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View Full Version : Word Press or Blogger? Pro's and Con's



Ad-Vice_Man
01-26-2009, 04:17 PM
Hey all... I currently use blogger, for no other reason than it was the first blog tool I came across that was free and easy when I started my website.

That said I'm at a point where it might make sense to make a transition. However I don't want to do this more than once... if I do change. SO. I'd love to hear some pro's and cons about Wordpress and Blogger... as well perhaps any other blog utilities that I may not have heard of.

Thanks

the goat
01-26-2009, 04:25 PM
I have never used blogger so I can't make an actual comparison, but I can tell you that I absolutely love wordpress.

I recently moved a friends site from a blogger platform to wordpress and it could not have been easier. It is 100% automated, no manual moving of anything.

orion_joel
01-26-2009, 06:12 PM
I did use blogger once, for a short period many years ago, and while it worked for me at the time, i think that if you are serious about a blog and want to do more (eg earn potential income, expand what your blog can do) with your blog, then you really need to host it yourself, just to have the flexibility.

I currently use wordpress, and dont know that i would want to use anything else at this point.

Harold Mansfield
01-26-2009, 07:15 PM
I couldn't imagine using anything other than Word Press. I used blogger before also, and it does serve it's purpose, but if you are serious about making money blogging, then self hosting is the only way to have control over your business.

There are other platforms like Square Space, and Joomla that offer some nice aesthetics, but Word Press is open source, and most of the plug ins that add functionality are free...and there are thousands of them.

With any other professional blogging platform, you have to pay extra for plug ins, templates and themes, and you don't have such a large community of support.

The design options, customizations, and functions of Word Press are far superior to blogger in just about every way.

By the way, every link in my sig is run on word press.

KristineS
01-26-2009, 09:51 PM
I still use Blogger for one of the blogs I write, although it will be moving to Wordpress soon (hint, hint Vangogh). One thing I've noticed with Blogger is you don't have the ability to add extra pages. Wordpress allows you to add informational pages to your blog quite easily.

seolman
01-26-2009, 11:21 PM
Blogger has a specific framework you work within and if that works for you then it may be just what you need.

Wordpress gives you the flexibility to add various modules to enhance it's functionality in ways Blogger won't. You can add literally hundreds of plugins to do anything from plot visitors on a map to allow them to buy goods from your own shopping cart system. Personally I like the freedom WordPress gives me over Blogger but it truly is a matter of what you are most comfortable with.

vangogh
01-26-2009, 11:43 PM
The main advantage of Blogger is it's free and easy to start. WordPress isn't difficult though. It's really just as easy and they also offer a free hosted version.

The best setup with WordPress is to pay for hosting and install WordPress. If you get Linux hosting you'll most likely have tools in your hosting control panel to install WordPress for you. Takes me a few minutes to install WordPress manually, not including the time to upload the files, but that's mostly idle time.

The advantages are the better control you have over your blog. You can do more with WordPress than you can with blogger, in part because you're hosting it yourself, but in part because of the application itself.

WordPres can be set up as a full content management system. You can use it without ever using the blog. The last few sites I've developed for people have all been on WordPress and some you would never know were built using a blogging system.

WP is generally search engine friendly out of the box (with a few small tweaks anyone can do). It also has several plugins to make it more search friendly.

Speaking of plugins, there's a very active developer community around WordPress offering free plugins for most anything you'd want to add. Most of the time I think to myself I wish WordPress could do something. So I search for wordpress plugins something and in a few minutes have found someone built me a free plugin to add the functionality I was looking for.

If you're up for customizing your own theme it's relatively easy to do. You'll want to know html and css, but if you can themes are easy to customize. If you prefer not to customize it yourself and decide instead to hire someone like me you'll likely pay less to have the work done than you would if the site was built on something other than WordPress.

Lots of free themes available too that are easy to install if you have an FTP program to upload the files to the server.

Blogging is easy. If you can post a blog on Blogger you can post one on WordPress. Might take you a couple of days to get used to a new interface, but odds are you'll be able to jump right in.

orion_joel
01-27-2009, 08:19 PM
I think that the concept behind blogger is, make it fool proof. The idea of a fixed system that cannot be expanded, is proof of that concept. It means people that really are not sure on what they are doing have a fixed way to do what they need to with the knowledge that doing that same thing will give them the same results each time.

