Fun Features On The New B-Side Blog!

I have been totally thrilled with my experience thus far on WordPress, and not just because the readers can comment easily now. Adding functionality to the site is a breeze, and in the past three hours alone, I’ve added the sort of gizmos that would normally take me a week or more on Movable Type. Of course, that probably speaks more to my lack of proficiency with the platform than anything else, but the point is that I’ve been able to do so much more with the site, and now I want to share with you some of the new features, LEST MY WORK GOES UNHERALDED.

Info after the jump.

Gravatar Support
As I mentioned in an earlier post, this site supports something called “Gravatars,” which are described as “Globally Recognized Avatars.” Basically what that means is that if you have a Gravatar, it will work not only on this site but any site that supports the system. Isn’t that lovely? For now, it seems only a few of you have filled out a Gravatar, which is fine, but it just means there are a whole lot of generic gray boxes next to the comments. Spice things up! Get a Gravatar. Go to Gravatar.com and sign up. After that, all you’ll need to do is enter your email address into the commenting field, and the system will automatically link to your pic. The Gravatar will also pop up in the next new feature (drumroll please)…

Top Commenters
I’ve added all sorts of junk to the sidebar, but of course, it’s not junk to me. It’s wonderful, beautiful functionality. The “Top Commenters This Week” may not be terribly useful, but at least it’s a fun tally of who’s been commenting the most. Be sure to check it out from time to time to see how you or someone else might be faring.

Threaded Comments
Speaking of comments, it’s now possible to reply to a comment directly. Just click “Reply” in a specific comment, and your response will appear nested under it (as opposed to at the end of the comment block). The nesting only goes about five levels deep though; so don’t expect too much craziness.

Facebook Like
At the bottom of posts I’ve added a button for “Liking” on Facebook. This means that if you like a particular post, you can click “Like,” and it will show up on your Facebook profile (and subsequently your news feed too). Now, I must be honest — I’ve had some issues getting the button to work on Firefox, but it seems to function just fine on Safari. Not sure if that’s just me or not, but give it a try if you want and let me know if it works for you.

Recent Posts
Sadly, not everyone checks this blog every day (or even every week). If you’ve fallen behind, be sure to keep an eye on the Recent Posts widget on the right. It’s like the “Hot Posts” feature I used to have on the old site except this one updates on its own (tears of joy flowing down my face).

Related Posts
I added a cool feature at the bottom of each post that suggests a list of five or so posts that might be related to the current one you may be reading. Be sure to check out the suggestions in case there’s content you might like. Also note that it’s controlled by a robot, and therefore some of the offerings may be wildly off-topic. But that’s half the fun, right?

Random Posts
If you’re bored, check out a random post from this site’s extensive archive. Just click on the link in the sidebar that says “Click here to read a random post” and let the B-Side Blog journey OVERTAKE YOU.

That’s it for now. Hopefully there will be more to come!