This site has been up in the current incarnation – that would be WordPress – for several months now. That means time to tear it up and do something different.
Since I’ve been bemoaning the sorry state of Joomla as a blogging platform, I’ve been politely told that I can in fact use Joomla as a blogging platform, and it’ll actually work like, you know, a blog.
So I’m investigating extensions and such to add the following features to a Joomla site:
- comments
- trackbacks
- pings
- tags
I know there are commercial platforms that can do some or all of these things, how about open source ones? The few things I HAVE tried were awful.
When I got it all figured out I’ll relaunch the blog, and document how it was done.
What is it now?
Right now this site is running WordPress with a few additional goodies:
- Pyrmont V2 2.0.7 by motta
- About Me 3000
- Twitter Widget
- My TwitPics
- Contact Form 7
- Dean’s Code Highlighter
- Google Analytics for WordPress
- Google XML Sitemaps
- Sociable
I tried the WordPress Events Calendar but it didn’t work; and ditto for my experience with a variety of book plugins, who either had absolutely horrific markup and display or broken code.
My favorite app in this whole experience ended up being the WordPress for iPhone app – which does exactly what it says, and allows you to manage posts, pages and comments all from your iPhone. Best of all you can incorporate photos in your content, making it more than just a “in case of emergency” tool.
Once I figure out what I’m going to do for a Joomla-powered blog, I’ll post as well. And this time I’ll include some redirects for old URLs from the WordPress instance, and keep the old content and comments. Wish me luck.
I'm Mitch, and this is my blog. I tend to blow the whole thing up and relaunch using a completely different platform every 90 days or so. You can learn more about me on my social site stuff (see links below) and by reading about me on this here site.
I have found a few extensions useful for blogging in Joomla:
- ArtCats creates a nice categories list.
- CustomProperties handles tagging nicely and has a tag cloud module.
- Sometimes I just use a Cutom HTML module for Analytics but the JoomlaGATor plugin is handy for automating things like download tracking.
- It seems more difficult to find a decent social bookmark plugin. The only one I currently tolerate is Sexy Bookmarks…I’d be curious to know if you find one you like (or any other extension, for that matter)
- Disqus plugin for comments seems to work well, if you want to go that route.
I’m told I can use K2 to turn Joomla into a blogging platform, but for me pings and trackbacks are a standard feature – not sure if K2 can do that out of the box.
I think tamka has both, may want to ask AmyStephen
Well, you were told well! K2 is great for your new blog plus much more
Since it can’t do pingbacks (for now) you can simply use this free extension http://extensions.joomla.org/extensions/news-production/blog/7702
I could also suggest trying our simple social blogging solution SuperBlogger, which turns Joomla! into a blog with just one mighty content plugin.
http://www.joomlaworks.gr/content/view/56/42/
Happy Joomla! blogging!
@Scoop Tamka seems to be abandoned, plus there is no download link available last time I checked.
I was wondering when you were going to show up, Fotis
Definitely will be checking out your SuperBlogger. And also keeping out an eye for SuperMegaGnarlyWhackDaddyBlogger.
BlogPing isn’t compatible with K2, so it is odd to suggest its use.
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Very timely, glad you asked and got answers. I’m planning my first serious blog and also want to use Joomla for the funk of it.
BTW, I’m a blues & funk harp player so when’s the Joomla Jam?
-Giacomo Jim
Breifly scanned some of the previous comments so I don’t know if you found an answer but I am using Lyften Bloggie. While it recently had some vulnerabilities (that may have had some impact of initial impression) I believe those were addressed just before new years.
Saw your reference to using wordpress for iPhone and also that you’re using Pyrmont V2 – I’m getting PHP errors when trying to use WP4iPhone, and narrowed it down to Pyrmont (by switching to the default theme and WP4iPhone working)
Did you have any problems using the app with this theme active?
It only should error the first time you try to connect from the iPhone app. Just switch to the base theme, then login with your iPhone, and then you can switch back again.
My assumption is there is a URL mapping provided by the default theme that is not available in many 3rd party themes.