Friday, October 26, 2007

An experiment in labels

Tim asked the other night if we could arrange Posts in folders?
As far as I know this is not possible. Posts are archived by dates. However searching can be made simpler by adding labels for Posts. In this way Posts can then be searched or sorted by these labels (sometimes called tags by other blog software).
So what is a label?
Simply put it is a one word descriptor that describes the category that the Post fits in (think of it like a folder name).
This post might be labeled instructions. A Post can have more than one label, but then it will turn up under searches or sorts for each label.

I suggest the following labels for this blog:

  • grammar - for posts on grammar (e.g. sneaked v snuck)
  • craft - for posts on plotting or outlining, dialogue, descriptions, character development (e.g. are dead dogs ok)
  • tools - for software, computing problems, hints or tips (Mac v PC, word v rtf, etc)
  • non-fiction - for posts on journalism, essays, memoir (e.g. voice, flashback and truth)
Feel free to suggest others, but remember too many will get confusing and unwieldy.

You will find the box to add Labels for this post at the bottom left of the input page on each new post.

The other thing to remember is to use short meaningful titles for the original post, so that there is a chance of guessing the likely content.

Comments are kept with Posts, so make sure the comment is relevant to the topic posted and try to keep each post to one topic.

One final thought. On the top right hand side you will see a search blog. This will find the post(s) that contain that key word searched on.


Geoff

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