The following 12 plugins are available on Edublogs supporter blogs and/or Edublogs Campus blogs only!
Remember you need to activate your plugins (Plugins > Installed) before you can use them — follow these instructions to activate your plugins
AddThis Social Bookmarking Plugin
The AddThis Social Bookmarking plugin allows readers to bookmark posts from blogs easily with over 45 popular services, and to share it with friends via email.
When activated it adds a AddThis Bookmark link to the bottom of every post. Readers use it by simply hovering their mouse over Bookmark and then clicking on the service they want to use!
See it in action at the bottom of The Edublogger posts!
Aggr
The Aggr plugin (Edublogs Campus blogs only) allows you to place the contents of an RSS feed into a page or post. This is really handy where you want to share the latest feed from a blog or site.
Adding the RSS feed is as simple as:
- Click on the HTML tab in the Add New Page or Post Screen
- Add the Aggr code with the desired RSS feed URL and then click Publish.
Here is an example Aggr being used in a post:
Akismet Plugin
Akismet checks your comments against the Akismet web service to see if they look like spam or not and lets you review the spam it catches under your blog’s “Comments” admin screen.
To use Akismet you need to follow these configuration instructions to obtain a WordPress.com API key and enter the key on your Akismet configuration screen (Plugins > Akismet configuration).
Audio and Video Comments Plugins
This plugin add the ability for your readers to leave audio and video comments in addition to written comments.
See it in action in the Audio and Video Comments post!
PLEASE NOTE:
The video comments include advertisements that display along the bottom of the video. This plugin is provided by Riffly.com and Edublogs.org has not control over these ads.
Contact Form Plugin
The contact form plugin allows user to set up a contact form that can be embedded into a page.
Footnotes Plugin
The Footnotes plugin is used to easily add footnotes to posts. Excellent for when you want students to reference their sources.
Besides links footnotes can contain anything you would like including images, etc. The footnotes are automatically linked back to the spot in the text where the note was made.
Here is an example of Footnotes added to a post.
Adding footnotes is as simple as:
- Write your post
- Add footnotes at the end of desired sentences by enclosing the footnote in a square brackets where each footnote must have a number followed by a period and a space and then the actual footnote. For example — [2. PLN yourself website.]
- Click Publish post
Google Analytics Plugin
The Google Analytics plugin lets you easily add Google’s tracking code from Google Analytics to your blog.
Google Analytics is used by bloggers because it provide detailed statistics of visits to your blog such as who’s coming to your blog site, how they’re getting there and what interests them.
To use Google Analytics you need to follow these instructions to add your Google tracking code to your Google Analytics configuration screen (Settings > Google Analytics).
See Also: The Basics of Using Google Analytics
Greet Box Plugin
The Greet Box plugin allows you to display specific messages, ‘a greet box’, to visitors to your blog depending on their referrer URL.
For example, you could ask a Digg visitor to Digg your post, or ask people referred from Twitter to twit the post and follow you on Twitter. You can also set a default message that invites a new visitor to subscribe to your RSS feed, for referrer URLs that don’t match the default deferrer URLs.
The Greet Box plugin has an administration screen in the Settings menu (Settings > Greet Box) where it can be customize.
Let It Snow Plugin
If you want a gentle fall of the seasonal white snow falling down your blog install the Let It Snow Plugin.
Subscribe2 Plugin
Subscribe2 Plugin is used on Edublogs Campus blogs to provide a comprehensive subscription management and email notification system.
The Subscribe2 Widget adds a form to your sidebar for readers simply enter their email address and then click on “Subscribe”. The readers then receive an email notifying when new posts are published on the blog.
Subscribe2 Counter Plugin
The Subscribe2 Counter Plugin (Edublogs Campus blogs only) adds a widget to your available widget area (Appearance > Widgets). This widget displays the number of people who have subscribed to your blog using Subscribe2 email notification system.
Subscribe To Comments Plugin
The Subscribe To Comments is a plugin that allows commenters on your blog to check a box before commenting and get e-mail notification of further comments.
This is a ‘must have’ plugin because it makes it easier for readers to be notified of the new comments on posts; also increases the chances they will respond back to newer comments!
The Subscribe to Comments plugins has an administration screen in the Settings menu (Settings > Subscribe to Comments) where it can be customize.
Threaded Comments Plugin
The Threaded Comments plugin enables threaded comments for your blog – simply activate, configure and enjoy as the comments perfectly nest. This allows you, or your readers, to respond back easily to individual comments.
This plugin has an administration screen in the Settings menu (Settings > Threaded Comments) where it can be customize.
See it in action in The Edublogger comments!
Twitter Tools Plugin
The Twitter tools plugin allows you to:
- Send a tweet to your twitter network whenever you write a blog post
- Create a blog post from a tweet
- Displays your tweets on your blog and post tweets from your blog
Once activated you need to go to the Twitter tools administration screen in the Settings menu (Settings > Twitter Tools) to configure.
Twitter tools is excellent of notifying your twitter network of latest posts however a 3rd party application, such as the widgets available from Twitter, is probably better for displaying your tweets on your blog.
Widget Pack Plugin
The Widget Pack plugin adds widgets for ClustrMaps, Delicious, FlickR, Google Search, Twitters, VodPod Widgets to your available widget area (Appearance > Widgets).
These widgets are designed to provide a quick and easy way of adding content from these services to your blog sidebar without having to grab the HTML embed code from their websites.
