Random Rotating Post Gadget with Excerpt.

If you have a blog with more than 20 posts than this gadget is just the thing your blog needs :



Click on above picture to enlarge it. You can see it above the posts column in this blog when the page is completely loaded. Features :

• 1. Shows one post title at a time.
• 2. Links to the post.
• 3. Shows post excerpt also.
• 4. Every 5 seconds shows a new post.
• 5. Cycles through all the posts in the blog.
• 6. Starts a new cycle at the end of the list.
• 7. Once loaded continues cycling even when not connected to the Internet.
• 8. Uses official Google AJAX technology.
• 9. Can be used on other blogging platforms (not tested).
• 10. Hovering with mouse cursor over the post title halts the rotation till mouse moves off the gadget.

............................................



Bloggers with plenty of posts in their blogs face a major problem in showing all of them to the viewers. Some solve this by changing the settings to show all the posts in Main Page. This slows down the loading speed of the blog and can turn away visitors.



The Blog Archive gadget which comes as a default with the standard Blogger Layouts shows only the posts in the blog for the present month. The rest of the posts are hidden and can be seen only by clicking the black arrows to expand the archives. This saves the real estate on the blog page but to the new visitor hides the previous months blog posts.



One can eliminate the dates in the Blog Archive and show all your posts in a blogger gadget but this makes a very long sidebar and if you have posts with little content this may make the blog seem lopsided.



To save space and yet show all posts one by one this gadget uses official Google AJAX API Feed technology and the Dynamic Feed Control. It fetches the post titles and data from your blog and displays it in the gadget. To install this on your blog :

1. Login at Blogger.com.
2. Click Layouts link on Dashboard.
3. Click Add Gadget link in sidebar on Page Elements subtab of Layout tab.
4. In popup window scroll down and click Html/Javascript gadget.
5. In Contents window copy the code below and paste after modifying it :

<style type="text/css">
    .gfg-root {
  width : 100%;
  height : auto;
  position : relative;
  overflow : hidden;
  text-align : center;
  font-family: "Arial", sans-serif;
  font-size: 20px;
  border: 1px solid #BCCDF0;
}

.gfg-title {
  font-size: 24px;
  font-weight : bold;
  color : #3366cc;
  background-color: #E5ECF9;
  line-height : 1.4em;
  overflow : hidden;
  white-space : nowrap;
}

.gfg-title a {
  color : #3366cc;
}

.gfg-subtitle {
  font-size: 20px;
  font-weight : bold;
  color : #3366cc;
  background-color: #E5ECF9;
  line-height : 1.4em;
  overflow : hidden;
  white-space : nowrap;
  margin-bottom : 0px;
}

.gfg-subtitle a {
  color : #3366cc;
  display:none !important;
}

.gfg-entry {
  background-color : white;
  width : 100%;
  height : 6.9em;
  position : relative;
  overflow : hidden;
  text-align : left;
  margin-top : 3px;
}

/* To allow correct behavior for overlay */
.gfg-root .gfg-entry .gf-result {
  position : relative;
  background-color : white;
  width : auto;
  height : 100%;
  padding-left : 20px;
  padding-right : 5px;
}

.gfg-list {
  position : relative;
  overflow : hidden;
  text-align : left;
  margin-bottom : 5px;
  display:none !important;
}

.gfg-listentry {
  line-height : 1.5em;
  overflow : hidden;
  white-space : nowrap;
  text-overflow : ellipsis;
  -o-text-overflow : ellipsis;
  padding-left : 15px;
  padding-right : 5px;
  margin-left : 5px;
  margin-right : 5px;
}

.gfg-listentry-odd {
  background-color : #F6F6F6;
}

.gfg-listentry-even {
}

.gfg-listentry-highlight { 
  background-image : url('garrow.gif');
  background-repeat: no-repeat;
  background-position : center left;
}

/*
 * FeedControl customizations.
 */

.gfg-root .gfg-entry .gf-result .gf-title {
  font-size: 24px;
  line-height : 1.2em;
  overflow : hidden;
  white-space : nowrap;
  text-overflow : ellipsis;
  -o-text-overflow : ellipsis;
  margin-bottom : 2px;
}

