People who publish blogs which are relevant to a specific country may be able to focus search engine attention, for their blog, and better target readers in the country in question.
Google Webmaster Tools provides the "Geographical target" setting, which lets a blog owner select a single country. The setting increases search engine attention, for their blog, in the country selected.
If you are logged in to Google Webmaster Tools, for a given blog, find the "gear" icon in the upper right corner of the dashboard display.
From the drop down menu behind the "gear", select "Site Settings" - and "Geographical target" will be right there, in front of you. Click on "Target users in:", then select the appropriate country, in the pull down menu.
The list of countries, presented to you, appears to be rather complete. The list appears to be alphabetically sorted in the English language, as most of Webmaster Tools appears to be presented.
It's likely that your potential readers will be located using geolocation, so you should allow for some inaccuracies, in targeting specific readers. Readers who are located in regions close to national borders may appear to be located on either side of the border. Only one country can be targeted.
Note that this setting is not related to any Blogger dashboard settings, such as "Language" or "Time Zone", in "Language and formatting".
Also, note that the usefulness of this setting, like other search engine features, will depend upon your efforts in properly publicising the blog. Publicising the blog is still dependent upon your efforts - this setting, when used, simply focuses your efforts towards a single country.
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Showing posts with label Globalisation. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Globalisation. Show all posts
Sunday, 15 December 2013
Wednesday, 20 November 2013
"go.blogger.com", And SMS Based Blogging, Has Been Deprecated
We're seeing a few queries recently, in Blogger Help Forum: Something Is Broken, about a little used option in mobile blog publishing.
"go.blogger.com", and MMS / SMS, was the Blogger solution for blog publishing using "mobile" phones, provided several years ago.
SMS is a protocol used for sending text messages between computers, that was used on "mobile" phones, before most "mobile phones" became just pocket sized computers using "cellular" (3g, 4g, etc) networking.
You can think of SMS as the original "Chat" protocol, used before cellular Internet service became the normal communications service.
With the gaining popularity of using "smart" phones with cellular service, most people will publish blogs using either a browser on the phone, email (and "Mail-To-Blogger") on the phone, or (for supported phones) the "Blogger" app.
Recently, I asked Blogger Support if "go.blogger.com" and SMS based blogging had any future. The reply was bleak.
Even when people in the USA were using "go.blogger.com" and SMS for blog publishing, SMS was a constant problem. SMS is a proprietary protocol, provided by various phone carriers, over the individual cellular networks.
Even with SMS in the USA, years ago, there were some cellular services providing SMS, that did not work with Blogger. SMS outside the USA is worse - and globalisation of Blogger made this a problem.
Nowadays, not every cellular service provides SMS. Most cellular Internet providers focus on regular Internet service. If you want to "chat" with somebody, you use a normal "chat" client like GTalk - or now, Google Hangout.
If your "smart phone" (or mobile computer) supports email over voice, you can use Mail-To-Blogger. If not, you'll need a modern and supported phone, with cellular Internet service - if you want to publish your blog using your phone.
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Is "go.blogger.com" down? I'm trying to claim a mobile token, but having no success.This blog owner, like a few others, is trying to use a dying Blogger feature.
"go.blogger.com", and MMS / SMS, was the Blogger solution for blog publishing using "mobile" phones, provided several years ago.
SMS is a protocol used for sending text messages between computers, that was used on "mobile" phones, before most "mobile phones" became just pocket sized computers using "cellular" (3g, 4g, etc) networking.
You can think of SMS as the original "Chat" protocol, used before cellular Internet service became the normal communications service.
With the gaining popularity of using "smart" phones with cellular service, most people will publish blogs using either a browser on the phone, email (and "Mail-To-Blogger") on the phone, or (for supported phones) the "Blogger" app.
Recently, I asked Blogger Support if "go.blogger.com" and SMS based blogging had any future. The reply was bleak.
So that feature has been deprecated.Basically, Blogger has moved onwards - and is trying to support mobile blogging using modern equipment and services.
Even when people in the USA were using "go.blogger.com" and SMS for blog publishing, SMS was a constant problem. SMS is a proprietary protocol, provided by various phone carriers, over the individual cellular networks.
Even with SMS in the USA, years ago, there were some cellular services providing SMS, that did not work with Blogger. SMS outside the USA is worse - and globalisation of Blogger made this a problem.
Nowadays, not every cellular service provides SMS. Most cellular Internet providers focus on regular Internet service. If you want to "chat" with somebody, you use a normal "chat" client like GTalk - or now, Google Hangout.
If your "smart phone" (or mobile computer) supports email over voice, you can use Mail-To-Blogger. If not, you'll need a modern and supported phone, with cellular Internet service - if you want to publish your blog using your phone.
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Sunday, 14 April 2013
The Tower Of Babble Comes Down Slowly - One Brick At A Time
I installed the Google auto translator - using a custom front end, which I helped develop - on this blog, 5 years ago.
I installed it originally because of the February 2008 Kaspersky problem with Blogger blogs - and hastily, because of the magnitude of the problem. I knew, at the time, that the Google auto translator was not 100% accurate.
No auto translator will ever be 100% accurate. Every language in the world is always developing, as society and technology develops. There will always be nuances in every language, which are not yet detected by any one person - or by any one computer.
That said, I think that it's obvious to many people, that auto translation is a legitimate feature on the Internet.
If you've read this far, and you're using the translator to read this in a non English language, my thanks to you.
I think that the Internet in general, and Blogger blogs - and translated Blogger blogs in particular, are going to do a lot to bring the various cultures and nations of the world closer together. Being a native of the USA, I speak only English with any degree of fluency. I have, at one time, attempted both French and Spanish, as secondary languages - but this is neither the time nor place for me to discuss my experiences in France and in Panama.
