What is a Blog?

I think that those of us who blog assume that everyone who surfs the Internet knows exactly what a blog is. I mean everyone has heard of MySpace, right? Haven’t you heard people say “I’m going to post that on my blog” at dinner parties? As a computer teacher I try to avoid using too much computer jargon when new students start my program, but as a blogger I sometimes forget that “blog” is a relatively new term to many. I realize this when I mention my various educational blogs to new students and they ask the question “exactly what is a blog?”

A blog or weblog is essentially a journal or diary that is available on the web. Updating or writing in a web journal is called “blogging”. Blogs have become very popular over the last several years; it’s difficult to tell today exactly how many blogs are currently “active”, but in 2004, Pew International stated that eight million Americans had created blogs. To learn more about the blog craze you may want to ready this Time article 10 Things We Learned About Blogs. Blogs have transformed over the last couple of years; while you will still find blogs that discuss a person’s daily events and/or innermost feelings, you will now find technology blogs, photo blogs, recipe blogs, music blogs, and even corporate blogs. This site is a blog.

How can you tell when a site is a blog?

Here are some common characteristics of a blog:

1. The content is posted in reverse chronological order (similar to a resume) with the most recent post at the top of the page.
2. Posts are separated by the post title, post author, and post date; each of these items is typically a link to further information or the full post content.
3. A blog allows visitors to make comments, so you will usually see a link for comments with each post.
4. Frequently bloggers use sidebars on their sites; these sidebars (site menus) include links to monthly and category archives, calendars, search boxes, subscription information, recent comments and posts, and site meta information. If you look to the right you will see many of these items.

If you take a look at my other blogs you will see the same characteristics at each site: photography blog, recipe blog, and the hermit crab blog.

So, what’s so good about blogs?

Once a blog has been setup it is very easy to update on a daily or regular basis because it requires little technical knowledge. Simply type the text that you want to add to your blog into a web form and click a button to post your content. That’s it, your new content is published immediately to the web. You don’t have to open a text editor, Dreamweaver, or any other HTML editor to update your content on the web and you don’t have to FTP. For the most part you really don’t have to know any HTML or XHTML code to have a blog. There is a screen capture to the right of the interface that I use to update this blog. That being said, most blogs are fully customizable; you can edit the PHP, the CSS, and the XHTML to suit your needs. You can be as geeky as you want to be with a blog.

How do I get a blog?

There are many blog publishing platforms available. Some are hosted on third party web sites like Blogger, TypePad, MySpace, SquareSpace, LiveJournal, and BlogEasy. The benefit of these hosted blogs is that setup is very easy; it usually only requires the user to complete a web form. Maintenance is also simple; a few mouse clicks and you can change the look of your entire blog. The possible downside of these blogging platforms is that their features may be limited and the blog is not usually hosted on your own domain. If you’re looking for really simple and free, this may be the option for you.

More robust publishing platforms require the installation of files on your web host. These publishing systems include: b2, Movable Type, Greymatter, and WordPress. For these programs your web host must have PHP/MySQL and possibly CGI capabilities. You will need to have some experience with HTML, FTP, CSS, and PHP. Personally, I prefer WordPress; the community support is wonderful, the interface is easy to use, and the installation is simple compared to some of the other platforms.

Fortunately, you can easily install WordPress and other blogging platforms with your robinshosting.com account. If you haven’t already signed up for a free robinshosting.com ’student’ account and you’re in my class, signup today. Using CPanel, you can access the Fantastico auto installer and install WordPress with just a few clicks of your mouse. I have created a Flash movie tutorial for installing WordPress that you can review to create your own WordPress blog today.

If you’re not into Flash movies, here are the simple steps:

1. Open CPanel - If you are a student in my class the CPanel address is http://www.robinshosting.com/cpanel. You will need your account username and password to access this page. If you haven’t signed up for an account, visit http://www.robinshosting.com and sign up for the “student” hosting account.
2. Click the Fantastico icon towards the bottom of the page.
3. You should see a menu on the left-hand side of the page. Under the Blog category there is a link for WordPress, click the WordPress link.
4. A WordPress description should appear, click the New Installation link.
5. At the install WordPress screen, select the domain that you want to install to and type the name of the folder that you want to install to (this folder will become a part of your blog address, so choose wisely). Type the desired admin username and password. Type the desired admin nickname (this will appear when you post to your blog) and enter your email address, the site name and a brief site description. Under the email account information you should only have to enter the password.
6. Click Install WordPress. When prompted click Finish Installation.
7. Congrats! You’ve successfully installed WordPress. Be sure to bookmark the blog address, the admin access page and don’t forget your username and password!

