Skip to main content

Web 2.0 without Notes 8 - Getting Started with BlogSphere on Domino

These instructions use Notes 7.

Getting hold of the Template
Go to OpenNTF.org and login. If you don't have a login, you should register for one. It's free, but you can't download without being logged in.

Download the BlogSphere Template. At the time of writing, the current version was 3.0

Documentation
Documentation for BlogSphere is at the BlogSphere Wiki. It's obviously going to be a better source of information than this blog. I'm only writing this because I want to keep my notes somewhere and I want to show how easy the product is.

[Note: Sadly, I've just had a look at the documentation and, at present, I'm not sure if it is actually better than this blog entry. Maybe I'm looking at it wrong - I hope so].

Save the Template on your Domino Server and Sign it with an appropriate ID.

Creating a New Blog
From the Notes Client select File, Database New.
Specify the Correct Server, Path and Filename to the Database (whatever you like really).

Choose the BlogSphere Template and click OK.


Initial Configuration
As part of the Blog Creation process a Start Wizard appears. This is pretty cool and I don't think I've seen this feature used in a Notes database before.

Click the Start Wizard Button.
fill in a Blog Name, Description, Home URL and Base URL. You can just hit next on the next two screens about comments and spam since you can change these settings later.

You might want to allow Email blogs in the Inbound Email Processing Section. Choose Specific Address and type an email address like myblog@mycompany.com


Access Controls
In order to be able to configure the blog template, you will need to put appropriate access controls in place. Don't forget to deal with -Default- and Anonymous if required.

First Blog Entry
To Have a look at your blog, Click the Goto button and then click Blog Homepage. It should open in a browser window.

At first, your blog will look a bit blank. That's because there are no entries there. I have to admit though, it already looks better in V3 than V2.5 of BlogSphere.

To create a new blog entry, click the button (in the Notes client) marked New Blog Entry.

You should put something into the Blog Title and the Blog Text fields. Once you've done that, click publish story.

Go back to the web version of your blog and refresh. It should look better.

Still nowhere near as user friendly as Blogger but for a commercial entity... not bad.

In my next post, I'll look at tidying up the settings and adding menus and functionality to the blog (assuming I can work it out by then).

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

How to Change Your Notification Options for New Lotus Notes Mail in version 8.x

Don't worry, I'm not patronizing you (my readers), I just decided to re-document this for one of our internal users and thought you might want to be able to use it in your own user documentation. WHAT IS THIS DOCUMENT ABOUT? Some people who don't get a lot of mail, like to be notified when such an event occurs. Notification can be; via a sound via a pop-up box via the system tray (where the computer clock is) The pop up box looks like this; Other people, who like myself, get too much mail would rather not be notified. The aim of this document is to tell you how (and where) to turn these options on and off. CHANGING YOUR SETTINGS To change your settings from the Notes 8.x client; On the Menu, click File , then Preferences... On the left hand side , click on the little plus sign to the left of Mail to expand the options. Click on the option marked Sending and Receiving . In the middle section, under receiving, you can control your notifications. If you untick the box mark...

How to Create a Bootable DVD Using Nero Burning ROM 9

I often need to create bootable CDs and DVDs but it's weird because I frequently end up buring myself a new coaster instead. It's not that the process is difficult, just that nero has a few too many options and I forget which ones to choose and end up picking the wrong one. I figured that the best way to avoid this mistake in future would be to write the steps down. Procedure Insert CD or DVD into your DVD Burner. Start Nero Burning ROM 9 Choose DVD-ROM (Boot) or CD-ROM (Boot) depending on what you're creating You'll be prompted for a disk image source. Choose a Nero Source - you'll usually find them somewhere like this... C:\Program Files\Nero\Nero9\Nero Burning Rom\DOSBootImage.ima Leave the Boot Locale as English - unless you really need a different keyboard layout Tick the box marked [X] Enable Expert Settings Choose Hard Drive Emulation and leave any other settings as they are. Click the button marked New Add any files you want but don't try to add operati...

How to Create an Auto-Response Mail Message in Lotus Notes 8.5.3+

Why would you do this? Suppose that you have an externally accessible generic email address for your company; support@mycompany.com or info@mycompany.com. You might expose this to the web and allow people to send messages to you. Setting up an auto-response email will tell the senders that their message reached its destination and that it will be dealt with accordingly.  It's also good practice to include links to FAQs or other useful information. Why 8.5.3 The techniques we'll be using here work in older versions of Notes but some of the options seem to have moved around in 8.5.3.  I figured it was a good time to show you where they've moved to. The Procedure Start Domino Designer and open the Mail file to be modified.  A really quick way to do this is to right-click on the application tab and choose "Open in Designer". In the Left hand panel of designer, expand Code and then double-click Agents.  A new window should appear. Click the action ...