When I click on "Blog" at the top right of the page, Alexandra's blog comes up, and there is a little gray heart next to the title that turns red when I click it. What is it?

It means I love you, Hans If I hated you, it would turn black

Only kidding -- I've wondered that myself.

I should note that my blog is off-site, not one of our new, fancy hosted blogs (it already existed and since I'd paid for and set up a site, it seemed silly to move it). I do hope people will use this. You can set one up in about two minutes (I did a test). I've asked atm to put up her wonderful 'Ruminations" blog again, and Helene's idea about using the blog for reviews of ballets seen on trips or special events (Natalia effectively blogged the Bournonville festival on a thread) or like the long-departed (and missed) Jerry from Seattle, who used the board as a diary for his first year of ballet viewing. Or to collect favorite dancers, or give us video reviews -- there are lots of ways to use it, and I hope to be reading some soon.

I'm gutted - the heart doesn't change colours at all for me.

Actually, it means that Hans loves Alexandra

When you click on the heart, and it turns red, it means you've added it to your favorites. Windows (XP): on Firefox, there's a little "tool tip" that appears if you hover your cursor over the heart ("Add blog to favorites" if it's not selected (not red); "Remove blog from favorites" if it is selected (red)"). On IE 6.0, the heart turns red, but the tool tips don't display. I'll check the Mac (OS X with Firefox and Safari) later this evening.

There is a few second delay before the change takes place.

What adding something to your favorites does on the blog is nothing I can find in the documentation or on the help forums. There have been suggestions for a "Favorite blogs" link in a future version, but if we're lucky, we'll find that the heart changes color or pattern if there's a new entry, like on the board where a little orange folder appears to the left of unread posts.

That's interesting--here on my work computer, there's nothing new in my "Favorites." I'll try it at home tonight with the Opera browser. It would definitely be nice if in a later version of the software there could be a list of one's favorite blogs in the My Controls section, similar to the way topics to which one has subscribed appear.

The blog software doesn't interact with the board software to update favorites -- the hearts only indicate favorites on the blog main page. You won't see blog favorites in My Controls in this version. (I haven't seen it listed as a feature in the next version.) Comments or entries on blogs don't add to the post total on the board, either.

Oh, I get it now. So all you have to do is click on "Blog" and you automatically see which ones are your favorites, thus rendering a list in My Controls unnecessary. Thanks for the explanation!

I have a question for Helene---under the 'add photos to your blog entry' it states that the photo should come from a phto file on the computer (I know, I know, my ignorance about computers is being revealed)--my question is---can I use my scanner to put on a photo? and Thanks Helene for all that work you put into the directions---I am reading through my 13 printed pages. It appears to be a lot like 'Type Pad".

atm, this may vary from one computer to another, but it's been my experience that when you scan a photo, the computer automatically stores it in a file. I believe you can then upload that file to your blog, although there may be some rules about uploading.

Yes, iif you scan a photo to your computer, that's a file. You can upload that file -- there will be size constraints. Make sure it's at 72 dpi (not 150 or 300; that's usually found in "image size" or something of that nature in your scanning/photo software. And make sure it's not 50 inches by 60 inches.

It is like Typepad, atm -- and many apologies for putting you through this three times!!!!! But those pieces are worth it. They need to be in one place so people can find them easily. they're beautiful, and very valuable

Alexanndra--you make me blush

I'm glad! A little color in the cheeks does a body good And I meant it. Those pieces ARE beautiful. So get 'em up already. I'm lonely in Blogsville.

This very weekend I shall get to it---it's too hot to go outdoors. I have been slowed down trying to write of Hugh Laing---I have been poking around trying to find some concrete opinions of what others thought of him on the stage---but there is not too much written of him.

Good news! Regarding Hugh Laing, I can't remember reading much specific, either. Just a line or two, always saying the same thing -- tremendous stage presence. But not much of him as a dancer. So I'll be especially eager to read what you have to say about him!

I started up my blog today---but I know I am doing something wrong---because I do not like the way it looks---the page is too crowded--help.!

I can't see anything that could be changed, atm. I took the coding out (probably put in automatically when you copied in the entry). It's a wide box, I think the size of our post boxes. One thing that you could do to make it look less crowded is to paragraph often -- every two or three sentences. Yes, it's awful, but it's what newspapers are doing now. The topic sentence is one of the many casualties of the modern era!!

Thanks, I am relieved I am doing it correctly...About Laing---most of the entries are:

Laing, Hugh---tantrums of....sex life of...blackmail of....ugh.

Well, were his tantrums well placed, or off-center?

If you'd like to fit more on the page, you can set the "Limit the entry size on main Blog page" from My Controls/Your Blog Settings, in the "Customize the look of your Blog" section.

The default is "0," so that each entry appears on the page in its entirety. If you set it to a number > 0, that is the number of characters that will appear on the main page, with a little "More" link in the bottom left. Once the "more" link is clicked, the entire entry appears as a page. 1000 characters is about 2 inches of screen space. While it won't make it any less crowded -- I suspect the settings were copied off the main board -- it will break up the page because each topic will have a header bar, making it easier to find a particular entry, and what shows will provide a "teaser" to the rest of the post.

You can tweak the number of characters displayed on the main page, or you can go back to the default by changing the setting back to "0."

I'm so grateful that you are putting your blog back up. It is a treasure.

As an FYI the "Favorites" functionality -- clicking the little "heart" to the right of the blog name, works in Mac OS X with Firefox and Safari.

If at least one blog is marked "favorite" and at least one blog is not, the favorites will be listed first, and a separator bar will appear between favorites and non-favorites.

...it is very lonesome here in Blogville....

i dont think i can add to the population of blogsville, but I do have a blog down the road in blogsburgh

I like to present and editorialize on aspects of the nations ballet news that interest me most. Somewhat like the links thread here. I'd like to think its worth checking out

http://blog.edwardmcpherson.com

I clicked, but nothing happened. Could you check the link please?

The link is working for me.

Ed's link works for me, too.