no-reply comments and links in a new window

Have I told you lately how much I love talking with you? Yes, you.

I love the comments you leave me each and every day and because of those comments I've started a lot of great friendships through this blog. I try my very best to answer each and every comment that comes in, but for some of you that's hard to do.

Yes, its the dreaded 'no-reply' comment discussion. I'm not the first to talk about this and there are many out there who will tell you how to correct this (here, here and here) but the crib notes version is, if you have a Blogger profile (which you can have even if you don't have a blog of your own) and your profile does not include your email, then you are a no-reply blogger. Also, if you have your Google + account linked as your blogger profile then you are a no-reply blogger as well.

This is frustrating because then I can't email you back. I used to do my best to research how to get a hold of the no-reply commenters and would sometimes be able to find an email address after a lot of digging but that is a lot of time. A lot.

So PLEASE check your profile and make sure that your email is listed, because I want to chat with you.

And one other thing for all of you fellow bloggers out there. In my former life I was in the big world of web development. Exciting, I know. And in that life I learned a few cardinal rules in the world of the web, one of which is broken all the time. Every single link within a post, whether it goes to another page on your blog or an entirely different site, should open in a new window.

You don't want a reader to be in the middle of an engrossing post that you worked hard to create to click on a link within the middle of your story and be taken away to another site. It is just like putting down a book only to find when you come back that you've lost your place. So frustrating. And frustrating to you as well if that reader doesn't end up going back to your site to finish that post. You don't want that.

The good news is that this is a super easy fix. When setting up your link, just make sure to click the 'open this link in a new window' box and you are all set.

So those are my two public service announcements for the day. And to thank you for your patience during this school lesson, I have a treat for you on Friday. You will love it, trust me.

And by the way,

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