Jacko.MY New Design

Google or Blogger just rolled out new blogger or blogspot platform. It's in beta for past months and I tried it once, I liked it because of enhancements over some frequently used features. For instance, the "Link" feature now includes "open in new window" option as oppose to I had to modify the html code for each link I inserted into the posts. Unfortunately, it was still beta, not all features (that I used) available at that point of time. Plus, I had too many customization. As a result, I had to revert to Classic dashboard and template.

I then took some time during my leave to remove unnecessary customization, refresh my knowledge over some custom scripts I use. After some tests, finally, Jacko.MY is on the new Blogger platform with new design template and dashboard...

The Old Jacko.MY

The New Jacko.MY

Not a fancy theme, neither an advanced template. I am a minimalist so you would expect I picked the "Simple" template. I did not do much on customization this round and don't plan to do so since the new template and Blogger platform provide built in of the features that I used in the old template, in summary:

• Justify for paragraph alignment.
• "Open in new window" for links.
• "Readmore"/"Jump Break" that provides a summary of posts in the homepage than displaying the entire story.
• Statistics view (with counter widget).
• The overlay of images (or called lightbox?) on the post when click. I wanted to customize the old template to support this, now I saved my time from doing so.

The customizations are:

• Unify the color scheme for blog and widgets. For example, links will appear in the same color across the blog and the widgets such as CBox.
• Open the post in new window for "Readmore"/"Jump Break"
• Facebook "Like" and Google+ "+1" buttons.
• LinkWithin widget for related posts.

Keeping the customization to minimal would definitely ease me in future migration, or when I feel like changing to another template. The most important thing is the site loads faster with lesser scripts.

I also removed the CBox chatter box as it causes unwanted/spam pop up windows to visitors. I didn't know this (this proves that the pop up blocker by Chrome and Firefox are really effective) until I was running tests using IE. Leave your questions in the comment box from now on.

There is so far only one thing I don't like about the new dashboard, it's the consistency of integration with Google+. When you publish (or update a published post), a "Share on Google+" window will pop up...

The share result is not consistent in Google+, look at this...

I have submitted the feedback to Blogger, hopefully they can nail down to the cause.

I think Jacko.MY is good for now. I shall blog soon about my next gadget :)