Programming Note

We've been riding this shiny bicycle we call BSD HD around for a few weeks now. Hopefully everyone is feeling pretty comfortable with it and checking out the new features. I'm really pleased with the amount of fanposts and fanshots we've been getting in addition to the usual great comments. You guys have really taken ownership of BSD. I must admit I'm still struggling to figure some things out in laying out the posts the way I would like to. But I'm getting there. As I play with it I'm learning more and more and I wanted to share some things with you guys that I've discovered.

New Sidebar Features

I wanted to point out I added a few things to the sidebars. On the left now just below the Big Ten Bloggers google feed you will see a PSU news feed. The articles come from something called the Sports Network. I have no idea where it picks up the articles from, but it looks like it only provides about one article a month. I'll keep it there for now in the hopes that it will pick up once the season starts. But if it doesn't give us daily updates then I'll probably take it down.

Down low on the right sidebar you will notice I added the football schedule and Big Ten standings. There are some things I would like to point out there. First you will notice some of the times are off. I have no control over that, but hopefully whoever does will fix it.

Next you may notice that some teams have red stars by their name. That means SBN has a blog in the network representing that team. Click on the star and it will take you to the respective blog. If you click on the team name it will take you a page listing all of the latest news in addition to any posts, fanshots, and fanposts on BSD tagged with that team. More on tagging in a minute.

Tagging

I cannot stress enough how important and useful the tags are. When you put together a Fanpost or Fanshot please take an extra minute at the end and add as many tags to the post as you can. You can see a tag box provided for you to type in custom tags. As you start to type in a tag a list of suggested tags will pop up, so try to choose one of those whenever possible. Also, take advantage of the drop down boxes to select teams and players whenever you can. Let me show you why.

Remember that BSD is part of a larger network of blogs called Sports Blog Nation. This new format has been created to make it easier for fans to find information about their teams that interest them. If you look at the post I did the other day titled The Hunt For Blue October you will notice I added a tag for Illinois Fighting Illini.

Now go check out this post on SBN's Missouri Tigers blog Rock M Nation. On the right sidebar you will see a link to my Blue October post because I we each used the Illinois FIghting Illini tag.

Likewise, you can see on the Blue October post that I selected Daryll Clark - (QB Penn St)  from the dropdown box. Now if you go on the BSD front page and select Roster and Daryll Clark the Blue October post appears once again along with any other posts with that tag.

Now let's say your Fanshot or Fanpost discusses a specific game either coming up on the schedule or played in the past. Hit the Attach Event button and select the game or games you talk about in your post. For the Blue October post I selected the Illinois and Wisconsin games since I talked about them in considerable depth. Now on the BSD main page take a look at the schedule on the sidebar. Click on the start time for the Wisconsin game. There again you see the Blue October post because I attached that game as an event.

Hopefully you've found this helpful. As you can see properly tagging your fanposts and fanshots not only helps us all find material at a later date, it gives your posts more exposure throughout the SBN network. I hope you will take advantage of this awesome tool.