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Monday, January 17, 2011

Switching Comment System: IntenseDebate

I have to admit me not liking the comment system of Blogger is nothing personal against Blogger. It just that AdBlocker in Firefox (in Chrome it works) blocks it…

So I have decided to look at other implementations, my requirements were:

  1. Easy to install
  2. No changing of Html source involved (I have already experienced first hand Blogger resetting my Html template)
  3. Looks good
  4. Easy to use

 

First lets look at what we have:

No-adblock-blogger-comments

With Firefox AddBlocker it looks like this:

Firefox-AdBlocker-Blogger-Comments

Well:

  1. It' is easy to install – no installation needed
  2. Built in
  3. Looks ok if you like grey as it is I don’t like it much
  4. Disabling AdBlocker is not so easy or that useful

 

IntenseDebate

Now I have to admit that so far I only tried one system but it’s a good one.

IntenseDebate-blog-comments-system

Now this one look much better, but lets look at the checklist:

Installing:

Just sign in to an account in IntenseDebate and either as part of the signing in choose to be a blog/site owner or:

IntenseDebate-add-a-blog

Enter the blog URL:

IntenseDebate-enter-blog-url

If you have a domain you will have to choose your blog Platform (my notes blog was identified automatically):

IntenseDebate-choose-blog-platform

Step 1: Widget

IntenseDebate-install-step-1

Step 2: On all blog posts

IntenseDebate-install-step-2

Step 3: Click on the link

IntenseDebate-install-step-3

Step 4: In Blogger->Settings->Comments:

Bloggr-Settings-Comment

Set comments to hide:

Blogger-comment-hide

Set new posts to not have comments:

Comments-Default-for-Posts-not-have

Click on Save Settings

Warning I ignored:

IntenseDebate-blogger-warning

Please Note: If the options to the right of the "New Post" button are "Edit Post, Settings, Template" then you are using Blogger Classic, which is currently unsupported.

My Settings seem to be for Blogger Classic but they still work.

Step 5: Add Widget to blog:

Click on the link

IntenseDebate-install-step-5-link

Select your blog:

Blogger-Click-on-Add-Widget-and-choose-blog

And then click on Add Widget.

Click on Save:

Blooger-save-design

Done.

 

Current look:

IntenseDebate-basic-look

Now you might say it doesn’t look the same. Well now we go to the tweaking:

Click on the link:

IntenseDebate-blog-settings

My Account Settings:

IntenseDebate-Account-settings

My Comments Settings:

IntenseDebate-Comments-Settings

My Activated Plugins:

IntenseDebate-My-Activated-Plugins

And now it looks like:

My-blogs-new-comment-system-looks-IntenseDebate

IntenseDebate-addon-share

Going back to the requirements:

  1. Done and easy
  2. No changes in the Html
  3. Looks good
  4. Easy to use – AdBlocker doesn’t block!

 

Keywords: blog, blogger, comments, IntenseDebate,AdBlocker