add-flash-tag-cloud-to-your-blogger-blog-

“Blogumus” is an Flash based tag cloud widget originally WP Cumulus plugin by Roy Tanck’s. You can see the demo for this hack below. You will see the Flash zoom effect on mouse over.

This hack uses both javascript and flash to implement. The intallation of flash cloud in your blogger blog is very simple. Just you need to copy and paste few lines of code in your template editor. I would like to thanks Amanda for releasing this powerful widget for blogger’s. Here you can see the installed Blogumus in sidebar.

Step needs to Add Flash Label Cloud in Blogger Blog

1. Login to blogger dashboard

2. Go to Layout >> Edit HTML

3. Save Your template first and dont expand widget template

4. Choose where you want to add Flash label cloud in your blog ( Sidebar, Footer, Below Header or Above footer or any section). Now Search for respective <section> (section releted to sidebar, footer, etc). The line of code may look like as follows

<b:section class=’sidebar’ id=’sidebar’ preferred=’yes’>

or

<b:section class=’footer’ id=’footer’ showaddelement=’no’>

or

<b:section class=’anything’ id=’anything’ preferred=’yes’>

5. Immediately after any one of the above line, Paste following widget code

<b:widget id=’Label99′ locked=’false’ title=’Labels’ type=’Label’>
<b:includable id=’main’>
  <b:if cond=’data:title’>
    <h2><data:title/></h2>
  </b:if>
  <div class=’widget-content’>

    &lt;object type=”application/x-shockwave-flash” data=”http://halotemplates.s3.amazonaws.com/wp-cumulus-example/tagcloud.swf” width=”250” height=”200” allowscriptaccess=”always” &gt;
        &lt;param name=”movie” value=”http://halotemplates.s3.amazonaws.com/wp-cumulus-example/tagcloud.swf” /&gt;
        &lt;param name=”bgcolor” value=”#ffffff” /&gt;
        &lt;param name=”flashvars” value=”tcolor=0x000000&amp;mode=tags&amp;distr=true&amp;tspeed=100&amp;tagcloud=&lt;tags&gt;
      <b:loop values=’data:labels’ var=’label’>
<a expr:dir=’data:blog.languageDirection’ expr:href=’data:label.url’ style=’12‘><data:label.name/></a>
</b:loop>
&lt;/tags&gt;” /&gt;
        &lt;p&gt;Blogumulus by &lt;a href=’http://www.roytanck.com/’&gt;Roy Tanck&lt;/a&gt; and &lt;a href=’http://www.bloggerbuster.com’&gt;Amanda Fazani&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;
    &lt;/object&gt;

  </div>

  <b:include name=’quickedit’/>
</b:includable>
</b:widget>

6. Save your template and if every thing goes well you will see the Blogumus in your blog.

Customization

250 : To change the width of the Blogumus

200 : To change the height of the Blogumus

000000 : To change the color of text

ffffff : To change the background color of Blogumus

12 : To alter the size of labels

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remove-threaded-comments-from-blogger

You can observe that we have rolled backthreaded commenting from our blog. The only reason was that since this feature is new therefore it involves some bugs. The biggest problem that almost all blogspot blogs are facing with threaded comments is that when you click a post link, the user is taken to the bottom of the page where comment box exists. In other words, upon clicking post URL, the control takes you to comment box rather remaining at top. This effected our AdSense Revenue and PageViews. If you are relaxed using this new commenting system then you may simply neglect this tutorial but if you think that you will add back the threaded commenting feature once all bugs are removed by Blogger Team then you can follow the easy steps shared below to get rid of this new feature.

Why We Removed Blogger Threaded Comments?

For three simple reasons:

1. This feature is new and the bug of taking the user to the bottom of page was effecting the PageViews and hence revenue
2. I was giving the same reply to repeated questions being asked. Readers had to search for admin comments and often could not observe the answers already posted thus they would ask the same question again. Giving rise to confusion and repeated questions.

Why we still like the old style?

1. We can answer all readers with a single reply thus keeping things simple and clean
2. Readers can easily differentiate between visitor and author comments
3. No additional scripts effect the overall percentage of the load time.
4. Page views Increase

Does this mean that this feature is all waste of time?

Of course not! We will install them back once blogger solves all bugs linked to it and make it more optimized.

Can't we customize Threaded Comments?

You can do all that you want. I am a little busy these days and need time to look into the new coding. We will share a lot of new themes and designs to add a fresh attractive look to these threaded style. We still need to write tutorials on how to distinguish between visitor and author comment styles, how to customize the new comment form, customize reply and delete buttons and how to add text above the comment box etc.

Shall you remove it too?

If you feel that you can go along with the current problems and that your readers are enjoying the new look and that your AdSense revenue and page views are not largely effected then you should surely keep it. You can surely expect blogger to solve the Jump-to-bottom problem very soon. But if you are searching for a quick solution then try today's tutorial served just for you.

