There is a list of 32 things that I consider important when come the time to check for blogging software and a hosting service. This is the features I was searching for in prevision of the next upgrade of this blog. This list is not really intended to beginner bloggers because many technical features are in the list. However, the items in the list are present in no particular order. It is certainly not complete, then if you have others to add, leave them in the comment section or by email and I will take care to add them to the list.

Traditional blogging features

• Comment post. The system should give the ability to the readers to comment posts. It should optionally give the possibility to moderate these
  comments. I think that all blogging systems have the feature.
  • Max adds that it would be nice
    if comments were displayed in a pop-up window instead of the bottom of the posts.
  • Sudar adds that it would be nice to have a permalink for each comment. It is effectively really essential when come the time to track your comments!
  • Sudar also adds that it would be really nice if each user that comments has the possibility to receive all comments on the post by email.
  • Tom add that the system would need to have a preview comment feature.
• Anti-spam for comments. The system should give some sort of anti-spam system for comments. Spam comments are becoming a real pain on the Blogsphere.
• Anti-hammering feature. Tom add that the system would need a feature to prevent auto-spam bots by putting a limit of time between each post (Movable type is 15 seconds, b2Evolution is 30 seconds).
• Trackbacks.
  The system should give the possibility to other bloggers the to trackback posts.
• Anti-spam for trackbacks. The system should give some sort of contrul (anti-spam or moderation) on the trackbacks. I had many problems of spamming in my trackbacks and I unfortunately cannot do anything to delete them with Radio Userland.
• Search engine friendly. The title of the posts needs to be the name of the perma-link.
  • Max adds that it is not only important for search engine, but also for your readers, because it make the perma-link "human readable".
  • Jack say that would be even more interesting if the the underscores ought to be replaced by dashes. It seems that this way, URL are much more “search engine friendly”.
• Import/Export.
  The system should give the possibility to import and export the posts, comments and trackbacks to other blogging platforms.
• Categories.
  The system should implement categorization. It should optionally implement sub categories. It could also be interesting to dynamically create the categories with tags defined on posts (it could be viewable as a tag cloud).
  • Max specifies 2 important things that the category systems need to do: (1) post a single post in more than one category, and (2) create a web feed for each individual category.
• Archives.
  The system should implement a good archive system.
• Multiple-Blogs.
  The system should permit multiple-blogs. I should not be supposed to
  reinstall the software to create a new blog on the same host.
• Guest blogging. The system should permit to create profiles for more than one blogger.
• The source code should be accessible. The system should distribute his source code to give the possibility to the blogger to add/change features.
• Images.
  The system should give the possibility to the blogger to easily upload and add images to his posts.
• Search engine. The system should give the possibility to search within posts, and this on the entire blog including the archives.
• Full feed/Abstract feed. The system should create full and abstract feeds. Then the reader will have the possibility to choose which is best
  for him.
• Comment feed. The system should create a feed for the comments posted on the messages of the blog.
  • Max reminds me something we already talked about some months ago: the possibility to add the comments directly into the posts’ feed. It would be really interesting, because comments are an integral part of posts.
• Web interface. The system should give the possibility to post messages on a blog via a web interface.
• Post by email. The system should give the possibility to post messages on a blog via email.
• IP banning. The system should give the possibility to ban an IP address to the system.
• Binary file upload.. Jack add: “Not only should the system allow easy posting of images, but you may as well look for easy posting of any kind of binary. With images you want it to understand thumbnails (creating them may be a function of your host). What about videos, pdfs, podcasts, etc?”
• Good web post editing tool. Radio Userland have a good web posting editing tool. I only had to do my editing in Word then copy/past my text into it. I think that such web editing tools are essential. Otherwise you will have to do the editing, with HTML tags, by hand.
• Supporting user community. Tom add: You’ll end up leaning on it eventually! This feature is blog platform specific.

Layout management

• Custom code. The system should allow the possibility to add custom code in the template, like JavaScript code.
• Template modification. The system should permit the total modification of the templates.
• Search engine friendly. The themes need to be search engine friendly.

Hosting service

• Unlimited bandwidth. The provider should not restrict the bandwidth of their hosted blogs.
• Technical support. The provider should give a premium service to all of his customers via phone or email.
• Availability of the source codes. The provider should give the rights to the blogger to change the code of the hosted blogging system.
• Domain name. The provider should give the possibility to map a domain name to the blog.
• Statistics.
  Sudar adds that it would be nice if a good statistic system is implemented on the host server. It is more than essential, because bloggers are addicted to all type of stats.
• Unlimited space for posts. The provider should give unlimited space for text posts. At least 1 gig should be available for photos and other documents.
• Low cost. The cost of such a service should be under 15$ per month.

Some Wishes

• “Wizard” system for generating category/user/date-specific feeds. All of the tools I’m familiar with still require too much technical expertise to customize feeds, and even when you do this, there’s a good chance the feeds won’t validate. Tom’s wishe
• Full-featured API. I would replace “post via email” with this, as it allows one to post from a user-friendly desktop client (like SharpMT) as I regularly do. Tom’s wishe

Am I demanding? I do not think so considering the blogging systems available today and the cost of the storage space. The best blogging services are open-source, and 1 gig of storage space cost less than 1$. Why such services are so rare? I cannot understand…

Have I missed some feature? Do not forget to leave it in the
comment section or byemail; I will take care to add them to the list.

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