The Real Blogger Status

Some Blogger blogs cannot be viewed, in some proxy servers. Proxy servers are useful, when diagnosing connectivity and other blog display issues . They are more useful, though, when the content of the blogs being diagnosed does not contribute to the problems. The reported discrepancy appears to start with blogs published using dynamic templates .

If your blog is published to a dynamic template, neither you or your readers will have a navbar, when your blog is being viewed. The navbar, found on blogs which use a non dynamic template - when selected by the blog owner - has a number of reader friendly icons and links. Dynamic templates have a "menu bar" 1/5 of the way down the page - which provides a combination of the Pages gadget, and limited navbar functions. At the far right end of the menu bar, you'll see 2 tiny icons - when you are properly logged in as the blog owner. New post, the "pencil" icon. Home, the "home" icon.

We see some concern about providing email subscriptions, from blog owners in Blogger Help Forum: Get Help with an Issue . How do I provide email subscriptions for my blog? Neither Follow by Email or Subscription Links works, for email! The blog in question is using a dynamic template. In some cases, even "Subscription Links" does not provide a "Subscribe by Email" option - and it appears that the blog owner is really out of luck.

Private blogs affect other Blogger features - and the combination of results are inconsistent. With dynamic templates, the private blog selection causes an inoperable display. Conversely, with Google+ Comments, enabling Google+ Comments disables the private blog (designated reader) selection - and vice versa, in the various Blogger dashboard pages. The two interactions - and differing mutual exclusiveness - contribute to some interesting diagnostic sessions, in Blogger Help Forum: Get Help with an Issue .

We see occasional concern about providing email subscriptions, from blog owners in Blogger Help Forum: Get Help with an Issue . How do I provide email subscriptions for my blog? Follow by Email does not work! The blog in question is using a dynamic template - and it appears that the blog owner is out of luck.

Some blog owners would like their readers to view the entire blog in one page. A small blog, with very limited size, can theoretically fit on one page. If you intend to publish a blog with any future, and page rank , you will have to publish content periodically - and the size of the blog will increase, steadily. And eventually, thanks in part to main page limitation by auto pagination , older posts in your blog will be forced into archive pages.

We deal with a lot of "lost blog control" complaints, in Blogger Help Forum: Get Help with an Issue . Lost blog control complaints, that involve blogs published using a dynamic template, are not easily resolved.

We see daily reports, in AdSense Help Forum: Blogger / Host Partners , about blogs with blank or empty ads. My AdSense was approved weeks ago! Why no ads, on my blog, even now?? The owners are certain that their blogs are mature and righteous - and that they received final approval for ad content. Looking at the blog - when the blog name is provided - we see one unfortunate detail, in many blogs. Blogs published to dynamic templates.

Sometimes, blog owners need complicated and conflicting feed setups, for multiple uses. One blog owner asks I want a email blog posts feed, using snippets of the posts, so my email subscribers will click on the snippets and read the blog itself. I would prefer that newsfeed readers have the option to read the entire post, in their readers. At first glance, this is an impossible request. FeedBurner can't do two things, with one feed. Fortunately, FeedBurner, like most Google services, is free - and there's no limit to the number of feeds that you can make.

Some blog owners, who publish their blogs using a dynamic template, prefer the "Magazine" view. A few owners observe that there's a problem with the "Read More" function, in the "Magazine" post summary display. How do I let my readers know that there's more to read? There's no caption to indicate "Read more ..."! This is an odd omission, too. With Dynamic Templates involving 7 different views, though, it's not difficult to imagine 1 or 2 details dropping through the cracks - and we are here.

Not every blog owner, who likes the dynamic templates, likes the docked sidebar - which pops out, only with the cursor properly positioned. How do I get the sidebar to remain visible? Nobody knows where it is, with it hidden! This blog owner is ignoring the need to use all horizontal screen space, effectively, when viewing the blog in some dynamic views. However, if you really want the sidebar to always be visible, it's easy enough to make it do that.

One odd question, that has intrigued me for a while, is about dynamic templates, and reader choice. We see the occasional question, in Blogger Help Forum: Learn More About Blogger . How do I prevent my readers from viewing my blog, using an unacceptable dynamic view? This blog owner is overlooking one of the major advantages to dynamic templates.

We all know the limitations of the dynamic template - how you can't easily edit dynamic template HTML code, or accessories as freely. At one time, you could switch back to dynamic view, for the comments and posts - and view the complete blog, using a non dynamic template. That ability was taken away , in early 2014. That doesn't mean that you have to give up completely, however, on adding pages - though this may not yet provide a solution for a custom home page.

The dynamic templates, magical as they may be, may not suit everybody . Some blog owners eagerly publish a blog to a dynamic template - then ask WHere are all of the sidebar gadgets? One of the downsides of the dynamic templates is that gadgets have to be specifically written to work with them. Not all of the accessories, available in "Add a Gadget", have been re written to support dynamic templates - and some may likely not ever be re written.

This week, we're seeing a noticeable increase in reports about problems with reading list content. People are, once again, reporting empty reading lists - and many deny the suggestion that computers used by the readers might have anything to do with the problem. Neither filtered cookies / scripts, nor using the wrong Blogger account, appears to be involved in some of this weeks problems. One account owner reported having cleaned her Reading List - and after having removed just one entry from the list, the Reading List content became visible, again. This suggests that the owner may be following too many blogs - or possibly, following one blog which recently increased feed size. Either could be true, based upon the common complaint. I didn't change anything! It just stopped working, last week, on its own!!

The process of examining browser source listings for a blog, and of having a blog owner carefully examine blog template code, is an important part of diagnosing many Blogger problems. With blogs published to dynamic templates, neither source listings , nor template "Edit HTML" , contain as much useful information, as with blogs published to non dynamic templates. Dynamic templates reference scripts, that are hosted in external libraries - and that cannot be updated or viewed. The idea of having templates that were less customisable was originally supposed to encourage people to work on post content, and increase stability of their blogs - not create instability.

One interesting question, which we see occasionally in Blogger Help Forum: Learn More About Blogger , would be about making the blog easier to read - if the blog were static. How do I number the pages, in the blog? This blog owner does not quite understand the concept of dynamic content.

We've been dealing with the limitations of the dynamic template - how you can't easily edit dynamic template HTML code, with a blog published to a dynamic template - for a while. At one time, you could link a dynamic and non dynamic view of the blog - and let your readers use the sidebar, and the many options there, in non dynamic view - and switch back to dynamic view, for the comments and posts. That choice was taken away , in 2014, because of "privacy issues". Like Designer and Layout templates, you can add a Pages gadget - and index dynamic pages, like label searches - as you may have done with gadgets on static pages .

Not everybody likes to be known, everywhere. Some folks prefer to publish a blog, without their name appearing. Anonymity is a goal, for many blog owners. Blogs using both Dynamic and non Dynamic (Layout, Designer) templates can be made anonymous - but different tasks are involved. Fortunately, both tasks are simple.

We all know the limitations of the dynamic template - how you can't easily edit dynamic template HTML code, or add gadgets. Long ago, you could link a dynamic and non dynamic view of the blog, and let your readers use the sidebar, and the many gadgets there, in non dynamic view - and switch back to dynamic view, for the comments and posts. That ability was taken away , earlier this year. And some gadgets, that you are used to seeing on a blog using a non dynamic template, have not been made available on dynamic templates. That doesn't mean that you have to give up completely, however, on adding the gadgets that you need. Thanks to the ability to embed gadgets in static pages, and to add pages to a dynamic template, you can have a static page, on a dynamic template, that contains many gadgets, of your own choosing.