If you do not have access to CPanel and Fantastico with your host and you need help setting up WordPress review How-to Setup a WordPress Blog with f2o.org Tutorial - Updated for WordPress 1.5

Part II of this series will discuss how to setup and post to your new WordPress blog. Part III will cover styling your blog using WordPress themes and customizing WordPress themes. Part IV will discuss WordPress plugins that make blogging easier.

There have been several other articles posted on this subject recently. Check the following for more information:

20 Answers to the Question What Does it Take to Blog

HOW TO: Start Blogging

Some ROP students have opted to sign up for paid hosting. If you have a paid hosting account with CPanel management you can setup what is called an Addon Domain. Addon domains allow you to point different domain names to different folders on your account.

For example, I have three sites that I manage, a photography site, a recipe site, and a baseball site. I could purchase three hosting packages to host the sites, but that’s expensive and I would have to use different CPanel interfaces to manage each account. I already pay for one hosting account with 500 megabytes of space. That’s really a lot of space for one small site, so instead of purchasing three hosting accounts I can use the larger account to host all three sites.

So how do I do that? The first step is to create folders for each of the sites. Site folders can be created with an FTP program, Dreamweaver, or by using CPanel’s File Manager (Flash SWF - 367kb). For the sites mentioned above I would create three folders: photos, recipes, and baseball to store the individual site’s files. Then the site files need to be uploaded to the appropriate site folders.

When a user wants to access the sites that are in these folders they would have to type http://robin.robinshosting.com/photos, http://robin.robinshosting.com/recipes, or http://robin.robinshosting.com/baseball. What I really want is to give each of these sites their own domain names. I already purchased three domain names for use with these sites: http://www.photosbyrobin.com for the photography site, recipesbyrobin.com for the recipe site, and robinlovesbaseball.com for the baseball site. I also changed the nameservers at the domain registrar to point to my hosting company. Using Addon domains, a CPanel function, allows me to point my different domain names at the appropriate folders.

Here are the steps:

1. Open CPanel.
2. Click the Addon Domains icon.
3. Type your domain name without the http://www. in the ‘New Domain Name’ box and press the tab key. When you press the tab key the ‘Username/directory/subdomain Name’ box will automatically be filled with the domain name. Click the image below to see a screen capture.
   
4. Change the ‘Username/directory/subdomain Name’ that was automatically filled out when you completed the previous step to the desired folder name. For this example I will use photos. Click the image below to see a screen capture.
   
5. Click Add Domain!

That’s it; your domain name (photosbyrobin.com) will now point at the specified folder (photos) and display the folder’s contents. For example, if a user was to type the URL photosbyrobin.com in their browser the site will appear. You can repeat the process for each domain/folder that you would like to associate. Please keep in mind that it will take up to 48 hours for the domain to propagate.

If you would like to see a demonstration of this process view the Flash movie tutorial How to Addon a Domain (Flash SWF file - 243kb).

Definition of Terms

Domain Name: www.mydomainname.com - this is the address that people will use to access your web site.

Domain Name Registrar: A service that leases domain names to the public. Many registrars are also hosting companies.

Hosting Company: A company that provides server space for you to store your web site.

Nameserver: The server that associates domain names with the web hosting company’s servers.

So you’re ready to get your first domain name? Terrific! Before you get to excited you will need to be sure that the domain name you want is available at a domain name registrar. There are many popular registrars available, but my personal favorite is Godaddy.com.

At the domain name registrar you can search for available domain names and order your site’s domain name if it is available. Keep in mind that your first choice for a domain name may already be taken. If your desired domain name is taken, check Domains Bot for alternative domain names. At Domains Bot type in a keyword that relates to your site content in the search box and click Search. Domains Bot will return a list of suggested domain names, their availability, and purchasing information.

Once you have the domain name selected and you’ve determined that it is available you can then lease the domain name at the registrar. Yes, I said lease; you don’t really own the domain name, instead you lease it for a period of one to 10 years.