I would never attempt to publish this blog, manually, in either French or Spanish - and certainly not any of the other 300+ languages which are present in the world. Since this blog has some value to Blogger blog owners and readers in general - and hopefully to some non English Blogger blog owners and readers - I think that using this blog, translated into other languages, has some value also.
If you are reading this blog in a non English language - or if you know of specific phrases or words which are not translated, successfully, by the Google translator - you are invited to suggest any appropriate improvement to Google. Translate the phrase or word in question, using the Google Translate web page - and select "Rate translation" in the lower right corner of the translation result window.
If you publish a blog in a non English language, and you don't have an auto translator gadget on your blog, I hope that you will soon add such a feature. I'll even invite you to look at Cumulus In Your Language, and see if the offered non English selections are useful to you.
Just don't dismiss auto translation, because it's not currently 100% accurate. Use it - or don't use it - on any web page where it's useful, right now. But don't dismiss it, with prejudice.
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I installed it originally because of the February 2008 Kaspersky problem with Blogger blogs - and hastily, because of the magnitude of the problem. I knew, at the time, that the Google auto translator was not 100% accurate.
No auto translator will ever be 100% accurate. Every language in the world is always developing, as society and technology develops. There will always be nuances in every language, which are not yet detected by any one person - or by any one computer.
That said, I think that it's obvious to many people, that auto translation is a legitimate feature on the Internet.
If you've read this far, and you're using the translator to read this in a non English language, my thanks to you.
I think that the Internet in general, and Blogger blogs - and translated Blogger blogs in particular, are going to do a lot to bring the various cultures and nations of the world closer together. Being a native of the USA, I speak only English with any degree of fluency. I have, at one time, attempted both French and Spanish, as secondary languages - but this is neither the time nor place for me to discuss my experiences in France and in Panama.
I would never attempt to publish this blog, manually, in either French or Spanish - and certainly not any of the other 300+ languages which are present in the world. Since this blog has some value to Blogger blog owners and readers in general - and hopefully to some non English Blogger blog owners and readers - I think that using this blog, translated into other languages, has some value also.
If you are reading this blog in a non English language - or if you know of specific phrases or words which are not translated, successfully, by the Google translator - you are invited to suggest any appropriate improvement to Google. Translate the phrase or word in question, using the Google Translate web page - and select "Rate translation" in the lower right corner of the translation result window.
If you publish a blog in a non English language, and you don't have an auto translator gadget on your blog, I hope that you will soon add such a feature. I'll even invite you to look at Cumulus In Your Language, and see if the offered non English selections are useful to you.
Just don't dismiss auto translation, because it's not currently 100% accurate. Use it - or don't use it - on any web page where it's useful, right now. But don't dismiss it, with prejudice.
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Saturday, 30 June 2012
The World Wide Blogger Culture, And Date Formatting Under The New GUI
Since Blogger took the next step with The New Blogger GUI a few months ago, and made it The Default Blogger GUI, complaints about the New GUI have been numerous, and impassioned. One complaint, seen occasionally, mentions the date / time setting wizard, in the Post Editor "Post settings" Schedule.
In criticising the new date setting wizard, we need to understand the reasons for the design. I don't think that Blogger designed the new wizard, and removed the ability to just type the date, simply because they wanted the new wizard to look shiny.
Since Blogger gave us the ability to compose posts now, and have them published some time in the future, there have been problems with scheduled posts not publishing properly. Both posts published too early, and posts never published, have been the source of many complaints. The reason for many of these complaints were not obvious, however.
When Blogger offered us the scheduled posts option in 2008, they made the ability to schedule posts quite simple. Unfortunately, they did not observe that the entire world does not type the date in the same way. Many scheduling problems were caused by people who did not enter the date properly.
Now that more people are using The New Blogger GUI, and the new date setting wizard, we are seeing significantly less complaints about posts not publishing at the right time (or at all). A large part of the reduction of such complaints, I believe, is due to the design of the new date setting wizard, which does not allow typing of the date - but forces you to explicitly select the month and year by sequential selection - and eliminates the ambiguity.
Unfortunately, this ignores the needs of people who wish to back date (or forward date) by large time spans. So, Blogger needs to make the date setting wizard just a bit more flexible.
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In the new blogger interface, it is very hard to backdate content. You have to use the calendar GUI, you can't just type a date it. I have content going back 13 years, do you know how hard it is to click the left-arrow on the calendar 144 times to get to the proper date??? It's a nightmare!This is one person who needs a more flexible date setting wizard, in The New GUI.
In criticising the new date setting wizard, we need to understand the reasons for the design. I don't think that Blogger designed the new wizard, and removed the ability to just type the date, simply because they wanted the new wizard to look shiny.
Since Blogger gave us the ability to compose posts now, and have them published some time in the future, there have been problems with scheduled posts not publishing properly. Both posts published too early, and posts never published, have been the source of many complaints. The reason for many of these complaints were not obvious, however.
When Blogger offered us the scheduled posts option in 2008, they made the ability to schedule posts quite simple. Unfortunately, they did not observe that the entire world does not type the date in the same way. Many scheduling problems were caused by people who did not enter the date properly.
Now that more people are using The New Blogger GUI, and the new date setting wizard, we are seeing significantly less complaints about posts not publishing at the right time (or at all). A large part of the reduction of such complaints, I believe, is due to the design of the new date setting wizard, which does not allow typing of the date - but forces you to explicitly select the month and year by sequential selection - and eliminates the ambiguity.
Unfortunately, this ignores the needs of people who wish to back date (or forward date) by large time spans. So, Blogger needs to make the date setting wizard just a bit more flexible.
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