What is a blog?

According to Wikipedia: A blog is a website where entries are written in chronological order and displayed in reverse chronological order. "Blog" can also be used as a verb, meaning to maintain or add content to a blog.

Blogs provide commentary or news on a particular subject such as food, politics, or local news; some function as more personal online diaries. A typical blog combines text, images, and links to other blogs, web pages, and other media related to its topic. The ability for readers to leave comments in an interactive format is an important part of many blogs.

In May 2007, blog search engine Technorati was tracking more than 71 million blogs.

The most important thing to remember when creating a blog is that all can SEE what you enter. Treat the info posted as something you would be proud to read on the front page of a newspaper. Also, posting minimal personal info is a good policy.

Why this blog?

This blog is intended to be a guide in the creation of a blog to document your research. This blog was inspired after viewing the following:
http://www.amymccleary.blogspot.com/
Amy did a great job and her blog is an excellent example of "how to do it right"

Getting Started

You can get started at:
http://www.blogger.com
Just go to this site to create a new blog. There are easy to follow step by step instructions, and it's free.

1. Create a Google Account (your user name will be the e-mail address you entered and write down your password)
2. Create a title and website address (write down your web address and don't forget to add the ".blogspot.com)
3. Choose a template and you're done! You can now post or logoff

Now post away!

Whenever you want to edit or add to your blog just go to web site www.blogger.com and login using your username and password. Note that your user name will be the e-mail address you used NOT your display name.

After you have logged in, click on the "View Blog". Select the "New Post" tab. To create a new post, select the "Create" tab to add text, format and add images. "Edit Posts" lets you select an existing post and add/modify text, format and add/delete images. Just click on the edit posts tab and select the post you want to modify by clicking on "edit" for that post and edit away. Make sure you click the orange "Publish Post" button to finalize your changes on your blog.

You can easily change the layout of your current template, edit page elements, or choose a new template by clicking on the "Template" tab and follow the directions.

A blog automatically posts from newest date to oldest. Sometimes in an informational blog, like this, you want to reorder the posts. The easiest way to do this is to go to the "Edit Posts" section and change the post dates by clicking on "Post Options" at the bottom of the edit box and overwrite the post date remembering that the most current will appear first on your blog. Again, always "Publish Post" to record your changes.

You can view your blog by just clicking on the "View Blog" at the top of the page.

Inserting a picture

It's easy to insert a photo. Just click on the new post menu and in either the new post or edit post section, you can click on the photo icon, follow the step by step directions and bam, you have a photo on your blog.

The first photo in this section was taken with a digital camera. The original jpg size, 1275kb; dimensions 2592 pixels (36") x 1944 pixels (27"). In the add a photo section, for the first copy of the photo, I selected the medium image option and selected the center position. I browsed to the photo and clicked the upload image button. Blogger took care of the rest, resizing the image and reducing the file size-easy, easy,easy. I did the same with the second image except I selected a small image, to the right of text. Now just hit the "Publish Post" button and you're done.

A reminder! Adhere to all copyright laws. If you did not take the photo, you need permission to use it. If you're the photographer, you should ask permission of identifiable people (and document ) . General crowd shots are ok to use. If you are participating in a funded research project, the use of research subject photos is prohibited. I obviously can't cover all the copyright issues, but you can ask your librarian or google copyright to get an overview.

Common sense and the "golden rule" (look it up) are also good guidelines.

The Next Step

If you start feeling confident about your blogging skills, you can add some interesting features.

If you have created a video or want to use an existing video, go to the You Tube site and upload your video or select one. Go to the Tag section on You Tube and copy the "embed" code (highlight and control C). Open your blog and either edit a post or create a new one. Paste (Control V) the code into the text section and "Publish Post". Your video is now embedded in your blog. Show time!