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11/12/2003: "Blogger Info"

Cliff's Notes is powered by Greymatter, which means that I key or paste some stuff into an input form, and "Presto," Noah Gray's Perl code does the rest. Very cool. And, Greymatter is extremely flexible and extremely free. There are absolutely no strings attached. The downside to Greymatter's flexibility is that right out of the box (download) it looks terrible, and it takes quite a bit of work to get your blog looking the way you'd like it to look. There is however, a "White Knight" called a template that can save you a lot of time. Click more.. below.

I got an e-mail from a nice guy named Jeff in late October. Jeff had downloaded and installed Greymatter, and since he admired the layout and color scheme of Cliff's Notes, he wrote to ask if I could give him any pointers on how he could get from the Greymatter "out of the box" layout to something like the layout of Cliff's Notes. The following is my response:

Easy as pie Jeff:

My layout and color scheme comes from a template called "Off Tilt."

http://www.foshdawg.net/gm/templates/gfx01.php

I added some extra stuff like the calendar pictures and today's date, but the colors are stock (not from the 216 web safe color pallet, mind you). If you want to see the same thing with different colors and graphics, check out www.cheepchick.com. I put that one up for my beloved.

Good Luck,
Cliff

ps When you get cooking, send me a link.

Jeff downloaded the template and was very impressed with how easily it went. The downside of using a template (yes, there's always a downside) is, as Jeff found out, that it's so easy that you haven't learned anything about how the software works, or probably even read the manual. Ouch; now you would like to make a few changes to the basic look of the template, and you don't know where to start. Jeff, like anyone else finding himself in that position, hoped for more magic. After all, if he hadn't asked in the first place he wouldn't have had a template, so he asked where he might go from here. The following is my response:


Jeff:

Now the easy part is over. You have templates that GM uses to produce some pages you like, and that is a long way in the right direction. Now, you have to tie the templates to the HTML code that GM produces with each template and start playing around. The calendar and search function are both in the manual as "{{Doo Daa}}" parameters. Put them where you think you want them, and see what happens. Manuals are always very clear after you're finished beating your head against the wall, but not otherwise. There is no shortcut to understanding what they mean when they say ... . I don't know what kind of tools you have, but all you really need to reverse engineer anybody else's trick is "right click - view source." This process can be fun if you take your time. I have some entries on my blog about my calendar picture and "todays date" JavaScript if you are interested.

Unless you are a blogger already, it will take you some time to relax and find your "voice." So if you make entries (frequent backups are a good idea) while you are "making pretty," then when you're ready you will really be READY; so try to kill two birds with one stone.

Cliff

I haven't heard from Jeff since Halloween, so I guess he's doing all right. The last thing he did say was that he was surprised that any software with the functionality of Greymatter would be free, and he expressed his intention to make a donation in appreciation of Noah Gray's efforts. Good idea Jeff. Not only would a donation be well-deserved and appreciated, but a link on the "recent donator" list on the Greymatter homepage is good for four or five hundred visitors the first month.

Oh, don't miss the new "This Week's Fantasy."

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