The Real Blogger Status

For a long time, blog owners have been requiring the ability to delete their blogs. In the beginning, people would delete a blog - whether intentionally or mistakenly - then change their mind, or realise their mistake. I did not really want to delete my blog. And the inevitable question. How do I get my very important blog back? Surely, it's in your computer somewhere?? But this question was not always answered, with encouragement.

We see regular queries about deleting a Blogger account, in Blogger Help Forum: Learn More About Blogger . A Blogger account is simply a Google account, used to publish or read blogs. If you want to delete a Blogger account, you need to delete the Google account. If you are using your Google account for other services, maybe GMail, Google+, and / or YouTube, you won't want to delete your Google account. But you can make the Blogger portion of your Google account invisible, to the public.

Some blog owners delete or rename a blog, without proper planning - and later regret their action. Some spammers track blog name availability - particularly with blog names that contain "English" (and some non English) language words. If a spammer discovers that a given blog name has recently become available, he will publish a stub blog to that name - and later, add spammy content. Why is a spammer interested in recently available names?

One of the painful experiences, with Blogger blogs, involves people who make blogs based on photo albums. Photos are, historically, a cherished souvenir of lifes passages - even in this modern age where a dozen photos might be taken, as opposed to one or two, 20 to 30 years ago. Sometimes, the souvenirs, part of a Blogger blog, are lost. Even if deleted photos can be restored, a blog may have to be rebuilt - one photo at a time. When restored, photos frequently have a different URL - and the code in the blog post must be updated, to reflect the new URL. For many blog owners, it is simpler to just upload each photo again.

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.

Every month, we see a concern about content theft or impersonation, in Blogger Help Forum: Get Help with an Issue . I deleted my blog last year! Now, I see it online again, using my name - but it's not in my dashboard! or I renamed my blog, last month! Somebody else is publishing it, this month!! These former blog owners have discovered the unpleasant reality of never ending spammer activity. URL recycling (a feature begged for, by many), plus blog content and feed caching (a reality, with most blogs), can lead to spammer harvesting and resurrection. And in some cases, to identity theft.

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.

We've seen a few reports in Blogger Help Forum: Get Help with an Issue , mentioning mysteriously resurrected posts, appearing in email or on peoples desktop displays. When investigated, the blog owner will observe that a new post, which had been originally published after the one mysteriously appearing, was recently deleted. Further investigation shows that the mysterious post, that just re appeared, was the 26th most recently published post.

We see some blog owners reporting loss of photos, when used in their blogs, and added using Post Editor. Some blog owners take photos using their camera / phone, upload them to Google+ Photos, and publish their blog posts. Having published their post, they remove the photos from their phones, to save storage space. And once deleted from their cameras / phones, their photos vanish from their blog .

Some blog owners setup blogs, then casually make their friends administrators, without considering the potential risk to their blogs. From time to time, in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken , we see reports by former blog owners, who have lost control of their blogs. There are several risks - and not all risks are apparent. Aggressive takeover of the blog, by one administrator. Unintentional self deletion or demotion, by the last active administrator. A team member, causing locking of a team blog. Any of these scenarios can result in inconvenience to the remaining administrators.

Blog owners, seeking to recover a deleted post , can do so easily enough - if the post has been indexed by the search engines . A post that's not indexed by the search engines can sometimes be found in the blog posts newsfeed. With the post retrieved in the feed, we generally tell people to copy the post contents into a new post. To re publish the post, the owner has to re format the post content - and has to publish the recovered post, under a new URL. But with a little work, you can find the PostID, in the posts newsfeed - and frequently, re publish the post in question.

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.

Blogger blog owners, who are accustomed to recovering deleted files on a personal computer, will find Blogger Comments to lack useful protection. If you accidentally delete a file on your personal computer, no worry - just look in the Trash Can, find the file in question, and recover the file. Just do this before you empty the Trash Can. Comments, published on our blogs, cannot be recovered once deleted. I deleted a comment - but now realise that I acted in haste. How do I recover the comment that I deleted? To this person, there is no useful answer.

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.

Many blog owners are occasionally confused, by the effects of various Blogger / Google security processes. We see the agony, daily, in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken , from those who only want to login to Blogger and work on their blogs. The side effects of the security processes are similar - and depending upon various owner specific details, can be easily confused for each other. The possibility of confusion requires careful initial analysis, when we are faced with an angry blog owner. My blog was deleted, by Blogger. How could they do this? I do not publish spam! This is a typical problem report, which can reflect any one of the processes, each requiring different action in the forums .

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.

Periodically, we have discussions in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken , about issues, that absolutely cannot be resolved in a forum problem discussion. These issues will vary, by relationship to a given blog, as well as by nature of the offense perceived. Some blog owners have lost control of their Blogger account, and lack ability to recover control . Some people are offended by a Blogger blog, but an offense which may not constitute a Google TOS violation . Some people may believe that a Blogger blog name, in use by someone else, may reflect badly upon their hard earned business identity . Some people may be the survivor, in a relationship where the owner of a given blog is now deceased . Some of these complaints may have been reported to Google, in an ongoing effort, for years.