Once you’ve gotten your new domain name you have to point your domain name to your hosting company’s servers. This process is called updating nameservers. When you purchase your domain name from a domain name registrar the nameservers are usually pointing to the registrar’s servers and to a temporary “coming soon” page.

You will have to get the nameserver addresses (there are typically two) from the hosting company. The nameserver addresses should look something like: NS1.YOURHOSTINGCOMPANY.COM and NS2.YOURHOSTINGCOMPANY.COM. Once you have the nameserver addresses from your host, visit your registrar’s home page and log into your account. From the account or domain manager you should look for an option to update or manage the nameservers. If you have used GoDaddy to purchase your domain names you can watch this Flash Movie - Updating Nameservers (Flash SWF - 1094kb) to see a demo of how to update your servers.

Once you change the nameservers it will take 24-48 hours for the domain name to propagate. This means that your new domain name may not work for up to 48 hours. Be patient.

If you do not have a hosting company here are some tips for finding a hosting company.

Free Web Hosting Information

Free web hosting is available to students who are currently enrolled in the ROP Technology Center’s Web Design Program. This hosting program will be available to students for the duration of their course.

Since many of you are approaching chapter four of the XHTML book it’s time to sign up for your free account. You can sign up for the free ‘Student’ hosting account at http://www.robinshosting.com. It is your responsibility to read all of the information presented on http://www.robinshosting.com including the terms of service. After reading the terms of service, select the ‘Student’ Plan under the Free hosting option and click Continue. Select ’search for a desired subdomain’ and type the desired subdomain name (subdomain names must be eight characters or less) and click continue to see if the name is available, click continue again. Complete the account details making sure to change your username (I would recommend that you make your subdomain and username the same) Click continue when you’re done.

Once you sign up for your account and it’s approved you will receive an email with important details about your account (login information, FTP details, webmail login, and CPanel access). Be sure to save the account details email.

Your free account will be a subdomain of robinshosting.com. This means that the URL to your site will look like this: http://yourusername.robinshosting.com. I hope to have additional domain name choices in the future.

You should take the time to get to know the features of your new account. Review the guides and resources and the CPanel and Fantastico tutorials.

If you need to update your customer contact information once your account is setup you can visit http://www.robinshosting.com/host/customer.php. You can also submit support tickets from the customer support area. There is a support forum for you to use to post questions and share tips with your fellow students.

Paid Web Hosting Information

When you graduate from the program you can continue to have your accounts hosted on the robinshosting.com servers for a monthly fee, move your files to another hosting company, or close your account. The monthly hosting fee helps to support free hosting for future ROP students. At this time we have two paid hosting packages available:

• Graduate $6.00/mo - 300MB space, 7GB bandwidth, unlimited email and FTP accounts, PHP 5 - MySQL 4.1 (unlimited databases), CPanel, Fantastico, five add-on domains
• Alumni $8.00/mo - 500MB space, 15GB bandwidth, unlimited email and FTP accounts, PHP 5 - MySQL 4.1 (unlimited databases), CPanel, Fantastico, unlimited sub domains, 10 add-on domains

You can learn more about the features of these plans on the hosting plans page.

Both of these accounts support multiple domains. This means that you can host and control multiple web sites with one account. The ‘Graduate’ plan will support up to five domains and the ‘Alumni’ plan will support up to 10 domains. If you decide to upgrade your account to paid hosting you will not have to move files, the upgrade will be handled by me.

If you would like to sign up for paid hosting and upgrade your existing account, let me know which plan you would like and how often you would like to be billed. I will upgrade your existing account and send you an invoice for payment.

Alternatively, if you would like to sign up for a separate new paid hosting account with it’s own domain name follow these steps:

1. Visit the hosting order page
2. Select the hosting plan (Graduate or Alumni) from the ‘Paid Hosting’ drop down menu, select the desired payment cycle (monthly, quartly, half yearly, yearly, and click Continue
3. Select ‘Use a domain name you already have’. Note: If you do not have a domain name, visit GoDaddy.com and purchase your domain name. Type your domain name and click Continue.
4. At the customer information page select the ‘Existing Customer’ option and type the email address and password that you used when you signed up for the account. Click Continue.
5. Review the Cart Contents and select ‘PayPal’ under the Payment options. Payments will be reoccurring with PayPal. Click Submit Order. Login to your PayPal account and click continue. Make the payment.