I have a small, personal blog under a different blogger sign in and I switched it over just now and I was very pleased. I am not ready to deal with changing over my much larger main blog, mostly because of my many template customizations and my sheer terror of either Blogger or me goofing something up .
Here's what I have to report:
Save your current template as a text file and print it out so it is in front of you. (Blogger also save a copy of the original, but this way it is in front of you if you need to type in or change anything)
Take note of any special colors you might have used
Think ahead of time about what labels you might want to use
When you change over your template appears unchanged and you can use the label function immediately. If you want to have a list of the labels you are using you will have to change to the new page elements format and chose a new format, which are based on the templates previously available. (No new looks, unfortunately.)
You can then add in all sorts of goodies such as links and your list of labels by using the page elements button. When you are done, go to fonts and colors to customize. My test blog had some sidebar colors that seriously needed to be changed after the conversion but it was a simple fix.
A note, think about the style of your labels before you begin. If you type labels, LABELS, LaBels, lables, or whatever, that's what the actual label will look like on your post, any subsequent post you use it in and on your blog home page if you display your label list.
Adding labels to old posts looks relatively painless as long as you can tell from the title what the labels should be. There are check boxes and drop down menu on the edit post page to enable adding labels to published posts. You can add the same labels or label to multiple posts at the same time or add labels post by post.
There are differences in how past posts and blog archives are displayed, but for me they were minor. I'll continue to play with my "test" and will let you know if I uncover any issues.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
15 comments:
I just switched a few minutes ago, too, and it was painless. There were a few tense moments, because it took a while, but it finally happened without a hitch.
I haven't decided whether I want to customize my layout yet -- it sounds nice, but I like my current template (and especially my banner). Would I have to recode it all over again to match what it currently looks like?
Thanks for your perspective, FJK.
Geesh, just posted a long comment, and Blogger ate it up.
I transferred Sweetnicks last night and didn't have one single problem. The process took just minutes, and I didn't need to do a thing.
I didn't copy my heavily-customized template beforehand, but luckily had no issues.
I have been using the new beta for another site for the past week or so, and love, love, love it. The biggest perk for me is instant publishing. No watching the little spinning timer when you upload a new post. You click publish and it's there instantly.
On the dashboard, it now shows my sites that are in the beta format on the top, and then the lower half are blogs that have not yet made the leap.
Anyways, very simple, painless process that takes just minutes. :)
I updated another site of mine last night and the transfer itself was fine. Then I did a template switch and lost everything I had in a sidebar. I don't think that was caused by the upgrade itself but something to think about if you are tempted to switch templates.
How can I switch my all 3 Blogs to the new version? I have NO switching option anymore.. or shell I wait with this?..
Thank you .
Ok,
I think this answer can help,here is the link:
http://groups.google.com/group/blogger-help-howdoi/msg/84efbab444fade9b
written by Jordan- a Blogger Employee .
Thank you
I've switched with no serious problems. The only two issues were:
a) My old hack to cover up the navbar at the top stopped working, but I already knew about this and thanks to help from other FBS members I had new code ready to implement... and it worked OK.
b) I lost all the accented characters in my sidebar and footer (although all accented characters in postings were fine). I couldn't make the help instructions to change encoding style work because I'm using my old template and not a standard one. So I changed them by hand and this was also OK.
I will report any other problems. Otherwise it looks good and very easy. FBS shows up as not converted yet, of course.
Paul,
Old blogger or new, anytime you switch templates you will lose any customization. The blog I switched didn't have much customization so it wasn't a big issue. My understanding is that if I had stayed with the original template after the switch, I would have no losses. If I switched to the new page element system, even if I kept my same "look" I would have to add back in all customization.
FJK
I've made some changes to my template, such as title color, margins, sidebar customizations, etc. I'm not clear from the comments as to whether all the customizations will remain when I cross over, or if it will revert to the native form of the template.
Oh, the irony!
Your post laid all my fears to rest and I was steeling myself to do the dreaded switch and now I'm not getting the offer (which has been on my dashboard for days and days and days)!
Well, they say that lots of folks are switching and they'll "let [us] know when they are ready for [us]".
Well, technically you are probably correct that I had customized it though I lost things like the "Powered by Blogger" button, my blogroll, and my Flickr badge. Things I had to manually add to the template before but now I can set up in Beta and switch templates all I want and not lose. I just never really considered that blog 'customized' in comparison to sites like Sweetnicks.
Now that blogger is out of beta, they were finally able to switch me. I made a lot of customizations to my template, but everything switched over beautifully as far as I can see. Now I just have to play around with the new features when I get a chance!
Chanit - you asked about switching all three of your blogs over. When they give you the option again to switch, they will automatically do it for ALL of the blogs that you administer.
cate , thanks .
Having survived the change over, and being one of the many people who emailed Sam to be unsubscribed (fortunately I was not), can I put on the record my gratitude for her patience during this whole process.
Post a Comment