Blogging Bootcamp Why I actually may want to know what you had for lunch

What and why Web logs or blogs are: Easy to create and maintain Make the delivery of information simple and social A simple way to establish or be part of a community

The nuts and bolts Starting out Murdoch uses a wordpress system at : Click on Get a new blog to start

Create your blog Choose the url whatihadforbreakfast Living with diabetes You can’t change the URL once you have chosen You can change the title later Choose the blog title Set your privacy You can change the privacy setting later Agree to the terms of service and create your blog

Ok, you have blog You can now log into your blog through the red login button from the front page or at the bottom of any page by clicking on dashboard

Backstage with your blog How your blog looks to the world

Pages versus Posts A post is an entry to your blog A page is where posts are stored

The post screen Killer penguins spotted at the post office Does anyone know about the penguins? The ABC reported that some of them were sporting laser guided heat seeking herrings : Add the title to your post Add your content

Tags and Categories Category – each post must have one Tags – entirely optional but used to refine the information in the post For example: Category : Local news Tags: Killer penguins, laser guided heat seeking herring, assault on post office

Draft or Publish? You can’t take back a post, once its on the net it may stay there forever. Use the Save Draft feature until you are ready to publish. Subscribers getting multiple copies of slightly altered blogs just makes you look unprofessional.

Over 100 to choose from Changing the theme So many themes to choose from.

Adding widgets Choose the widget you want and then click on Add, modify if required and then Save Changes

Plugins Add cool stuff to your blog. Plugins are site wide and sometimes may require outside registration for activation Some plugins have customisable settings For example gdstar rating allows people to rate your posts and comments

The settings General you can change the title of the blog and the tagline also Discussion lets you decide how you and others comment on the blog posts, you can choose to moderate the comments yourself or just have the conversation flow freely. In privacy you can set the level of access there is to your blog, the top makes your blog visible to the entire world. The administrators setting will mean effectively only you will be able to see it.

hyperlinking In the post write your hyperlink text, and click on the hyperlink button Paste the link url, set if the item should open a new window and if you wish set a hover title, then click insert to finish killerpenguinsgonewild.com The horror, oh god, the horror

Linking to an image Locate the image on the internet then click on add media Click on From URL, paste your link and add a title, then click insert into post. This will create a hyperlink to the picture.

Uploading an image Locate the image on the internet then click on add media Click on Select files, then locate the file on your computer Highlight the file and click open Add in the title, caption and alignment, then click Insert into post Your image will be inserted

Embedding a youtube video 4. Switch back to visual mode and add the full title as it appears on youtube, it is also customary to hyperlink to the item. 1. go to youtube and copy the embed code for the video 2.Edit your post and switch from visual to html 3.Paste the embed code into the html screen

Commenting Scroll to the bottom of the page and you will see a the comments on a blog or a link to add comments Fill in the comment form Click on the comments button Approve the comment You can then see the responses

RSS feeds Really Simple Syndication is a way of letting your subscribers know when you have created or updated a post. They can add the rss feed to a rss reader like google reader, netvibes or microsoft outlook. Two types of rss are required, one to your original post and another to the comments to the blog

Further information Better blogging tips Using wordpress videos How to use trackbacks wordpress/ Blogging ettiquete Creative commons and copyright on the web your-intellectual-property