Steps To Remove Threaded Comments

1. Go To Blogger > Design > Edit HTML
2. Back up your template
3. Check "Expand Widget Templates"
4. Search for this:

<b:if cond='data:post.showThreadedComments'>
            <b:include data='post' name='threaded_comments'/>
          <b:else/>
            <b:include data='post' name='comments'/>
          </b:if>
        </b:if>
        <b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == &quot;item&quot;'>
          <b:if cond='data:post.showThreadedComments'>
            <b:include data='post' name='threaded_comments'/>
          <b:else/>
            <b:include data='post' name='comments'/>
          </b:if>
        </b:if>

you will find this code twice and replace it twice with the following code:

            <b:include data='post' name='comments'/>
          </b:if>
               <b:if cond='data:blog.pageType == &quot;item&quot;'>
                     <b:include data='post' name='comments'/>
      
        </b:if>

    5.    Save your template

    6.     Done!

Visit your blogs to see everything back to normal. You wont see the page jumping to comment box and posts will load as they normally used to do. Your page views and AdSense page Impressions will increase again.

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50-widgets-for-blogs-and-websites

Widgets are a handy, easy and simple way to add some flare to your blog. Whether you’d like to display the number of currently online visitors to your site or simply the weather report for Los Angeles, you can do it with widgets. We’ve assembled a list of 50 useful or simply cool widgets for your pleasure. And remember, the first rule of widgetizing your blog is – don’t overdo it!
MyBlogLog’s Recent Readers – this widget can easily be called a hit amongst blog owners; its popularity even managed to convince Yahoo into buying MyBlogLog. The widget lets you see the avatars of recent visitors to your blog, provided they’re also members of MyBlogLog.
Mashable – get the latest social networking news from this very site.
Flickr Flash Photo Stream Badge – display images from your Flickr profile with a handy Flash photo stream.
Preview Anywhere – see a live preview of outgoing links in a small popup which activates on mouseover. Some find this annoying, while others might find it useful.
Twitter Badge – if your life is so interesting that everyone must know what you’re up to all the time, then a Twitter badge is the ideal counterpart to your blog. It’ll proudly displays your recent tweets.
Digg News – display the latest Digg links on your blog. Themeable and fully customizable.
FEEDJIT – real time traffic data directly in your blog’s sidebar.
LineBuzz – inline comments for your blog. Very handy for blogs with frequent lively discussions.
Flixn – display a stream directly from your webcam, so your blog visitors can always see what you’re up to.
3Jam – lets your visitors send messages to your mobile phone, without them knowing your phone number.
Jaxtr – with Jaxtr, your visitors can actually call you to your mobile phone; again, your number stays private.
LinkedInABox – show off your LinkedIn profile. Perfect for personal blogs.
Box Widget – enable visitors to use box.net’s online storage directly on your web site.
Price of gas – displaying gas prices on your blog might seem unnecessary to some, but it’s cool if you have a traffic/travel related blog.
iBegin Weather Widget – Display weather information in your sidebar. Just like with Price of Gas, works great with travel-related blogs.
ClockLink – display time in various time zones with these nifty Flash clocks.
Film Loops – display the latest loops from your FilmLoops account.
Daily Painters – display paintings from famous painters on your blog.
WhoLinked – show your visitors which sites have recently linked to your web site. Works with all major blog platforms.
Criteo AutoRoll – displays links to blogs similar to your blog.
Bitty Browser – embed a cute, fully functional mini web browser to your blog.
Leafletter – create a mini website and embed it into your blog.
WikiSeek – search Wikipedia with this simple widget.
FeedCount – show off the number of visitors to your blog with this handy little button.
Technorati Link Count – display the number of links your website has from one of the biggest blog authorities – Technorati.
MyPageRank – another good way to show how “big” your blog is is to show off your Google PageRank.
CheckPageRank – in addition to showing your PageRank, this widget also shows your Alexa ranking.
BlinkxIt – embed a link to related videos directly into your website.
Skype button – display your Skype online/offline status on your blog.
RockYou Horoscope – not something I would personally use, but some people are into horoscope. Hell, most people are into horoscope. Anyway, this widget shows horoscope (doh!) and does it in a nicely designed colorful box.
del.icio.us Tagometer – display how many times have del.icio.us users saved your page.
del.icio.us Linkrolls – this badge shows your latest bookmarks from del.icio.us.
Timelines – need to create a timeline? Seek no further. This widget makes it really easy.
PollDaddy – PollDaddy lets you create beautiful polls in no time, and display them at your blog.
Vizu – another poll-making widget, compatible with all major blog platforms.
AnswerTips – display definitions from Answers.com for various terms on your blog. The definitions are shown in bubbles which are activated on doubleclick.
AnswerBoxes – give your visitors a chance to enter a term themselves, and get a definition from Answers.com
Now Playing – if you got to share your current playlist contents with the world, Sigamp will do the trick. Works with most popular music players, including Foobar, Winamp, iTunes and others.
BuzzBoost – display headlines from your RSS feed on any website.
LibraryThing – show off the latest books you’ve been reading.
Plaxo Address Book – let your most faithful visitors access their address books direclty from your site.
AuctionAds – a widget that displays auctioned items on eBay, and gives you a percentage of the price paid when sometimes buys an item.
aStore – similar to AuctionAds, only for Amazon. Create a mini-store on your site and receive profit when someone buys an item through your store.
Plazes – show your current location on a Plazes map.
Stockalicious – track your portfolio with this widget, and share it with others. Let everyone know how much money you’ve lost.
Yahoo! For Good – create a charity badge and ask for donations for a worthy cause.
Giftspace – your friends never know what to buy you for birthday? Let them know what you really want with this nifty widget.
MixMap – see where are the visitors to your MySpace profile from on a map.
Google Map Widget – display a searchable Google Map on your website.
Google Video Search – add a video search form and selected videos to your web site.
Odeo player – display an Odeo player for and podcast right there in your sidebar.

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