Donovan Watts: Radio UserLand Tips

10 Tools Every New Radio UserLand User Should Install

Tue, 20 Dec 2005 03:27:27 GMT

The following is a list of 10 tools every new Radio UserLand user should install. These tools should help new Radio users get off the ground and running with Radio UserLand. I tried my best to narrow the list down to the most essential tools. Of course, this list doesn't include all the great tools available, but then it wouldn't be a top ten if I included any more, now would it?

Before using any Radio tool, you should consider turning on nightly backups and learning how to back up your Radio UserLand data.

activeRenderer

activeRenderer is an outline publishing tool for Radio UserLand. It brings the power of outlining to your blogging and web publishing experience. With activeRenderer, you can publish outlines on your public web site. Style your weblog as an outline. Add active blogrolls to your site's pages. Publish your browser bookmarks as an active blogroll. Enhance your pages with news feed boxes. Browse outlines, RSS news feeds, and the content of Radio's aggregator from activeRenderer's outline browser.

dataFileCleaner

The dataFileCleaner tool will remove certain errant entries from your Data Files that cause problems.

editThisRadioPage

editThisRadioPage adds an Edit this Page link to your live site for easy editing of your weblog posts.

DirectoryTool

Using DirectoryTool for Radio UserLand, you can create directory files using the Radio UserLand outliner, generate HTML files corresponding to your directory structure, and automatically upload your directory to your Radio UserLand weblog.

Kit

Kit is a suite of "page tools" for Radio UserLand 8, including Weblog search, an improved News Aggregator page, a web Quick Script, "Radio to the Past" for changing weblog items' dates, a web outline editor, a per-category weblog index, a subscribed feeds lister, file uploader, and the Kit dashboard.

MailEdit

The MailEdit tool works like the Mail-To-Weblog functionality built into Radio. If you send a message with the correct subject to the email address that Radio is set up to monitor, it will be posted to your weblog. In addition, MailEdit will return an email confirmation of the posting, along with a copy of the post suitable for editing.

Markdown

Markdown is a text-to-HTML conversion tool for web writers. Markdown allows you to write using an easy-to-read, easy-to-write plain text format, then convert it to structurally valid XHTML (or HTML). In other words, it makes HTML editing easy! Andy Fragen created a tool for Radio UserLand that allows you to use Markdown on your Radio posts. His tool is in beta and you need to email him for the tool.

Master Ping

The Master Ping tool comes with blo.gs, blo.gs extended, Syndic8, Syndic8 extended, Yahoo and Technocrati.

RadioAtomBridge

The RadioAtomBridge tool is a way to mirror blog posts from Radio Userland to blogs that are hosted at Blogger.com.

Workbench

A set of easy-to-use scripts by Rogers Cadenhead, author of Radio UserLand Kick Start, that enhance the functionality of a Radio UserLand weblog. Workbench.viewCategories is a script to display category links on your home page template and other pages. Workbench.viewPostIndex is a script to display links to your posts in reverse chronological order.

Upload Images to Your Radio UserLand Site Easily with ImageWell

Mon, 30 May 2005 18:02:43 GMT

For easily uploading images to your Mac OS X Radio UserLand site, try ImageWell, a finely written, free application that uploads images to various locations, allowing you to make some handy last minute changes in the process. Currently, I have my iDisk and two ftp servers configured and waiting for an image to drop into the "well". All I have to do is drag and drop an image on to the ImageWell dock icon and the application will create a thumbnail of the image for my viewing pleasure, allow me to make changes to the image such as add a watermark or edge it with a shape, and most importantly, choose which server it should go to. For instance, I dropped an image of me and my buddy Nick just before catching a ferry to a friend's wedding on Angel Island (Extra points if you guess which one is me) on to the dock icon and here is the resulting ImageWell window. I want this image to fit in the browser window a bit better so I change the width and height, make sure the correct location is going to get the image, and then I 'send' it. After the image is sent to the server, which is very obvious from the well implemented upload status bar, the clipboard is populated with a proper HTML image tag, ready to paste into my weblog editing window. In order to get the proper code in the clipboard, be sure to click on the 'More' button in the ImageWell application window, then choose 'html ' in the section "url to copy to clipboard". You only need to do this once. I switch to MarsEdit or the Radio Desktop Home Page, and simply paste in the url. Here's a neat trick. Drag and drop images in your browser right onto the ImageWell dock icon and upload it to your site without even saving it to your hard disk first. Thank you XtraLean Software for ImageWell! You make adding images to my Radio site an intuitive breeze. And thanks to Missing Manual reader Will Findlay for mentioning this application to me.

