Projects, and choices in how to post 'em up

I had a question today from a site member about choosing the best way to post up a project. This question was about installing a windlass -- a subject of constant interest and much scrutiny here. :nerd:

I advised either doing a "blog" or IF wanting any sort of feedback, a "thread". A completed project might be good to have in the Blog format -- easier searching for one reason.

Here is a link to Blogging:
http://www.ericsonyachts.org/infoexchange/showthread.php?10060-Blogging-On-EY-o-Yes!

Note that one neat part of it is the ability to put up your article and view it before you let it 'go live' for others to see.
I have no qualms about modifying my forum posts, replies, or blogs... FWIW.

The only thing about a Blog is that it asks for the originator to continue it forward with more entries. I am sometimes rather uncertain about this, having nothing to say for a month or three at a time!
(Some might notice that I've little to say even I do post!)

Anyhow, I hope that you all continue to enjoy the site.

Regards,
Loren
moderator

ps: yes this is in the 'wrong place' but this is the forum everyone looks at first. I will move this after a short time here.

Excellent. Allow me to add or amplify:

--A good blog entry is complete in itself, a narrative with photos of a project, voyage, or idea. It is essentially a brief magazine article.

--Blogs don't work well for discussion or feedback. For one thing, new entries don't appear in the "New Posts" tab, and are therefore less likely to be noticed. That's true also for comments. Also, photos cannot be attached to blog comments, which really limits their value.

--Our blogs are well indexed by search engines like Google, but my experience is that they are hard to find using forum software, and they don't always appear in the Tag Cloud or in the list of "similar topics" that appears under forum threads.

--For feedback and discussion, the forums are best. To publish a full article, blog it.

As the person who asked Loren about reporting on my completed windlass project, I have a follow-up question:

I can see the advantages of a blog entry (especially going over the 5-picture limit) but I am concerned about low visibility and findability. Would it be appropriate forum etiquette to submit a posting in "Maintenance and Mechanical" informing users that the blog entry existed? That way it could be found using the standard search tool.

Stefan

Teranodon said:

As the person who asked Loren about reporting on my completed windlass project, I have a follow-up question:

I can see the advantages of a blog entry (especially going over the 5-picture limit) but I am concerned about low visibility and findability. Would it be appropriate forum etiquette to submit a posting in "Maintenance and Mechanical" informing users that the blog entry existed? That way it could be found using the standard search tool.

Stefan

Click to expand...

One way to do what you suggest is to recall that your postings here are dynamic and not fixed. You could put up a short pointer thread in Maint. & Mech. to your blog and remove it after a while. Or, that short thread might lengthen as others asked questions about the work and then posted up pix.... and it takes on a new life of its own.

As Christian sez the Blogs seem to be well indexed, and I find that exclusively using Google's search engine for the site works very well also. This site uses otherwise-well-regarded software that has one glaring weakness -- poor searching capabilities. Other similar sailing sites like SBO and Sailnet have the same complaint with the same software package.


Loren