Resource Analysis

Name of Tool

Templates for Blogger pages.

Brief overview of the tool

Blogger has a 'Customize' option that allows users to make changes to the appearance of blog pages. One of the tabs that is presented is 'Layout'. A sub-option of Layout is 'Edit HTML'. Before any changes are made, it is recommended to download and save the existing template. For this, you click on the link 'Download Full Template' and save an xml file in your local disk.

Using the 'Browse...' button, it is possible to search for a new blogger template that has been previous saved as an xml file. Then, you click on the 'Upload' button to load the new xml contents in the code window. If you have nothing else to do, simply click on 'Save Template. Now, you can take a look at the new visual appearance of the blog page that has been modified by clicking on 'View Blog'.

What was the problem or goal you wanted to address?

The goal that I wanted to address was related to finding out ways of changing the very basic look of standard blogger blog templates. Since, blog pages all look the same, they do not command the same authority as those blogs that are made to look more professional. Depending on the your purpose for blogging, you may choose to remove the blogger navbar because having one makes a blog look more like a free-hosted blog and less like a professional site worth taking seriously. Moreover, making changes to the template's arrangement of objects may also provide a better control about how to arrange and what to display on the pages.

Before

After

The positives of the tool
 
The tool has very limited options, but are restricted just allowing a user to finding a substitute template and then uploading the code to the blogger page. It is important to mention that, the most important option here is the one that allows users to backup their existing template. If a user changes to different templates, he/she can easily load the original template at any time. You can always 'Clear Edits' or 'Revert widget templates to default' or the Classic template.

When working with the code window, you have to pay attention to remember the location of the line of code that you are modifying. If you don't pay attention to the scroll bar slide on the right, don't be surprised when you decide to save the template and find yourself at the top of the code window again.

Most of the templates that you can find on the Internet will have comments on the code. They may even have areas where you are told what type of information to fill in. For instance a hyperlink tag or title tag might contain something like this: href='YOUR-LINK-HERE' or title='YOUR-LINK-TITLE-HERE'.

The negatives of the tool

If users are interested in modifying the template that is currently loaded in the code window, they better have some knowledge of HTML or XML code before making changes. For instance, someone may choose to remove the blogger navbar because having one makes a blog look more like a free-hosted blog and less like a professional site worth taking seriously. This actually is not much of a deal, but it requires users to include the following line of code:

#navbar-iframe {
display: none !important;
}

As you can see in the image below, the contents window does not provide any line number to help you find code lines when needed.

Challenges

In order to make real changes to the blogger blogs using the templates that can be easily found in the Internet, users need to learn some basic characteristics of web pages. For example, I would recommend people to learn about the concept of widgets. According to Wikipedia, widgets are basic visual building blocks which, combined in an application, hold all the data processed by the application and the available interactions on this data. This is an interesting concept, because when you upload per-defined templates, sometimes you need to chose whether or not to keep certain widgets.

If you find that reading from the code window results in a tedious process, you could also open the XML file in Dreamweaver and modify the code there. The editor in Dreamweaver will provide additional features that will allow you to visualize and change the code easily. You will just need to copy that code back to the blogger code window.

There are many free XML blogger template web sites and really innumerable possibilities to use for a professional looking template. Take your chances and explore various options until you find your match.

Resources

How to Make Your Google Blogger Blog Look More Professional:
http://www.ehow.com/how_5469916_make-blogger-blog-look-professional.html

The Blogger Template Designer:
http://bloggerindraft.blogspot.com/2010/03/blogger-template-designer.html

How To Remove The Blogger Nav Bar:
http://hubpages.com/hub/How-To-Remove-The-Blogger-Nav-Bar

15 Websites to Download Free Blogger Templates:
http://techshali.com/15-websites-to-download-free-blogger-templates/

GUI widget:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Widget_%28computer%29

How to Change or install new Template in Blogger?:
http://www.tothepc.com/archives/how-to-change-or-install-new-template-in-blogger/