Tag Archives: categories

Differences Between Blog Pages and Posts

Posted on by
59

Are you confused about the point of a blog page? Or perhaps you’ve been trying to separate topics or classes on your blog using pages but are struggling to get it to work how you would like.

Deciding when to use blog posts vs pages can be puzzling. With numerous questions on pages in the Edublogs forum Dr Mike suggested I write a post to explain the difference between a Page and a Post plus share ideas for separating topics or classes on a blog to help address some of the confusion.

Posts properties

  • Blog posts appear in reverse chronological order so that the most recent post is the first post that your readers see
  • Posts are dynamic (updated regularly) and have time stamps i.e. display the date posted
  • You can assign tags and categories to organise blog posts
  • Posts appear in RSS feeds i.e. your readers who subscribe to your blog will receive your latest post in their feed reader

Image of parts of a post

Page Properties

  • Blog pages are displayed independently of post history and are more static i.e. remain the same from day to day since they are rarely updated.
  • You normally use pages for information that you want to share with your readers but don’t expect to update frequently. Getting Started with Edublogs and What You Would Like To See Covered on this blog are pages.
  • Pages don’t have time stamps i.e. don’t show the date they were posted.
  • Blog pages can appear anywhere on your blog depending on your theme. e.g. my personal blog uses the Cutline Theme which displays pages across the top of my blog whereas Miss W. and her Smartboard uses Rubric theme and pages are display in her right sidebar.
  • You can change the order pages appear. Pages are normally displayed in alphabetical order but their order can be changed using Page Order.
  • You can’t assign tags and categories to pages.
  • Pages don’t appear in RSS feeds so readers need to visit your site to view the latest updates to pages.
  • You can’t embed posts into an Edublogs page.
  • You can create sub-pages which you assign to a parent page to build a more complex site.

Image of pages on this blog

Ways of separating topics or classes on a blog

Image of Categories

If you don’t want students from different classes seeing posts/information that don’t relate to their class the best solution is separate blogs for each class. Benefit is students have an increased sense of ownership.

However if you want to use just one blog the best way of separating topics or classes is using categories. Check out Mr Riggan’s Science blog to see how categories can be used to separate lessons for different classes (displayed in left sidebar). For example here are his posts for:

Students can access their posts by:

Thanks to Mike Temple for providing the link to Mr Riggan’s Science blog.

Image of a category

FINAL THOUGHT

Hope this has helped you understand the differences between Pages and Posts. Would love to hear how ou manage separating topics and/or classes.

If you are enjoying reading this blog, please consider Subscribing For Free!

What’s The Difference Between Tags and Categories, You Ask?

Posted on by
37

When I first started blogging with Edublogs we only had categories; which most of us used like tags. But then came Christmas — and Edublogs gave us tags for every post and a tag clouds for our sidebars. Now all we had to work out was “What’s the difference between tags and categories, and how we would use them?.”

The aim of this post is to provide an overview of categories and tags; there is so much more that could be covered.

Tags vs Categories

The whole reason why tags, categories and search widgets are used on blogs is to serve one purpose — help your readers locate the information they want on your blog. Readers want quick and easy solutions; too hard and they look elsewhere.

While aim of using tags and categories is the same — to help readers locate information — they are used differently.

Categories are like chapters of a book; they provide a general overview of the topics you blog about. Whereas tags are more like the index at the back of the book and explode the topic into a million bits.

Image of categories used on my personal blogCategories and tags are displayed in your blog sidebar using the categories widget and Tag cloud widget.

Categories Are Used For Categorizing

Let me show you. I’m currently using 17 categories on my Mobile Technology in TAFE blog (shown in the image on the right). Unfortunately I blog on a wide subject area which is why I’ve so many categories. Ideally I believe it would be better for me to use less categories and for the categories names to be descriptive enough without using two lines.

Categories can have unique names and be wordy; you want them sufficiently descriptive so your reader understands the type of subject matter they will find when they click on the link. For example my Cool Web 2.0 & Desktop Tools category contains all posts that review, road test or tell my readers how to use web 2.0 or desktop tools more effectively.

Posts can be allocated to more than one category; I assign twitter posts using the categories Cool Web 2.0 & Desktop Tools and Microblogging Tips similarly those on Flickr are distributed using categories Cool Web 2.0 & Desktop Tools and Photosharing and Editing Tips. Remember I’m doing this to make it easier for my readers to locate the information they need quickly.Image of my tag cloud

Tags and Tag Clouds

Tags are displayed on your blog as a tag cloud; clicking on a tag name will take your readers to all posts tagged with that term. Tags are normally short, one or two words, and are generally keywords (i.e. terms readers would be likely to use if they searched your site); terms that your readers will understand.

The number of categories you allocate to a post are normally limited whereas you will use as many tags on a post as you like.

