May 19 2007
Top Blogs – Geekiness Added
Updating the list of 100 Top Australian Blogs each week is quite an onerous task (of course made infinitively easier by the script written by Scott Yang). This is further complicated by needing to inset the table into the page.
The other day I discovered a very nifty little WordPress Plugin that allows you to do funky things with tables. With this plugin, I’m able to upload the .csv file, and voila! it’s all but done.
What’s geeky about it? It allows you to sort the list alphabetically, by Alexa AU rank, or by Technorati rank – just by clicking on the column heading. An of course, it looks much prettier (nothing to do with geeky, I know).
The downside is the URL’s are no longer hyperlinks 
so to check out a blog, you’ll need to copy and paste the URL into a browser. I’m hoping you’ll agree that the geek appeal outweighs the minor inconvenience.
So what’s next? Michael Visser commented on my last update:
Hey Meg, it’d be awesome if there’s some way we can be emailed our ranking on a daily basis or as a WordPress module, even better See the TopBlogSites rank at the bottom of my site (bottom right corner), something like that; surely it wouldn’t be too difficult?
Love this.
Well, given that the list is only updated weekly (and there is a small cost involved every time I run the script), it’s NOT going to happen on a daily basis.
But I do think it’s time we incorporate some sort of badge or widget for the list.
Any bright sparks out there who might have an idea of how this could be done? (Note: the more automated, the better). I would love to hear any suggestions 😀
13 Responses to “Top Blogs – Geekiness Added”
Hey Meg,
I’ve got concerns that not having inbound links to the Top 100 will see a drop in interest from those individuals. Surely a link mod can be applied to the widget.
I’m happy to speak to my friends and figure out a badge script for you, can’t be that hard. 😉
Any way that cuts down on the work has to be a good a thing. As far as emailling – well i guess you could have an email list but thats what feeds are for.
Hi Michael
If anyone knows of a way that I can make the links “active” I’m happy to do it.
I suppose the alternative would be to add all the links underneath.
By all means talk to your friends…
Cheers
Hi Greg – I like the way you think 😀
Bugger – I just realised the hyphenated URLs look crappy on IE
Something that i forgot to mention that could also answer Michael’s question for email updates is a plugin subscribe2 which automatically notifies anyone subscribed of updates – i am not sure if it can be set up for just one particular category or whether its all or nothing. You can get it from subscribe2.wordpress.com
To manage the Missing Link regular feature at Club Troppo I used a combination of cat2email and a regular mailing list. Drop me a line if you’d like me help you set up something similar.
Cheers,
JC.
OMG – i just had a look and its turned all pink – i think i have pink poisoning.
Hi Jacques
many thanks for the offer – I’ll see what I can come up with….
Greg
Consider it branding…. And I am a chick after all 😉
Hey Meg,
Your still doing an awesome job as always on the Top Blogs
Also glad to hear you have got a script to make it easier!
Thanks Matt
You clever, clever thing…
I wait with baited breath for the next development. Onya for making it easier! 😉
Naw, I just have to work out how to get the bl**dy links working.
This blog did! I must give them a “hoy” and ask how….
http://www.leadernotes.com/2007/05/top_100_australian_blogs_3.html