How to replace the xml graphic with an alternative

Thu, 26 May 2005 23:49:52 GMT

I want to preface this tip by urging you not to implement this tip. I believe the orange XML button that is rendered by default is the best, most consistent way, to represent your RSS feed. Having said that, if you still want to replace yours, here's how. On the Radio UserLand Discussion Group, Peter Cook asked this question: "I'd like to replace the default xml button with an rss button. Has anyone been down this road? Have any wisdom to share? Thanks -Peter" I responded, "Hi Peter. Drop an alternative rss button in your images folder. Radio will upstream it to your site. Then, replace the default macro that generates the xml button with standard HTML image code that refers to your new image and make it link to your rss.xml file. I'd suggest you do a view source on your current, working page first for an idea of how to properly write the code." Allow me to elaborate.. After starting Radio UserLand, visit the Built-in Macros Preference page for a list of macros you can enter into your site template to produce any number of results, such as displaying the default orange XML button; the macro that is responsible for that function is <%rssLink%>. Just insert this macro in your site template and Radio will automatically convert it to the proper HTML which will display the orange XML button along with a link to your RSS feed page. That's mighty handy but you can bypass the macro if you'd prefer to insert your own graphic. Here's an example. If I were to drop Peter's new RSS image called petersRssButton.gif to my images folder, Radio would upstream it to my server. Then I would enter something like the following into my Main Template, replacing the <%rssLink%> macro. Now, all that is left is to render the home page to see the results. From within the Radio application, choose Radio:Publish:Weblog Home Page. Visit your site. Can you see your replacement graphic? Click on it. Does it take you to your RSS Feed? Did you enjoy this artice? Would you like to discuss it?

Save time. Stop opening your Desktop Home Page. Here's how and why.

Thu, 12 May 2005 04:25:43 GMT

Radio comes with a weblogging application and a news aggregator. The way you interact with Radio is through a web based interface. This is a smart way to use Radio since all you need is a web browser. However, there are disadvantages and other reasons why you, like me, might only on occasion visit the Radio Desktop Home page. Let's take the first part, weblogging. I used to pull up the Radio desktop home page, type my entry and then click on the Post button. Now I use [MarsEdit](http://www.ranchero.com/marsedit/) to do the same thing, only it has a beautiful OS X environment. Scratch off one reason why I now need to interact with Radio in the browser. There are many news readers out there. Radio is one of the best but I prefer [NetNewsWire](http://www.ranchero.com/netnewswire/), a top notch application by Ranchero, the same people who brought us MarsEdit, for my news gathering. So now I no longer need to use the browser to retrieve my news using Radio. Thankfully, Radio allows us to control whether or not to [open the home page at startup](http://127.0.0.1:5335/system/pages/prefs?page=6.8 "Open home page at startup?"). Unselect this option and you won't waste your computer's time by having Radio open a window in your browser every time you start it up. ![Don't open the home page at startup](http://www.donovanwatts.com/log/images/2005/05/11/posttohomepagecheckbox.gif "Open home page at startup?") For those times when you do want the Desktop home page, either create a bookmark that is easily accessible or switch to your Radio application. From the Radio menu, select Local Pages and then Home Page. Your Desktop Home Page will open in your default browser. ![Open Desktop from within Radio](http://www.donovanwatts.com/log/images/2005/05/11/posthomepage.gif "Open home page at startup?") I was going to write something witty here, but I don't want to waste your time.

Change the default email graphic

Mon, 14 Feb 2005 08:20:54 GMT

You can change the little, yellow email graphic that Radio uses by default in your template. I found an email graphic on google images that I want to use. It looks like this. ![envelope](http://www.becomethemedia.org/radio/images/envelope.jpg) In the Radio application, Choose Tools, Developers, Jump... Enter 'radio.macros.mailto' without the quotes and hit enter. ![jump](http://www.becomethemedia.org/radio/images/mailtoJump.jpg) Look for the following image code. ![jump](http://www.becomethemedia.org/radio/images/mailtoCode.jpg) Change the code to match the new image that you'd prefer. For this example, I've changed it to the following: ![jump](http://www.becomethemedia.org/radio/images/mailtoCodeAfter.jpg) Hit the Compile button and then close the window. Repost any pages that you want to have the new image.

