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)

New Blogger Widgets: Newsreel and Video Bar

Blogger has added two new page element widgets: a Newsreel and a Video Bar.



The Newsreel widget searches Google News for chosen keywords. It is dynamic and updates over time.

The Video Bar widget searches Google Video and YouTube for videos based on the keywords used. Videos open in the blog above the main body of text.



Check out the examples at my test blog. (via Blogger Buzz).

Widget Permalink Hack

After I changed the style of my Labels Widget I didn't want people to look all over the blog trying to find it. I thought permalinks might be a solution but didn't know what to look for. I looked at some blogs using the idea and saw the solution.

Each widget has a unique name and is written as "widget id= [widget name]". Here is the Labels Widget:



The name of the widget in the screenshot is Label1. To link to the widget you need to set up the link like this:

<a href="#[widget name]"></a>

Replace [widget name] with the name of the widget you wish to link to. Use an html/javascript widget to place the link in the sidebar.



You can use this hack for any widget. Check out this blog for more ideas.

Search Engine Widget Reviews

I have been experimenting with some search engine widgets in my test blog.



Widget: Blogbar

URL: http://www.blogbar.org/

Description: Blogbar is a free search engine bar you can add to your blog. I found this at Google Gadgets.

Review: This is the nicest looking of the several I tried. It doesn't slow down the loading of the sidebar or present any other problems. Unfortunately it has too many search options I don't use so it's not for me.



Widget: BeeWak

URL: http://www.beewak.com/

Description: Another search engine widget I found at Google Gadgets.

Review: The BeeWak widget isn't as nice looking as Blogbar's but it works fine. If I used Beewak I would probably use a text link to the website to save sidebar space.



Widget: Technorati Searchlet

URL: http://www.technorati.com/developers/help/searchlet.html

Description: Technorati Searchlet "enables site-specific and weblog search across Technorati's entire database of posts." It is currently in beta.

Review: This is an interesting idea and I would like to see how it develops. I am most interested in the search this blog feature but I haven't been able to get it to work yet. It may work if embedded into a template.

I am not sure if I would use the searchlet in my blogs because Blogger already has several search features built into it.