Tuesday, January 05, 2010

It's harder than it used to be

Blogging, that is. And dealing with changes, too.

My retirement gift to myself was a new computer. Having nearly pulled my hair out over repeated virus problems at home and at work, I took my daughter Kim's advice and bought an iMac. I'm very satisfied with the computer itself, but what I failed to realize was that some of my favorite software isn't available for Mac systems.

I like to write my blog posts in a word-processing program (where editing is easier) and transfer them to Blogger for posting. There used to be a version of WordPerfect (my old favorite word-processing standby) for Mac, but there isn't anymore. When I bought the new computer, I had to decide between Pages and Microsoft Word. I knew I wasn't nuts about Word, so I chose the less expensive Pages. So far I've been able to do everything I've needed in Pages, but it's always taken longer than it would have in WordPerfect. (Maybe I need to read that manual I bought instead of relying on the trial-and-error method.)

Also, the little keyboard that comes with iMac, streamlined and quiet as it is, isn't as comfortable for me as an older style keyboard. The keys are full-sized on the new keyboard, but they're closer together, too. The problems were worse because the arthritis in my right hand has increased during the last year. When I hold my hand flat and try to put my fingers together, there's a distinct "V" space between my middle finger and ring finger from the fingertips to the second joint. That made it very easy to type a semi-colon instead of an "l" on the closely spaced keys. For example, if I'd had the holiday spirit, I might have typed: "Deck the ha;;s with boughs of ho;;y; fa ;a ;a ;a ;a ;a ;a ;a ;a!" Fortunately, Kim came up with a spare, older-model keyboard that has made it much easier to keep my fingers where they're supposed to be.

Today I decided to do a little blog housekeeping and clean up the sidebar. Much to my surprise, somebody apparently broke Blogger while I was gone. The "drag and drop" page elements neither drag nor drop. I was able to edit existing elements, but I couldn't add anything to the sidebar, and I couldn't move anything from one spot to the other.

Have you experienced this problem, too? Do you know of other things that have changed about Blogger in the last year? Any good new features I might enjoy? Or bad things I may not have discovered yet?

Any tips will be appreciated.

6 comments:

  1. we're just so glad you are back...I enjoy the side bar update in blogger to show when my Sister's have posted...but it does not always work...sometimes I have to post to get it to update...I am not sure that is fair...So are you about freezing where you are...Sisters in AR are about frozen stiff...It is warm and sunny in AZ...

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  2. I use Wordpress so I can't help with your problems. But if it makes you feel any better, Wordpress has its own problems-it's not as much fun to post when you have to struggle with technical hurdles.

    Glad you have a solution for the keyboard! The best thing I ever did (computer-wise) was get a wireless mouse, that eliminated the rage I felt when I had to yank on the cord trying to get a little more reach. I'm surprised I never yanked that cord right out of the back of the computer.

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  3. Velvet, the drag and drop is not available to mac users ... I found this out when discussing blogger issues with blogger buddy... She is both Mac and PC and found this out when her Mac was down! They have a totally more difficult interface for Macs!

    Re: 4th sister's issue, Some people fill out their site feed settings incorrectly and it never shows in update. Make sure your sister's have their Post Feed Redirect URL BLANK (no typing). Found under Settings / Site Feed tab in Blogger.

    Velvet, I prep posts in notepad...not sure if that bit of free software comes with Macs but it posts the cleanest to the blogger platform. DO NOT USE WORD! Formatting doesn't transfer and word puts a lot of "crap" in the post!

    Hope this helps!

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  4. Velvet, I thought I would give you an example of what word does to blogger! This happened to me tonight when I needed a symbol for my bead blog.

    Word added 1,087 characters of html to my blogger.

    And what crazy thing was I trying to add to my blog??? One tiny little heart!

    Word + Blogger = Does NOT compute!

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  5. I'm just glad you're back and I'm sorry blogger is up to its usual hijinks. Lots of things have changed with blogger...and I haven't moved to iMac. I can imagine the frustration I would feel.

    I hope the damn Arthritis isn't too bad. My fingers lock up sometimes, and I get things like this;;;;;;;;;j, lol!

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  6. Well, I'm only 3 weeks late in commenting, LOL. I've tried to use Word for my posts but its actually easier to just post them from the Blogger page as fas as I'm concerned. I may try Notepad like CreekHiker suggests and see if that's easier for me. Glad you're back....I've really missed you. Hope the weather is good for you...right now its 4 outside and I have to go out to my part-time job.....its almost not worth it. LOL

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