SA Blog Round Up Part 1

Welcome to the South African Blog Roundup co-hosted with SA Rocks. I wanted to have a special SA roundup because many South Africans took the time to list their blogs with BBD. Another reason is that I have been following the SA blog scene since last fall and find it interesting.

This post will list some of the South African blogs found in Big Blog Directory. Blogs that participate in the roundup will have additional information added to their link. I will update this post over the next few days.

Part 2 will look at "The South African Blog Scene".

Part 3 will look at other participating blogs and offer some concluding remarks.

Have a look at the listings and check out the blogs. You might find something you like.

Leon

South African Blogs

A Designer's Ramblings

A Weird But Passionate World In South Africa

Musings from a jam jar

Nicharalambous.com

Protocolinpractice has contributed: South African Blog Roundup.

Romsky's

SA Rocks posted the roundup introduction. Nic also posted a mini roundup of his own: SA Roundup Featuring Some Stuff.

Soekershof; the 'scientific' backup

South African Cricket Scene

Blogger Header Customization

In January I wrote a post about customizing the header in Blogger blogs. The method worked okay but involved modifying the template.

I found out from phydeaux3 that Blogger has a new "Configure Header" widget and finally got to test it yesterday. The screenshot below is from my test blog.



Images upload okay but can't be resized or repositioned. I would have liked my test image centered horizontally.



It would be nice if images could be tiled, or moved, or a made to fit. At the very least the header widget should be given layout options like those used when uploading images to posts.



Freevlog has a video tutorial that shows how to use the widget.(via)

Soekershof; the 'scientific' backup

Blog Name: Soekershof; the 'scientific' backup

Blog URL: http://soekershof.wordpress.com

Description: This blog is primarily a service tool for customers of Soekershof Nursery and other succulent lovers. It provides visitors with information about all (basic) aspects of cultivating succulents including cacti in South Africa. There are links to other relevant Internet sites.

A Weird But Passionate World In South Africa

Blog Name: A Weird But Passionate World In South Africa

Blog URL: http://soekershofwalkabout.blogspot.com

Description: This blog keeps (potential) visitors updated with the latest developments in and around Soekershof and with links to other interesting things-to-do/see in the area.

May 16 Featured Feeds

Love, Food, Wine, and Good Chick Flix and Magick River are the featured blog feeds for the next week.

These two blogs mark the end of the first round of featuring blogs here at BBD. Next week I'll start from the top of the list at BBD Blog Feeds and work from A-Z.

Contacting Bloggers

I visited all of the South African blogs listed in BBD and invited them to participate in the SA Blog Roundup. One part of me felt good about leaving the comments in the blogs but another part felt intrusive.

I'll see how this goes and decide whether to change tactics for the next roundups. I am planning a Creative Arts Blog Roundup for mid June and a Sports Blog Roundup for sometime in July. Contact me if you want more information.

One side effect of this is that I can update some blog listings. South African Cricket Scene has changed URLs and is being updated regularly. South African Rugby hasn't been updated since March.

One thing I noticed is that BBD gets called many different things in blogrolls. I have seen "Big Blog Directory", "The Big Blog Directory", and "Big Blog Dir". Only the first name is correct but I am more interested in the link being correct.

Coconut Girl Wireless

Blog Name: Coconut Girl Wireless

Blog URL: http://coconutgirlwireless.wordpress.com/

Description: Tropical enlightenment...between sessions.

Eclectic mix of culture, entertainment, health, personal, spiritual and environmental issues and the zen of surfing...brought to you courtesy of some Hawaii surf wahines and Darby Romeo of Ben Is Dead Magazine, Killzine, the I Hate Brenda Newsletter, and the book Retro Hell.

Come on in - Pina Coladas are strong and the water's nice and warm! Aloha.

Software Testing Zone

Blog Name: Software Testing Zone

Blog URL: http://software-testing-zone.blogspot.com

Description: Dedicated to thoughts about software testing, QA, and other software quality related practices. Articles on software quality assurance, testing and test automation.

South African Blog Roundup

Big Blog Directory and SA Rocks are co-hosting a South African Blog Roundup. Any South African blogger can participate.

Between May 25th and 30th write a post with something like the following (please link to both blogs):

Big Blog Directory and SA Rocks are co-hosting a South African Blog Roundup and I am participating...

Next answer the following three questions:

1. Why does South Africa "rock"?
2. Why do you blog?
3. What are two of your favourite posts?

Once you have written your posts leave a comment here with a link. Blogs not listed with BBD can leave their links with SA Rocks.

Take Firemind's Blog Test

Last year I created a short survey about blogging. Take the "test" and compare your answers to those provided by other bloggers.

Blog Updates

Keeping track of nearly 100 blogs can be daunting. I track most of the blogs in Google Reader but it still is a big job.

When a blog hasn't been updated in over two months I will delist it but save the listing as a draft. When I know it is being published again I will restore the listing. It is important to let me know you are blogging again.

somewhatsane and [La Madriguera] are dormant and the latter links to a "on hiatus" page.

A Designer's Ramblings is back and it's nice to hear from Peter again.

Camoen's Poetry and Thoughts is now just Camoen. Check out the poetry and take the poetry poll.

You can't reason with Crazy has moved to a new site and uses WordPress now. Stop by and see how everyone is making out.

May 10 Featured Feeds

Knotgypsy's Journey of Creation and Mickey's Musings are the featured blog feeds for the next week.

Blogger's feed page element is working again and I added all of the new listings to BBD Blog Feeds. We have almost been through the list for the first time. I may change the way I pick featured feeds by working only from A to Z. In any case every blog will be a featured blog sometime.

The Two Cents

Blog Name: The Two Cents

Blog URL: http://www.thetwocents.com

Description: A Pop Culture Blog for Everyone! I always find I'm talking about this stuff, forwarding fun links, or debating certain issues with everyone ...so I started this page so everyone can be a part of the action. TV, Movies, Music, Sports, whatever! Post Comments everywhere. Let the world know what you think! Give them your own Two Cents!

New Listings 8

These are the blogs that were added to Big Blog Directory in the last month.

MyBootsnMe.com

Love, Food, Wine, and Good Chick Flix

Protocolinpractice

Camoen

Wampago Music Videos

Church of Integrity

Another Point of View

The Astonishing Adventures Of Lord Likely

Powell River Books Blog

Webtalks

SportsGuru

Pericharis

Reiki Healing-Remote Healings

EternaLee

KnotGypsy's Journey of Creation

Use Quick Blog Search to view all listed blogs alphabetically or Search This Blog Using Labels to search by topic.

MyBootsnMe.com

Blog Name: MyBootsnMe.com

Blog URL: http://mybootsnme.blogspot.com

Description: Travel info and photos of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada and surrounding areas. Updates on 2010 Vancouver Olympic venues as well as current weather, ski and ferry reports.

Love, Food, Wine, and Good Chick Flix

Blog Name: Love, Food, Wine, and Good Chick Flix

Blog URL: http://lovefoodwineandgoodchickflix.blogspot.com

Description: Commentary on recipes and cooking, TV and movies, music, pop culture, celebrities, wine recommendations, and anything else that happens to be going on in my life at the time. Lots of pictures, video clips and general fun stuff.

May 3 Featured Feeds

Motivation and JENRIKS24hphoetry are this weeks featured feeds. It just happens that both are photoblogs. Enjoy the pictures.

Blogger's Feed page element hasn't been working properly for the past week. I can change feeds but not add new ones. I will add the new blogs to BBD Blog Feeds when the problem is fixed.