How to use this blog

Posted by admin on April 4th, 2005 9:42 am

In order to write a post (see glossary, below) to this blog, you need to register a user name and an email address. Note that user names and login passwords are case sensitive (i.e. capitalization matters).

To register, get a password and log in:

1. Click on “register” under “User Portal” on the right side menu of the blog. If somehow you get a login box rather than a register box, just click on the link “register” at the bottom.

2. Enter whatever username you want to use and a valid email address, which is necessary so you can get your password via email.

3. Click on “register” to submit the information.

4. Check your email, a password should be sent shortly. If you know how, it’s best to use your mouse to copy and paste the password, since it will be a gobbledygook one.

5. Go back to the site, and click on “log in” under the user portal, or else “write post,” which will also get you to the login screen. Enter the exact username and password, being careful to use the same capitalization. Click “log in.” If you get a red error message, try again. There might be a bug in the program so it often does this the first time.

6. The login directs you to the “dashboard page” with a pink “latest activity” box. Above that screen is a line of links. To write a post click on “Write.”

7: To change your password (optional): On the dashboard page, above the “latest activity” box, click on “users” and you will see your profile. You can change your password at the bottom of your profile by entering any password twice. Just remember that capitalization is important.

 

Hints and Tips

Clicking on the blog title at the top of the page will always go to the blog home page.

Posts automatically go to the top of the page and are listed in reverse chronological order. All posts will be kept in this order. You can get to older blog posts by clicking on “previous” at the bottom or using the search function.

To add a working link to a post or comment use the “quick tag” link above the writing box. First select a word like “blog”, then click on the “link” little box and cut and paste the address from the browser window into the little pop-up box, deleting the extra “http” that is automatically inserted. Then click “ok.”

Use the right mouse click to cut, copy and paste things.

To put a “read the rest of this entry” link and truncate your post if it’s very long: just put the cursor where you want to cut off the post and click on the quicktag “more” above the main writing box. It will insert the link that you click on to read the rest of the post.

The Unread Comments and Weather functions use cookies that are stored on your computers. Changing them only changes what you see on your computer, not on anyone else’s. The Unread Comments feature is a little buggy and doesn’t always work perfectly.

Glossary:

Post — the main paragraph with the title, starting off the conversation.
Comment — paragraphs underneath the post.
Category — the category of subject of the post. There is a place to choose the category of the post in the screen for when you write a post but not in the screen to make a comment.
Page — a page that’s like a post except it’s on the menu and not in the blog order. It doesn’t have comments. This is a page.
User Portal — navigation area for user functions of the blog: registering, logging in, writing posts, changing passwords etc.
Site admin — where registered users can write posts, change their profiles and look at lists of recent comments and posts by title.

Quicktags

The quicktags are things to help format text. Generally you select a word or block of text and then click on the quick tag to apply the formatting. Here are what they are:

b — bold
i – italics
b-quote —

block quote, which indents a block of quote and puts a little border around it

del — makes a strikeout line
ins — underlines
img — inserts an image
ul —

    unordered list not indented

ol —

    ordered list (not sure what this does)

li -

  • list, which inserts bullets

    • code — makes this type font
    more — if you insert this it truncates your post so the rest of the post goes on another page. The reader can click on “read more.”
    lookup — looks up whatever you’ve selected on “answers.com
    Close tags — don’t know

    If you have a problem that isn’t answered here, please email me by using the “contact webmaster” link at the bottom of the page, or send an email to Jo or my mother, Darlyne and they can forward it to me.

    Jenny