Blog redesign!!!

There are many things about Blogger that I have found frustrating in the past—the comment section that does not notify people when I respond to their comments, the archaic email subscription system, the random glitches, etc. I cannot fix any of these things, but there is one thing about Blogger that I discovered I could fix—my blog's design! The previous theme I was using looked like this:


It was one of the older Blogger themes (which I literally chose because it was the first one on the list), and though it was reasonable enough, I never liked how it appeared in comparison to some of the other bloggers who were lucky enough to start out on WordPress.com. But as it turns out, Blogger has some new, much more aesthetically pleasing themes available, so I selected one and customized it to where my blog now looks like this:


Here's what's different (and the same):
  • I have a new header image of blue books without their dust jackets that I took myself! I think it came out well (and it better have, considering how many different ones I tried).
  • My homepage now shows summaries of each post instead of the entire post, which makes finding older content a bit more manageable.
  • You can now subscribe by email by clicking the Subscribe button under the blog name. I tried it myself, and it does work correctly, which I'm very glad about!
  • You can search the whole site by clicking the spyglass icon in the top-right.
  • The comments work similarly to how they used to—click "Enter your comment," and all of the normal options appear. The site still runs on Blogger, so your Google account still works for comments.
  • If you're on a smaller computer or a cell phone, the sidebar may appear gone, but it's actually just moved—click the three-line button on the top-left of the homepage, and you can see all of my normal clutter! This is the first time that all of the widgets are accessible on mobile (you used to not be able to see any of them on a cell phone). If you're on a larger computer screen, the sidebar will be permanently visible on the left.
  • At the end of each post, you'll see a few popular posts—honestly, they're a bit random, and I may get rid of them, but for now, I like people being able to see some extra content when they're done with the post they just read.
  • And of course, all of the posts and comments have stuck around! Again, I'm still on Blogger, so the web addresses for each post should be exactly the same.
I hope that you all like the new design and find it reasonably intuitive! If there's anything about it that frustrates you, please let me know in the comments of my most recent post, and I'll see if I can fix it. And of course, rest assured that my post content will remain exactly the same—just as much ranting and blithering as ever! See you all next Monday, as always!

Comments

  1. I love the redesign! I am in exactly the same position as you - I started my blog on Blogger 14 years ago, so it is BADLY in need of a more modern design. And a new banner! Yours looks really great! I hate to dive into tech stuff because even after so many years of blogging, I am a newbie with the behind-the-scenes stuff, but I REALLY need to do this - thanks for the inspiration!

    Sue
    Book By Book

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Thank you so much—I'm glad you like the redesign! If you end up deciding to change your design, I would give you two tips to relieve frustration:

      - In the Theme editor, under Advanced (where basically all of the actually-useful settings are), there is a dropdown for different page elements that looks like it has only four things, but you can actually scroll down it to find the rest of the stuff. (Although some things are missing—I never found an option for the text color on the sidebar or comment section.)

      - The Gadgets section in the Theme editor is useless—you have to go to Layout to fix anything involving the gadgets (like the fact that it decided to set all of mine to hidden, so I had to go into each one's settings and turn it back on.)

      Good luck if you choose to redesign, and thanks so much for stopping by and commenting!

      Delete
    2. Thanks for the tips! I really appreciate that and will save this. I know a redesign is long overdue for me!

      Delete

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