How to add TrackBack to your Radio UserLand posts

Sun, 06 Feb 2005 19:13:29 GMT

[Katya](http://blogs.salon.com/0004519/), a reader of this site, requested a tip on the TrackBack feature in Radio. Wikipedia says... > [TrackBack](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trackback) is a system implemented by many blogging tools, including Movable Type and WordPress, that allows a blogger to see who has seen the original post and has written another entry concerning it. The system works by sending a 'ping' between the blogs, and therefore providing the alert. > TrackBack typically appears below a blog entry and shows a summary of what has been written on the target blog, together with a URL and the name of the blog. UserLand added [TrackBack support for Radio](http://radio.userland.com/userGuide/reference/howToEnableTrackback) on August 4, 2003. You'll notice that every post on this manual has a trackback link so I can easily find out who is linking to my site. Here's how I did it. First, I made sure my [Radio is up to date](http://127.0.0.1:5335/system/pages/updateRadioRoot). Then, I added the TrackBack macro to my [#itemTemplate.txt](http://127.0.0.1:5335/system/pages/prefs?page=3.4) file. I put the word "TrackBack:" in front of the macro but you can put whatever you'd like, such as "There have been this many trackbacks to this post:" ![trackbacktip1](http://www.becomethemedia.org/radio/images/trackbacktip1.jpg) After adding the TrackBack macro, I then visited the [TrackBack prefs page](http://127.0.0.1:5335/system/pages/prefs?page=2.17) and selected the top two checkboxes. Then, I scrolled to the bottom of the window and entered the following for my TrackBack link text. You can change this to whatever you'd like. ![trackbacktip2](http://www.becomethemedia.org/radio/images/trackbacktip2.jpg) Click Submit. That's all there is to it.

How to add comments to your Radio weblog in four steps

Mon, 31 Jan 2005 06:54:32 GMT

1. [Update radio.root](http://127.0.0.1:5335/system/pages/updateRadioRoot) 2. On the [Comments prefs page](http://127.0.0.1:5335/system/pages/prefs?page=2.12), enter the following settings: Comments Page URL: http://radiocomments2.userland.com/comments Comment Text: Comments [<%commentCount%>] 3. In your [#itemTemplate.txt](http://127.0.0.1:5335/system/pages/prefs?page=3.4) file, enter <%commentLink%> where you want the comments link to appear 4. Publish your home page to see the results

Add your shortcuts to the glossary

Tue, 25 Jan 2005 02:01:08 GMT

I'm tired of typing the same URL over and over again. Aren't you? You know the drill.. Start a weblog post in Radio, create a link to the same web address that you've typed a hundred times before, hope you got all the HTML correct, and post your entry. Fortunately, Radio allows us to save shortcuts for those URL's that we refer to often, so that instead of typing out all that bothersome HTML code every time, we simply type a special word that we get to create and be sure to enclose it in double quotes.

For instance, I refer to NetNewsWire, the RSS news reader by Ranchero Software quite a bit. I got tired of type the HTML code every time I wanted to make a link to their site. So, I added a shortcut to Radio called 'nnw' and then entered the HTML code that makes it a link. Now, whenever I type those letters, enclose them in double quotes, and post to my site, Radio will automatically convert that shortcut into the full HTML code that creates a link to Ranchero's site. Let's test it. This should produce a link to "nnw".

Here's how you do it. Start up Radio. From the Tools-Developer's menu, select Jump... or Command-J for the Mac users like me out there. Enter user.html.glossary and choose OK. You'll see a bunch of entries which are existing shortcuts.

Try adding your own shortcut. Hit Enter to start a new entry, add a shortcut name, tab to the next field, enter the HTML for that link (follow the example of another shortcut to be sure you get it right) and hit Enter. Now, the next time you enter a new post in Radio, just enter your shortcut in double quotes and Radio will expand it for you, automatically.

There's more to know about Shortcuts, if you find this helpful. Perhaps I'll talk more about them in the future. Until then, take a look at the shortcuts page on the Radio site for more info.