I agree that installing wordpress is a very easy option. Fantastico makes it literally a 1 minute job if you have access, other wise you can use the file manger in cpanel and upload the zip, and unzip on the fly in less then 5 minutes.

greenoak
01-29-2009, 11:50 AM
love the foolproof part!!!!
blogger is right for me...im pretty sure i couldnt handle the harder wordpress...i havent been able to learn all the stuffi can do on blogger yet anyway...i just love it, it gives me capabilities i never imagined...and i get so much nice feedback from it....

now i do want a third column....the plan is to get dh in a nice helpful mood /aka butter him up and make him do it...i wouldnt even try and hes so good at stuf like that........i think that would expand my thing quite a bit...
.i realize wordpress is way better in many ways...but for me at my level, im very happy with blogger...

vangogh
01-29-2009, 11:58 AM
Nice to see you back Ann. There's nothing hard about WordPress. You'd likely find it just as easy to use as Blogger. If there was any issue it would be installing WordPress, though there's a good chance your hosting account will let you install WordPress with a few clicks. And even if you hired someone like me to install it for you the money wouldn't be much.

orion_joel
01-29-2009, 10:12 PM
I think you would be able to handle wordpress as well ann, the actual main area's that you use for posting and such are quite straight forward, the only difference is that you have a lot more control in wordpress over somethings that can affect how the site works.

vangogh
01-29-2009, 10:53 PM
Yeah the ease of Blogger is really just not having to get hosting and install WordPress. You already have a hosting account Ann and installing WordPress is actually pretty easy. I bet you've done more complicated things.

billbenson
01-30-2009, 06:08 AM
Ann, if your host has Fantastico it should just be a couple of clicks to install WP. If not, you will need to go to your control panel ->databases -> create database -> then add a user to the database. Upload wordpress to a subdirectory on your site via FTP. Then navigate to it ie domain/wpdirectory and it will ask you for user name and passwords and you are done. Just make sure you write your user names and passwords down when you create the database.

It's really straight forward. If you run into any problems, just post them here. Someone will help you out. Its the easiest install of a program of this type I have installed. I just installed it for the first time a week or so ago. They have a really good paint by numbers procedure on their website.

greenoak
01-30-2009, 09:35 AM
uh, i cant reliably even cut and paste or turn the computer on.......
v.g. i might remember that when i outgrow blogger!!! you are right, i can definitely do complicated things...like price items from a truckload just bought at auction without notes.....but thats not like a machine....we all have our good parts!!
we just started selling on etsy and sold 5 things in the first 2 days...so my interest in the internet part of our business might be growing.....
ann

vangogh
01-30-2009, 12:16 PM
Ann in all likelihood your site is hosted on a Linux server of some kind. And odds are you have a control panel with Fantastico installed. Now I know you're more than capable of logging into a hosting control panel. Assuming Fantastico is installed your process to install WordPress would go something like this:

Find the icon for Fantastico in your control panel and click it
Find the link to install WordPress and click it
Enter in a couple of things to a form like your email address, a name for the folder where WordPress will be installed (can be a folder that doesn't currently exist) and then click one more button. In less than 30 seconds you'll have WordPress installed on your site and the information about how and where to login.

There really isn't anything more technical about installing WordPress this way than there is shopping online and making a purchase.

tmijs789
02-25-2009, 01:54 PM
There are other platforms like Square Space, and Joomla that offer some nice aesthetics, but Word Press is open source, and most of the plug ins that add functionality are free...and there are thousands of them.

Joomla's pretty complicated and a bit bloated... but good.
I'm surprised no one's mentioned Word Press's biggest con... security. It is a security nightmare. Be sure to ALWAYS keep up with the latest updates.. even then - you can look up wordpress at security sites like secunia.com and have a look at their general track records from year to year.

I vote blogger. When blogger gets hacked it's news... with Word Press it's old news.

vangogh
02-25-2009, 02:31 PM
All apps need to be updated to be secure. That's not unique to WordPress. WordPress also makes it very easy to update, easier than most apps that I've seen. A couple of clicks and you're done. There's also plenty of info about making it more secure.

The weak link in security is most often people. It's like saying your antivirus software doesn't work because you don't update it. If you don't update your software the insecurity is your fault not the software.

Do you have a link to something about Wordpress on secunia? I typed WordPress in to the search box, but no results were returned. I'm not questioning that the info is there. I just couldn't find it and would appreciate a link.

seolman
02-26-2009, 10:09 PM
WordPress also makes it very easy to update, easier than most apps that I've seen. A couple of clicks and you're done. There's also plenty of info about making it more secure.

