I’d saved this topic for the day 29 and am here today to discuss about the How to use JOOMLA!  as BLOG. Let’s start with difference between blog and website.

What is Blog ?

A blog is a type of website or part of a website. Blogs are usually maintained by an individual with regular entries of comments, posts, descriptions of events, or other material such as graphics or video. Entries are commonly displayed in reverse-chronological order.

What is CMS?

CMS refers to Content Management System just like Joomla is CMS, which enables you to build Web sites and powerful online applications.

Joomla is a great content management system which is used to build web site. Now I’m going to discuss on how to use Joomla! as a blog.

How to use Joomla! as Blog

Blogging is a great way to get more traffic to your site and communicate with the community interested in the same topics as you. Now am going to tell you how you can use joomla as blog for your site.

Following points need to considered for site as a blog :

How to structure Joomla! as a blog

Joomla! was not built to be a blog in its basic form, unlike WordPress. However, Joomla! has a built-in layout function called Blog layout that can be used for sections and categories. RSS Feeds are also built in, but we need to put an extra component in place to get a commenting system.

• Let’s set up the basic structure of your Joomla! based blog.The first thing you need to do is to come up with a section name for your blog.You already have an extended keywords list, so it should not be difficult to set up a blog. In my example site I have set up a Section called Health and Fitness Blog and the Alias I want to use is Health and Fitness.This alias is going to be included in the SEF URL and contains some of the keywordsOnce you are ready with this, you need to create the main categories, which of course will be the main topics of your blog section.

• Now we have section “Health and Fitness”for our blog , We will create the  main categories under this section. I have created the category “Exercise ” and “Morning Walk” under the section.

• While naming the categories I will stay on the same blog topic and keep the terms as relevant as possible with my category name.

• I will not create too many categories as joomla is going to create a separate menu for the blog. Too many categories will fill my blog menu with a long list of topics, and the visitors will not be able to choose from this long list and make them frustrate ohhhhh. So while creating category, I will keep thing in mind that my category menu should look pretty also.

• Am done with the creation of section and categories name. Now I will create menu for Blog using joomla. Health and Fitness Blog as in my example site. To set this feature I will goto administrator or at joomla backend.

• I have created new menu item “Health and Fitness” with the help of main menu at joomla backend Click on Menus | Main Menu from the menu bar at top.

• Now I will go to theExtensions menu, choose Module Manager, and Publish the module in the location I want it to show on my site.

• I would also like to share following important points while creating menu item.

• The first thing you should do is create a link to the section in which you are going to put your blog posts, and change the Parameters(Basic) to match the layout you want:

• #Leading is set to 1, which means one full length article to start with

• #Intro is set the 6, so you have the introduction text (that is the text before the “read more” link) from six articles, getting a total of seven on the blog page

• Columns is set to 1 to get a complete overview of the articles in a listing that is not broken into two columns after the first Intro article

• #Links this is the number of links with the title of older articles that don’t show on the  blog page anymore

• Now we are done with the Parameters(Basic),  But also need to set the Parameters(Advanced) as well.Change the Category Order to Order and the Primary Order to Most recent first.

• Make sure Show a Feed Link set to Yes—only for this menu item. This option is set so that we can get a full RSS Feed over all the blog categories For a blog, I need to change some of the settings in the Parameters(Component) also.For a blog, I also need to Show the Author Name, the Created Date and Time, the Show Navigation, and the Read more… Link.

• To separate blog categories from the complete overview, place a separator just below the section link. Simply choose the option Separator in the new menu item and give it a title. I just named it “Blog categories”. Now start adding the menu links to the different categories using the Category Blog Layout option as shown in below figure.

Now you are ready to use Joomla as Blog!!!!!!

Note : I would also like to share this One of the most important features of a blog is the commenting system, where visitors can respond to the articles posted on the blog. Comments can be a direct response to a post, questions, or additional information that can help others who read the article. As joomla doesn’t have commenting system with anti spam features , So I have to look for third party to provide this feature. Following are name of components and modules used for commenting system in joomla blog.

• IDoBlog – blog for Joomla! 1.5.x. IDoBlog – is not just a blog, this is a full blog system containing profiles, commenting system and multiuser blogs system without any additional. Using IDoBlog commenting system you can organise not linear discussion, with branches.

• Webee Comments is a Joomla 1.5 native component/plugin that enables simple, AJAX based and to-the-point commenting. Enable comments on specific sections, categories or articles. Make a blog with this easy to install and styled component.

• The JComments 2.2 is a powerful and easy to use AJAX based comment system for Joomla with flexible ACL, smiles, BBCodes and avatars support.

• yvComment is the first native Joomla! 1.5 Commenting solution, it is well documented and free.

• JXtended Comments for Joomla! gives you the same powerful yet simple commenting system used by the Joomla! project for the Joomla! Community.

• CompojoomComment has now replaced the amazing JoomlaComment extension.

• RDBS Comments is a commenting system for Joomla! with the focus on accessbility.

• rsiComments display comments on Joomla! articles and blog feed layouts.

• Commentator a very simple comment system for Joomla! our focus is to be the most flexible of all comments systems. It takes all advantages from the new MVC Framework and can be used by any 3rd party Extension.

• With RSComments! you can add commenting to articles, blogs and other Joomla! extensions on your website.