter comments, and there is no moderation ability. facebook.com
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  • HTML Comment Box - This is another comments system that doesn't require a Publisher Account, and again you can't moderate the discussions. www.htmlcommentbox.com
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  • Livefyre - Another option. It does require a Publisher Account. web.livefyre.com
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  • IntenseDebate - This system is offered by Automattic - they're the folks responsible for WordPress. A Publisher Account is required. intensedebate.com

The selection on the Blog Settings page will be applied to any new article written (actually when you click the "New Article" link). So if you write three articles while Disqus is your selection, then switch to SolidOpinion for another article, the three you write before the change stay on Disqus. This way no discussions vanish.

If there's a comment system not represented here that you really love, just let us know at SpeakFreelyForFree@gmail.com.