The image of the tag cloud on the right is from my Mobile Technology in TAFE blog.

Tags or Categories: Which One To Use?

If you checked out problogger sites — you will see each has their own preference as to which they use, or if they use both.

However if you are planning on using categories, like I have, you really need sit down, think carefully about what content you will blog and allocate categories that reflect this. You may want to use the categories I use on my Mobile Technology in TAFE blog as a guide.

If you’re going to use categories you need to do it properly; your readers expect that when they click on a category they will get ALL posts on the topic. If you add new categories this means you will need to go back through old post and allocating them to these new categories.

Creating categories can be time consuming — if you want to promise a “good enough” system, then use tags, where no thoroughness is implied. You will still need to be consistent with tagging e.g. use widget, Widget or widgets not all three. It’s worth checking out popular tags for ideas of what to use — check out Edublogs tag cloud, del.icio.us tag cloud, Edutagger tag cloud.

Changing my Mobile Technology in TAFE blog from the old system of just categories to now using categories and tags did take time — I had to sort through 223 posts. If you’ve got lots of old posts it may be better to stick with how you’ve been doing it, and add a search widget to the top of your blog.

Image of Tags and Categories

FINAL THOUGHT

I’m definitely not an expert with categories and tags; thanks to all the people who helped me out in coming to terms with using them.

Recommend you also check out the difference between pages and post plus how you can use categories to separate different subjects or classes on a blog.

If you are enjoying reading this blog, please consider Subscribing For Free!

Getting More Out of Widgets!

Posted on by
90

Wow – thanks everyone. Your response, support and feedback has been incredible! We have set up this page to keep track of your feedback on what you’d like to see covered!

As you can see there are some really great topic areas to get us started. Which got me thinking! The Edublogger is about community, and helping each other. Perhaps you have already covered some of these topics in your own posts? Or you would like to cover a topic(s) in your own post(s)? Let us know by posting the link in the comments below, and we will let the community know!examples of widgets

Meanwhile lets start working through the list! Many readers express interest in widgets, so I have decided this is a good place to start!

What are Widgets?

Web terminology makes it so much harder when people are starting their online journey; suddenly you being bombarded all these foreign terms and widgets are a classic example! In simple terms widgets are mini web applications that you can put onto your website (i.e. blog, wiki, homepage) e.g. the Clustrmap on the side bar is a widget.

How To Embed A Widget

People use widgets to add extra features to their website. But be warned! Choose widgets for your blog wisely because they can clutter your side menu which will distract your readers. My list of “must have widgets” on a blog include:

  1. Search - so readers can easily search your blog
  2. Email subscription – for readers who prefer to be notified of new posts by email
  3. RSS feed - not all feed readers are able to detect the RSS feed from the site URL; this is why I add a Feed burner feed to my sites to make it easier for readers to subscribe
  4. Categories and Tag Cloud – to make it easier for readers to locate posts on your blog. We will be writing a post soon to explain the difference between categories and tag clouds; and why/how each is used

I also like to add a widget that links to information on how to be notified of new posts; to make it easier for new people to understand how to subscribe to blogs.

Edublogs Widgets

Removing WidgetsCould I Mess up My blog Embedding Widgets?

Don’t worry! Widgets won’t break your blog. Any widgets you add can easily be removed, and won’t effect existing widgets in your side bar.

To try out widget drag and drop the widget from your Available Widgets to your Side Bar, then click Save Changes and view your site. To remove a widget just drag it from your Side Bar back to your Available Widget area and then click Save Changes.

What Widgets Should I Add To My Blog?

Widgets are PERSONAL. We all have our favourites.

Clustrmap

Many educators like to add Clustrmaps, especially those with younger students, because the students loving seeing the red dots grow as their readers, from around the World, visit their site.

Other common widgets bloggers use include:

  • Flickr – shows the latest photos you have uploaded to your Flickr Account
  • Del.icio.us – shows the latest sites you have bookmarked in your del.icio.us account
  • Vod Pod Videos – shows the latest videos you have saved to your VodPod account
  • Google Reader Shared Items – for latest items you share in your Google Reader
  • Twitter – shows your latest updates from Twitter

Not all widgets can be embedded in Edublogs because some types of code and code that includes Java Script can cause problems. For example, you can’t embed a clip of your shared items in Google Reader because the code includes Java

Google Reader shared items

Script however you can still embed by using an RSS widget!

And if you want even more widgets, don’t forget you can grab some from Widgetbox! This video explains how to embed Widgetbox widgets into Edublogs.

FINAL THOUGHT

For those struggling to embed widgets we hope these “how to” tips have helped! For everyone else we hope that you find these tips useful when demonstrating to new people.

Please leave a comment to let us know how you go, and if you need any help with widgets I haven’t mentioned.

If you are enjoying reading this blog, please consider Subscribing For Free!