Tuesday 10 January 2012

Look what blogger has done to my site! I can't believe it! I'm leaving the room!

UPDATE! I've fixed it. I know it still needs work, but man, is it better!

Blogger and Google are doing a lot of fiddling in the 'sphere. This is what I ended up with - my old look blogger I started with 3 years ago. All my customisation has been lost. My three columns? Hopefully it'll be somewhere in cyberspace but for now I'm too weary to bother.

A sad day when I should be writing! First I got messages that people couldn't comment. Which after a few hours I worked out was because Google is changing our URLs, and Australia starts with 'A' so was one of the first. This meant anything I'd added couldn't read the new URL. So some bright spark at Disqus finally solved that problem and my comments all returned.

Just a few minutes ago I went into my blog and I saw this hideous sight! All the bells and whistles have disappeared. And strangely the Dashboard looks like the really old one. And you'll notice there's no 'Design' element. Definitely the techies fiddling!

I write this to apologise for the pathethic-looking blog. And maybe you might be in the know and tell me where to go and slap someone!

It's too cruel to think I have to build all over again after I'd just got my blog how I wanted it for now! At least at this stage my friend list is still hiding in the Dashboard. For how longer I wonder? But every comment I ever had has disappeared into the ether.

And there's no 'Preview' button.



26 comments:

Trisha said...

I had one noticeable problem - my followers widget stopped working, because I too got the .com.au URL ending and the widget hadn't been updated. I had to go to the actual Google Friend Connect site to rectify that.

Sorry all your hard work designing your blog has been lost. I hope they restore it soon 'cause what a pain to have to start fresh!!

Hilary said...

Hi Denise .. I can only comment on embedded comment boxes by changing browsers - so I assume your pop up box choice has disappeared too ..

It looks kinda flat .. I'd wait a few days and see what happens ..

I'll keep an eye out and if I see anything I'll let you know .. no wonder you want to S H O U T ...

Somehow stay calm .. with many thoughts .. Hilary

Lynda R Young as Elle Cardy said...

Oh my gosh... I'm scared to press the refresh button on my blog now lol.

Miranda Hardy said...

Now, I'm going to check on mine. Yikes! Scary this is happening. I've noticed several blogs moving to wordpress and I wonder if this is the reason.

Zan Marie said...

This *is* scary! I've had no problems except for the little comment/no followers showing up a few months ago. My solution was to no click the "keep me signed in" box and all went back to normal. Don't ask me why.

Good luck, Denise!

J.L. Campbell said...

OMG! So sorry to see this, Denise. Fingers crossed that somehow your stuff hasn't all gone without a trace.

I can't help hoping they get this fixed by the time they come to the J's. Meantime, I think I'll go save the html code for my blog someplace, just in case the whole thing takes leave.

Trisha said...

UM...they changed their mind again?!?! I think we're back on just .com now ;)

Julia Hones said...

I hope all these problems will get fixed ASAP. It can be really frustrating.

Alex J. Cavanaugh said...

Sorry about all the changes! I'd panic if mine suddenly looked different. Wish Blogger and Google would focus on changing the real problems rather than messing with everything else.

Jules said...

OMG, sorry to read and hear this Denise. I have always had this fear. I export my blog at least twice a month just in case. Keeping my fingers crossed for you. :)
Jules @ Trying To Get Over The Rainbow

L. Diane Wolfe said...

Oh wow! What happened? Don't cry, you can rebuild.

Anonymous said...

Oh my gosh, Denise. I came over to see YOU, and found THIS. Well, YOU are still here. Your content is the same. But this is AWFUL. What a shock. Well, I'm B in their system. I just don't want to lose my followers that I route from Blogger over to my WordPress. And I was just trying to think what I was going to post tomorrow. So now I have one thing: a link to "poor Denise's blog." Diane (above) says you can rebuild, but it takes TIME. I'm just not going to do it if this happens to me. But I'm crying for you because I really did like your blog and I was so startled when I saw this. Deepest sympathy. Bells tolling, etc. etc.!!
Ann Best, Author of In the Mirror & Other Memoirs

Kittie Howard said...

OMG! What a mess! I feel for you!!!!!!!!! And I'm feeling kinda scared cause I don't know how to fix this stuff.

BTW, LSU lost. The game was pathetic. Even Wing couldn't kick a decent ball. I'm in mourning!

Denise Covey said...

Hi all. Well I finally got my head out of the sand and am looking at this as a challenge, not a threat. Thanks for your support. I've been thinking of going to Word Press for ages. This just might be what tips me over. But like Ann says, you lose all your followers. I still have all the important stuff here but as Ann also says, it takes a lot of time to rebuild.

What to do? I'm going to rattle Blogger's chain and see what happens first. Then, well, hmm, a new better Blogger blog or a Word Press blog.

Stay tuned!

Denise

Golden Eagle said...

I'm so sorry they changed around your blog like that! I hope it's fixed soon--sometimes Blogger will whack out and then return to normal, for some reason.

Denise Covey said...

I'm just about on air again. It was strange but I'm quite happy with what I did. All it came down to was upgrading, choosing a new template, going into Design and fiddling with Layout. Will have more work to do yet but this is a big improvement!

Denise

Roland D. Yeomans said...

Like Kittie, I feel a bit apprehensive myself. I am Wiley E. Coyote when it comes to anything computer tech. I can only imagine your distress when this hit out of the blue!!

The Poet said...

Hello Denise.
I think I would have a total meltdown if this happened to me.
Based on what I've been reading this week, Google have been implementing some BIG changes to Blogger, the main one being the addition of threaded comments, like they already have at Wordpress & Disqus. Many people have been requesting it for ages, so I guess they've finally listened & done something about it. I know I've been having issues with Blogger for a while now. I'm going to save my template just to be prepared & maybe even look into exporting my blog too. I'm not too tech savy with this stuff, so I'll just ask my trusty Executive Assistant (wife) to help me.
BTW, I like what you've done so far.

Wishing you the best.
Andy

Francine Howarth said...

Yee gods, I read your post and thought right: backup, backup, backup SAVE html!

What a bummer!

Hopefully they will have sorted the problem by the time they get to UK. ;)

best
F

Anonymous said...

Heaven Denise! Did you back up your blog onto your hard drive for such eventualities or does that not make any difference?
I thought the new vamping of google and blogger might cause some problems. Luckily mine is still ok, fingers crossed.Did you click anything to change to a new look or new way of using blogger? I'm always wary of doing that incase it cause such problmes, though recently i did so I could interface my About Me with my Google+ profile and thankfully it worked ok.

Glynis Peters said...

Such a shame for you, Denise! I await the joy as my turn comes around!

Karen Jones Gowen said...

I have a theory that Google is going to somehow transfer all our blogs to Google +, which is floundering and not as promising as it seemed at first. And eventually we on Blogger will all have to go to Google + to post our blogs. That's my prediction, let's see if it happens. I hope NOT! (Glad to see you have your design back!)

Southpaw said...

YIPES! I totally understand. Blogger had me in knots for the past couple of days too. I didn't know about the URL changing, but boy, that sure explains a lot.

And now, the feeds from my blogger blog won't update.

M Pax said...

I haven't been able to follow anybody's blogs using the widget in months. I have to use the 'follow' at the tippy top with my dashboard stuff.

Now you have me scared, Denise. What is blogger going to do to the rest of us?

Carol Kilgore said...

Yikes! I guess we're all in for some disruption ... coming soon to a blog near you. I think I'll go hide now.

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