The Real Blogger Status

We see the occasional hopeful yet naive request, in Blogger Help Forum: Get Help with an Issue , about a common mistake. I deleted my post, that I've been working on, for a week. How do I get it back? Here, the blog owner is asking about a feature that has been requested, several times. If you delete your blog, you can recover it - within 90 days, using the same Blogger account . There are no "do overs" for a deleted page or post, however.

Blog owners occasionally delete blog content, and later change their mind. How do I recover a post, after I deleted it from my blog? Sometimes, knowing the URL - or at least the title - of a post, we can retrieve the post from the Blogger database . In other cases, it may be possible to retrieve post content from a cached newsfeed . Some blog owners like to construct a blog using static pages - and this presents a bit more of a challenge, when a static page is deleted.

Even after being able to find a deleted post in cache, and retrieve the BlogID / PostID , some blog owners may find themselves unable to restore a deleted post. Until Blogger gives us an actual recycle bin / trash can for deleted pages and posts, some deleted pages and posts just may not be re publishable. It appears that all deleted content is not retained consistently, similar to the legendary "90 days" for deleted blogs.

One of the easiest disasters, that you can make with a Blogger blog, is to delete a post. Every week, we see the anguish, in Blogger Help Forum: Get Help with an Issue . I deleted my post, by mistake. How do I get it back? It's so easy to just hit "Yes", instinctively, after you hit "Delete" - and once it's done, you're done. Unlike many computer processes, Blogger has no recycle bin / trash can, for deleted pages or posts. Hit delete, then "Yes" - and it's gone, Jim. But maybe, not.

Some blog owners report various discrepancies, and oddities, with Stats and its various components . A few owners find that the Popular Posts gadget, that supposedly will display any selected number (1 - 10) of the most popular posts for a blog during a given time period, is sometimes short the number selected. With only 6 posts displayed out of 8 posts selected, it is possible that the desired 8 posts may be displayed - if 10 posts are selected, and the display is refreshed. On the other hand, with only 9 posts displayed out of 10 posts selected, it's not possible to increase the selection to 11, to compensate for the "missing" post.

I've previously provided instructions for recovering a deleted page (static page) or post (dynamic page) . Retrieval of a deleted page / post involves editing the deleted page / post, using a URL which contains the BlogID, and the PageID / PostID. It's easy enough to get the BlogID - the source listing for any blog page will have multiple places where the BlogID can be found - but where can one find the PageID / PostID? The PageID / PostID can be found - given a small amount of effort, for any well indexed blog. Any cached copy, of the deleted page or post, will provide the PageID / PostID - once you know what to look for.

We've been advising anxious blog owners, for some time, how to recover deleted pages and posts. The easiest solution, in the long run, is to recover the PageID / PostID , and re publish the deleted page / post. Unfortunately, all deleted pages and posts can't be edited and re published . With new posts, un indexed by the search engines, you won't be able to find the post in cache - and you'll never determine the PostID. This will be a frequent problem with deleted pages - as static pages generally won't get indexed by the search engines - nor will they ever be included in the blog posts feed. In some cases, even when you know the PageID or PostID, the page editor / post editor may simply reject your attempt to re edit - and give you another bX code. Even so, all is not lost. You may have to rebuild the page or post - but you can generally keep the URL, of the deleted page or post, operational. Just plan the rebuilding process.

Blog owners have been deleting their pages and posts, then changing their minds later, since Blogger started providing the ability to delete pages and posts. We've been advising anxious blog owners, for some time, how to recover deleted pages and posts. The easiest solution, in the long run, is to recover the PageID / PostID , and re publish the deleted page / post. When the deleted page or post cannot be re published, the next option is to re build the page / post, possibly using feed cache. Using this technique, you'll have to reformat the post content, as feed content is formatted relatively simply. When you publish the post, it will publish as a new post, with a new URL - so any external references to the missing post URL will still be broken. Thanks to the recently offered Custom Redirects option, though, we can make this latter choice slightly less undesirable.

If you delete a post (page) in your blog, it's a simple matter to recover the post - as long as you know the PostID. Unfortunately, once the post is gone, finding the post (page) id is not a simple matter - especially for those who would typically delete a page or post without planning. Blogger does not provide the PostID in any list, that we might save, periodically, to reference later.

One of the challenges of using the Blogger dashboard "Posts" menu is the too easy ability to delete posts - if you are not thinking about what you're doing. Fortunately, under the right circumstances, accidental deletion of a single post won't cause a terrible catastrophe - though you (the blog owner) will need to react properly.

In late 2010, Blogger Support announced that they cannot provide the service to restore deleted posts . Once you (the blog owner) delete a page or post, it's gone - though we have asked for a recovery option . Fortunately, there are several possibilities, to recover deleted pages or posts - though some work may be required.