Changes at Mabfan's Musings
Those of you who read my entries via a Friends page are probably not aware of the changes I've made over here on my blog, so I thought I would bring it to everyone's attention, for your amusement and edification. And those of you who are visiting from elsewhere have probably reloaded my page and gone, "Huh? What?" Since Howard Waldrop taught me back at Clarion over ten years ago that you should never do anything to make your readers go "Huh? What?" I thought I'd explain.
Basically, I woke up yesterday morning and decided that I wanted this blog to have a more "professional" feel. LiveJournal supports a variety of different customizations for paid users, so I investigated those styles and pick one that I liked.
gnomi suggested the layout called "Component" and I went with it. If you're reading this from the main page at http://mabfan.livejournal.com, you can see that my profile is on the upper right, with a calendar underneath and a list of links. (Well, one link so far, to Analog magazine. Where else?) There's a clear path to my website, and links to all the usual LiveJournal stuff (such as my user info) can still be found along the top.
Over the next few months, I imagine I'll be tinkering with the blog a little more. I need to come up with a list of appropriate links, after all, and a line of description somewhere would be nice as well. I'm also thinking of creating new headings for each entry, to give them appropriate categories, such as "Personal," "Writing," "Links," etc. Then again, it might be too much trouble.
One other note, primarily for non-LJ users. I've enabled anonymous commenting on this blog so visitors from outside of LJ-land can participate in the discussions. There are only two rules to keep in mind. First of all, I'd appreciate it if you'd end your comments with your name and perhaps a link to your own blog or webpage; otherwise we'll have no idea who you are, since Anonymous comments have no other indication of who posted them. And secondly, I reserve the right, as always, to delete any comments for whatever reason. (I suspect most LJ users enforce this second rule in their own blogs; I'm just making it explicit.)
Basically, I woke up yesterday morning and decided that I wanted this blog to have a more "professional" feel. LiveJournal supports a variety of different customizations for paid users, so I investigated those styles and pick one that I liked.
gnomi suggested the layout called "Component" and I went with it. If you're reading this from the main page at http://mabfan.livejournal.com, you can see that my profile is on the upper right, with a calendar underneath and a list of links. (Well, one link so far, to Analog magazine. Where else?) There's a clear path to my website, and links to all the usual LiveJournal stuff (such as my user info) can still be found along the top.Over the next few months, I imagine I'll be tinkering with the blog a little more. I need to come up with a list of appropriate links, after all, and a line of description somewhere would be nice as well. I'm also thinking of creating new headings for each entry, to give them appropriate categories, such as "Personal," "Writing," "Links," etc. Then again, it might be too much trouble.
One other note, primarily for non-LJ users. I've enabled anonymous commenting on this blog so visitors from outside of LJ-land can participate in the discussions. There are only two rules to keep in mind. First of all, I'd appreciate it if you'd end your comments with your name and perhaps a link to your own blog or webpage; otherwise we'll have no idea who you are, since Anonymous comments have no other indication of who posted them. And secondly, I reserve the right, as always, to delete any comments for whatever reason. (I suspect most LJ users enforce this second rule in their own blogs; I'm just making it explicit.)
(Anonymous)
If you want to connect your LJ content to a more professional context, you could import it into your official website with an iframe. There are sketchy instructions for doing so at the Drupal site: http://drupal.org/node/1901. (They don't actually require Drupal.) There's a blurty page that lists every possible way of achieving the same objective: http://www.blurty.com/developer/embedding.bml?method=all.
mcd
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www.mcdemarco.net
I would love to have the blog on my official website; I'll take a look at the pages you recommended. I considered getting Movable Type and other such things for my website, but for right now, the LiveJournal interface is what I know, and so it's easiest to keep using it.
(Anonymous)
Though many people click through a LJ username tag (
To summarize, I don't think that there is a way for you to control the first-time user experience to the extent you might want, at least not with LJ. There will always be a significant number of visitors looking at the generic blue LJ interface, and (if they browse just entry/comments pages) *only* that style.
Whether converting to another blogging system is worth in look-and-feel what you'd lose in convenience (not just for you but for other LJ users who follow your LJ) is another question.
mcd
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www.mcdemarco.net