.gfg-root .gfg-entry .gf-result .gf-snippet {
  height : 3.8em;
  color: #000000;
  margin-top : 3px;
}

/*
 * Easy way to get horizontal mode, applicable via js options to gadget.
 */

.gfg-horizontal-container {
  position : relative;
}

.gfg-horizontal-root {
  height : 1.5em;
  _height : 100%;
  position : relative;
  white-space : nowrap;
  overflow : hidden;
  text-align : center;
  font-family: "Arial", sans-serif;
  font-size: 13px;
  border: 1px solid #AAAAAA;
  padding : 5px;
  margin-right : 80px;
}

.gfg-horizontal-root .gfg-title {
  font-weight : bold;
  background-color: #FFFFFF;
  line-height : 1.5em;
  overflow : hidden;
  white-space : nowrap;
  float : left;
  padding-left : 10px;
  padding-right : 12px;
  border-right: 1px solid #AAAAAA;
}

.gfg-horizontal-root .gfg-title a {
  color : #444444;
  text-decoration : none;
}

.gfg-horizontal-root .gfg-entry {
  width : auto;
  height : 1.5em;
  position : relative;
  overflow : hidden;
  text-align : left;
  margin-top : 0px;
  margin-left : 0px;
  padding-left : 10px;
}

/* To allow correct behavior for overlay */
.gfg-horizontal-root .gfg-entry .gf-result {
  position : relative;
  background-color : white;
  width : 100%;
  height : 100%;
  line-height : 1.5em;
  overflow : hidden;
  white-space : nowrap;
}

.gfg-horizontal-root .gfg-list {
  display : none;
}

/*
 * FeedControl customizations.
 */

.gfg-horizontal-root .gfg-entry .gf-result .gf-snippet,
.gfg-horizontal-root .gfg-entry .gf-result .gf-author {
  display : none;
}

.gfg-horizontal-root .gfg-entry  .gf-result .gf-title {
  color: #0000cc;
  margin-right : 3px;
  float : left;
}

.gfg-horizontal-root .gfg-entry .gf-result .gf-spacer {
  float : left;
}

.gfg-horizontal-root .gfg-entry .gf-result .gf-spacer,
.gfg-horizontal-root .gfg-entry .gf-result .gf-relativePublishedDate {
  display : block;
  color: #AAAAAA;
}

.gfg-branding {
  white-space : nowrap;
  overflow : hidden;
  text-align : left;
  position : absolute;
  right : 0px;
  top : 0px;
  width : 80px;
}

.gfg-collapse-open, .gfg-collapse-closed {
  background-repeat : no-repeat;
  background-position : center;
  cursor : pointer;
  float : right;
  width : 17px;
  height : 20px;
}

.gfg-collapse-open {
  background-image : url('arrow_open.gif');
}

.gfg-collapse-closed {
  background-image : url('arrow_close.gif');
}

.gfg-collapse-href {
  float : left;
}

.clearFloat {
  clear : both;
}
body {
      background-color: white;
      color: black;
      font-family: Arial;
      font-size: small;
      margin: 0;
    }
    #feedGadget { 
      margin-top : 5px;
      margin-left: auto;
      margin-right: auto;
      width : 440px;
      font-size: 16px;
      color: #9CADD0;
    }
</style>
<script src="http://www.google.com/jsapi/?key=PUT_AJAX_KEY_HERE" 
 type="text/javascript"></script>
  <script src="http://www.google.com/uds/solutions/dynamicfeed/gfdynamicfeedcontrol.js" type="text/javascript"></script>

  <script type="text/javascript">

    function showGadget() {
      var feeds = [
       {title:'title',
        url:'http://MYBLOG.blogspot.com/atom.xml?redirect=false&start-index=1&max-results=999'},
       
       ];

      new GFdynamicFeedControl(feeds, 'feedGadget',
                               {numResults : 1000, stacked : true,
                               title: "BLOG_TITLE ~ Random Posts."});
    }
    google.load("feeds", "1");
    google.setOnLoadCallback(showGadget);
  </script>
<div id="feedGadget">Loading...</div>
  <div id="feedGadget">Gadget by <a href="http://www.blogdoctor.me" target="_blank">The Blog Doctor</a>.</div>

