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Sunday, September 26, 2004

Tips: Categorize Blogger Posts

Before read this article, I need to tell you that I have implemented a Web services to generate cateogry list for blogger. You can check out at BlogCat, which is easier to maintain than the method introduced in the following paragraphs.


This article give a tip to categorize ur posts. With tricks given, u only need to add several words in ur posts to put them into a certain category. And then, following a hyperlink, u can list all posts of a category.
Before you read this post, plz refer to another post, which bring a idea to categorize ur blogger archives. Its basic idea is to:

  1. generate a permanent link for each post on blogger, actually, this is the default action of most blogger template
  2. build some category pages that list those permanent links.
The shortcoming of this method is that u must maintain these category pages, oh, thank god, we need not to do it anymore.
  1. plz confirm whether u have generate a permanent link for each post, if no, plz follow this post to generate them.
  2. add a site search for ur blogger. I know google is the choice for most ppls, here, i recommend PICO, as i am using it. Why to use PICO? As it can index ur website when you need, and no need to wait several months for google reindexing. U donna know what's PICO site search? plz visit its homepage. :-), or try the sample in my right panel. its codes are:
    <FORM METHOD="GET"
          ACTION="http://www.picosearch.com/cgi-bin/ts.pl">
    <INPUT TYPE="HIDDEN" NAME="index" VALUE="223786">
    <TABLE  CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 BORDER=0><TR><TD>
    <TABLE  CELLSPACING=2 CELLPADDING=0 BORDER=0>
    <TR>
    <TD colspan="2"><A HREF="http://www.picosearch.com/cgi-bin/index.pl?wherefrom=picobox&type=all" TARGET="_blank">
    <IMG BORDER="0" SRC="http://www.picosearch.com/picosmall.gif" ALT="PicoSearch"></A>
    <INPUT TYPE="TEXT" NAME="query" VALUE="" SIZE="19"></TD>
    </TR>
    <TR>
    <TD>
    <INPUT TYPE="SUBMIT" VALUE="Go" name="SEARCH">
    </TD><TD ALIGN=RIGHT><SELECT NAME="opt"><OPTION SELECTED VALUE="ANY">Find ANY word  <OPTION VALUE="ALL">Find ALL words <OPTION VALUE="EXACT">Find EXACT phrase</SELECT></TD></TR>
    <tr><td><FONT SIZE=-2><A HREF="http://www.picosearch.com/cgi-bin/ts.pl?index=223786&help=help" >Help </A></FONT></td><td align=right><font size=-2><a href="http://www.picosearch.com/cgi-bin/index.pl?wherefrom=picobox&type=all" target=_blank>Site Search by PicoSearch</a></font></td></tr>
    </TABLE></TD></TR></TABLE></FORM>
  3. add a form to ur blogger template: <form METHOD="GET" ACTION="http://www.picosearch.com/cgi-bin/ts.pl">
    <INPUT TYPE="HIDDEN" NAME="index" VALUE="223786">
    <INPUT TYPE="HIDDEN" NAME="opt" VALUE="ALL">
    <SELECT NAME="query" width="100"><OPTION SELECTED VALUE="xxxxx Category-Research">Research   
    <OPTION VALUE="xxxxx Category-Life">Life</SELECT>
    <INPUT TYPE="SUBMIT" VALUE="List Posts" name="SEARCH">
    </form>
    plz replace the index INPUT value with ur own value. Mine is 223786. Your can find it in the FORM codes given by PICO. Here, i build two categories in my blogger --- "Research" and "Life". The pith is coming. :-) plz set the value of the select input's value to some words corresponding to categories. Corresponding to research category, I set the value to "xxxxx Category-Research", where xxxxx is a word (or phrase) appearing in pemanent posts only. (I use xxxxx here is because if I use the real phrase i am using, this post will taint my category.) To life category, i set it to "xxxxx Category-Life".
  4. add the word "Category-Research" to the post, anywhere u want. Then, it is categorized to "Research" category.
  5. reindex ur pico
When writing a new post, u only need to do step 4 and 5. That's all. Now u can choose a category using the combo list, and press the button. Try the pull-down menu below. Cheers.

10 comments:

rg said...

Ahh, that sounds like a nice way to organize thoughts! I also read about having multiple blogs in the help pages of blogger.

As a response to your comment on my site:

Well, it's not quite the first month. This is more like the third. I've been posting since the end of July. But I think that my posts are more of an internet-log. Other people have photo-logs, life-logs, mobile-blogs, and then there are the footnoters.

People post about what they like. Some post pictures, some vent their feelings, but I think I am laughing along with most of the internet, while I visit sites such as Fark, Ebaumsworld, etc.

Well, it's nice to have an intercontinental visitor that leaves a comment. Check out my Stats, most of the specific statistics are based on the last 100 visitors.

Li-Zhao 李钊 said...

I enjoy seating myself in a cosy chair and read various blogs. hehe, however, time is so limited, I need more papers to get my degree. I notice that google updated PR values just now, and our PR were both changed to 3. :-D

rg said...

Wow, it's true!!! 3/10... I feel like saying 'Hooray'

so

Hooray!!!!

Christine said...

Hi,

I just started my blog recently. Your nice instruction is the tip I was looking for. One question though, what is your entry point? My blog is "http://yuphoto.blogspot.com". I use "http://yuphoto.blogspot.com" as my entry point but the message always shows
[NoIndex URL] http://yuphoto.blogspot.com/
[Nofollow Links from URL] http://yuphoto.blogspot.com/

Thank you!

Michael Durand said...

thanks li zhao... very useful! i cast around a bit for what text to use that would only appear in the entries (ie and not in the monthly archives, etc). finally, i settled on 'post a comment'. it's ghetto, but it works. thanks again!

Li-Zhao 李钊 said...

hi, michael, u r welcome, actually, u can do further config of the format of search results.

Michael Durand said...

interesting. i'd love to hear how. what i'd _really_ love to do is format the categories to work exactly like the archives ... so that you never have to leave the blogger domain. i guess it may be a pipe dream, but that would be ideal.... any thoughts?

Li-Zhao 李钊 said...

so far, i think we can only change format options provided by pico. :-) as for ur 'dream', i think it also be possible. you can use iframe to embed the search result in ur current page: e.g., http://spide.blogspot.com/2004/08/some-links.html

John said...

Another method for Categories in Blogger: I add tags to my post that are valid in technorati but also link to del.icio.us. When you bookmark the post to your del.icio.us account, the tags become your categories, & del.icio.us manages them for you. As a side benefit, your posts are also picked up by tag search engines. Other folks are building on this method w/ drop-down menus & such. See Freshblog for the scoop.

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