How to Leverage Technorati Tags in Radio UserLand

Sat, 15 Jan 2005 01:45:55 GMT

Today, [Technorati introduced a new feature called Technorati Tags](http://www.technorati.com/tag/) that is really cool. Basically, it combines the power of blogs, pictures, and links contributed by people all over the world, and displays them all on the same page, according to whatever 'tag' they've been assigned. As of today, Technorati has no posts yet that match the tag:radiouserland. I see an opportunity to fill a void here by adding the posts on my site, [Radio UserLand: The Missing Manual](http://www.becomethemedia.org/radio/ "Radio UserLand tips and tricks. Geared towards the newbie."), to this page. To accomplish this, I'm going to have to start tagging my blog posts. _Technorati says.._ > To contribute to this tag, just make a post to your blog about radiouserland and include a link to this page like so: > ![Tag](http://www.becomethemedia.org/radio/images/technoratiTagToEnter.jpg) I'd rather not type the link every time I post a new item to my site. Rather, I'm going to modify the #itemTemplate.txt file, located in the Radio UserLand:www folder. I pasted the link provided by Technorati into the text file, saved and closed the file. From now on, when I publish a post, it will have that link embedded in it. That's step one. Step two involves pinging Technorati. Pinging is the process by which your Radio weblog tells a server that you've published a post. Radio UserLand can [automatically ping Weblogs.com when you publish your weblog](http://127.0.0.1:5335/system/pages/prefs?page=2.8) but how do you instruct Radio to ping Technorati? *Master Ping* _Technorati says.._ > If your blog software is configured to automatically ping us, there's nothing more you need to do – your post should appear here automatically. Patrick Ritchie, Radio programmer extraordinaire, created a [Radio tool](http://radio.weblogs.com/0101131/stories/2004/07/14/masterPingToolForRadio.html) that not only pings Technorati, it pings several other services as well. Download and place the tool in your Radio Tools folder, then restart Radio. Visit the [Master Ping control panel](http://127.0.0.1:5335/masterPing/) to select the desired services to be pinged. The Tool comes with blo.gs, blo.gs extended, Syndic8, Syndic8 extended, Yahoo and Technorati. That takes care of letting Technorati know about my posts. Now, I'll fire off a test post to be sure it's working. ![After](http://www.becomethemedia.org/radio/images/technoratiTagAfter.jpg) Now that's more like it! There are links to my posts and since I regularly add links to Del.icio.us with a tag of 'radiouserland', all those links also show up on the page. If I took the time to upload Radio UserLand screen grabs to flickr, those would show up as well. At this point, you may be asking yourself, "Do I really want all my posts tagged with one particular tag?" Well, in my case, Yes. For those of you who want to selectively tag your posts, [Matt from Oddio has created a bookmarklet for adding Technorati Tags](http://oddiophile.com/index.php?p=29). I haven't tried it with Radio yet but I see no reason why it shouldn't work. Happy tagging!

Create a backlog of your RSS feed for better search results at Feedster

Sun, 09 Jan 2005 19:33:54 GMT

Steve Hooker makes some useful Radio tools. Recently, I installed his tool, backLogAllRSS which is designed to improve your search results on the Feedster search engine site. I want my weblog, iceplant radio, to rank better at Feedster, an RSS search engine. You see, I've been weblogging at iceplant radio since 2001. Feedster came along in 2003 so there are a lot of posts on my weblog that visitors to Feedster don't know exist. What to do? Well, if you are running Radio UserLand just install Steve's tool and generate a backlog RSS file of your entire weblog by pressing one button. Then, index your entire blog with Feedster by telling them the address of that new file. Now Feedster knows about the entire history of your weblog and will automatically pick up where it left off with your next post. A human will inspect the feed you submit first to keep the spammers away. Thanks for a very useful tool, Steve.

Upstream your backup files to the public server

Mon, 03 Jan 2005 05:53:52 GMT

Radio can keep a backup of your weblog posts, stories, templates and preference settings. Every night, Radio will back up new or changed data, and optionally upstream it to the public server. You can use the backup files to restore your data using a fresh installation of Radio. In [Nightly Backups](http://127.0.0.1:5335/system/pages/prefs?page=2.16), select the second box, "Check this box if you want to upstream your backup files to the public server." The first item should be selected as well. By upstreaming your files to the public server, you are protecting yourself in case of a hard drive crash.

Try Thumbscrew to upload your Radio images

Tue, 21 Dec 2004 04:39:33 GMT

Thumbscrew is an impressive application for OS X that easily adds a nice border to your images. Tonight I learned a useful tip from [Paolo Valdemarin](http://paolo.evectors.it/ "The man behind eVectors") that I'm going to start applying for my Radio UserLand image uploading needs right away.

"I have always loved whitebordered-tilted-shadowed images for this blog.

Now there's a very nice little application that does the trick with a simple drag and drop, no photoshopping needed for every picture anymore.

Thumbscrew by Zachery Bir allows me to set up background color, image size, file type and destination folder (in my case it's my blog's images folder, which means that Radio automatically uploads everything for me)."

Add a Favicon to your URL

Sat, 18 Dec 2004 18:51:03 GMT

Admit it, you want one. You know, that cool little icon in your web browser address bar, just to the left of your URL. Well, I did too and now I've got one. [Here's how I did it.](http://www.becomethemedia.org/radio/outlines/tips/addFavicon.html)