In the above code make changes in the following parts :

 <script type="text/javascript">

    function showGadget() {
      var feeds = [
       {title:'title',
        url:'http://MYBLOG.blogspot.com/atom.xml?redirect=false&start-index=1&max-results=999'},
       
       ];

      new GFdynamicFeedControl(feeds, 'feedGadget',
                               {numResults : 1000, stacked : true,
                               title: "BLOG_TITLE ~ Random Posts."});
    }

Change "MYBLOG" to actual blog subdomain and "BLOG_TITLE" to actual title of your blog. Then paste the modified code in the Html gadget and save the gadget.


Get your AJAX API key and put it in above code instead of 'PUT_AJAX_KEY_HERE'.


Lastly click and drag the HTML gadget from the sidebar to above the posts column. See picture below.



This is because the width of the gadget is more suited for the posts column than the sidebar. Save the Layout. View Blog.


If you do not want to save space you can show the whole Table of Contents with post preview.

Table of Contents with Preview for Blogger.

A Table of Contents is essential for each blog so that readers can look at the post titles and decide which post to visit. The Blog Archives widget can be configured to show all post titles but it has the dates also cluttering up the view. Then there are the arrows collapsing past months so that all post titles are not seen at once.


Classic templates have a Previous Posts section which shows only the previous ten posts. Here also all the blog posts cannot be seen.


One method to display post titles without dates is by using blog feeds. However this shows all posts from one blog only! What if you have multiple blogs and wish to show posts from all of them in one place? See picture below :



This method uses the AJAX Dynamic Feed Control from Google to show any number of posts from any number of your blogs in one place and cycles through each post title to show a preview at the top.........

TOC for ONE BLOG

First login at Blogger.com and click Settings link on Dashboard. Then click Site Feed subtab. Click drop down arrow for Allow Blog Feeds and choose the Short option. Save Settings.


Next click Layout tab and on the Page Elements subtab click the Add Page Elements link. Choose Html/Javascript option in popup window. In Contents paste the following code :

<!-- ++Begin Dynamic Feed Wizard Generated Code++ -->
<!--
// Created with a Google AJAX Search and Feed Wizard
// http://code.google.com/apis/ajaxsearch/wizards.html
-->

<!--
// The Following div element will end up holding the actual feed control.
// You can place this anywhere on your page.
-->
<div id="feed-control">
  <span style="margin:10px;padding:4px;">Loading...</span>
</div>

<!-- Google Ajax Api
-->
<script src="http://www.google.com/jsapi?key=<<INSERT KEY>>"
type="text/javascript"></script>

<!-- Dynamic Feed Control and Stylesheet -->
<script src="http://simblogg.googlepages.com/gfdynamicfeedcontrol.js"
type="text/javascript"></script>
<style type="text/css">
  @import url("http://www.google.com/uds/solutions/dynamicfeed/gfdynamicfeedcontrol.css");
</style>

<script type="text/javascript">
  function LoadDynamicFeedControl() {
    var feeds = [
{title: 'Table of Contents',
 url: 'http://MYBLOG.blogspot.com/atom.xml?redirect=false&start-index=1&max-results=999'
}];
    var options = {
      stacked : true,
      horizontal : false,
      title : "BLOG_TITLE."
    }

    new GFdynamicFeedControl(feeds, 'feed-control', options);
  }
  // Load the feeds API and set the onload callback.
  google.load('feeds', '1');
  google.setOnLoadCallback(LoadDynamicFeedControl);
</script>
Widget by <a href="http://betabloggerfordummies.blogspot.com">Betabloggerfordummies.</a>
<!-- ++End Dynamic Feed Control Wizard Generated Code++ -->

Change the code in green CAPS ('MYBLOG' and 'BLOG_TITLE') to your blog name and the title of your blog.


Also sign up for your Google API Key and put it instead of "<<INSERT KEY>>" in the above code.

Then save the page element. View Blog and wait for the page element to load. See Picture below :



You can see a live demo at top of the posts column on Widgetry blog.