Steve, I'm having a dog of a time getting my WP to auto update. It's on a dedicated server. I finally got it to the point where I get "Unable to locate WordPress Plugin directory."

If I wasn't bald I'd be pulling out my hair...

Any ideas?

vangogh
02-27-2009, 01:17 AM
What version of WP are you using? If it's 2.7 you should be able to use the new auto upgrade feature. If it's prior you need to add the auto upgrade plugin. For most it works fine. You click a series of links and you're using the latest version. Perhaps a plugin you've added is causing conflict.

I'm guessing you're doing the above and for whatever reason it's still not working. Only once did the auto upgrade fail on me.

My guess is WP needs the FTP info for connecting to your server. It's probably something with the sever more so than WP. Your server might be set to block the connection WordPress is trying to make.

You could always go for the manual upgrade. That's still pretty easy for anyone familiar with web development.

seolman
02-27-2009, 11:14 AM
Yeah I'm doing manual upgrades every time some new upgrade pops up because the auto-upgrade simply isn't finding the file folders - weird.

I'll check and see if I have an old module in there somewhere messing things up. My heads a bit muddled lately from too many hours behind the monitor...

vangogh
02-27-2009, 11:28 AM
Something tells me it's the way your server is set up. It's probably blocking WP from trying to connect. I actually tend to do the manual updates anyway. They're still pretty easy and this way I'm more prepared just in case something doesn't work right.

seolman
02-27-2009, 12:20 PM
Just got finished fixing it and read your post...you must have a sixth sense. It was a problem inherent with pair hosting. Had to make a couple small changes to the php setup on the server and it's working great.

Interesting - there is a decent list of incompatible hosts (http://codex.wordpress.org/Core_Update_Host_Compatibility) for their auto-upgrade system - my host was listed amongst the crowd and just happened to have a "fix" link *phew* otherwise I would have had to figure it out myself or just continued with the manual updates. :p

vangogh
02-27-2009, 03:56 PM
I need to start advertising my mind reading and psychic prediction services :)

WordPress obviously needs to connect to your site to be able to deliver the files so I figured it was something in place on the server preventing that from happening. I assume it's a security thing by the hosting company.

Thanks for the list. Good to know who to recommend people to when they plan on using WordPress to run their site.

tmijs789
03-02-2009, 07:28 PM
Do you have a link to something about Wordpress on secunia? I typed WordPress in to the search box, but no results were returned. I'm not questioning that the info is there. I just couldn't find it and would appreciate a link.

Sure,

WordPress 2.x - Advisories by Product - Secunia Advisories - Vulnerability Information - Secunia.com (http://secunia.com/advisories/product/6745/)

If you have a look at 2007's reports you'll understand my bias against Wordpress. That is horrendous. I'd have to look more deeply to see if the 'unpatched vulnerabilities' are relevant but I usually take that as a bad sign. I was consistently seeing wordpress site's hacked throughout that year and much of the next.

vangogh
03-02-2009, 08:38 PM
Thanks for the link. One thing I would say though is it's no longer 2007. Granted we're still early in 2009, but at the moment there are no security advisories for the year. In 2008 there was a total of 5 advisories none of which was rated extremely critical.

Also here's a quote from Secunia site about WordPress


The most severe unpatched Secunia advisory affecting WordPress 2.x, with all vendor patches applied, is rated Less critical

I think you have to look beyond one year and also note that the WordPress team is usually very fast at releasing patches. True that means you have to upgrade your software, but that's true with all software. Dave's problems above notwithstanding WordPress is quite easy to upgrade and Dave's problems were actually the server and not WordPress.

If you're someone who doesn't want to upgrade your software sign up with WordPress.com so they'll upgrade things for you.

I think you're characterizing the software based on one bad year. Every piece of software ever written has security problems. There's no such thing as 100% secure.

tmijs789
03-03-2009, 01:40 PM
Call me a disgruntled wordpress admin :) I spent a fair amount of time in 07/08 cleaning up messes from peoples hacked wordpress sites or providing them alternative solutions.

It's a little strange what secunia considers critical and not. I've checked on a "non-critical" vulnerability and found it allows me to write files to the server which could allow me to write a script to the server that would allow me shell access. How is that not critical? Read the fine print and judge accordingly what's "critical" in your server operation. (can't recall the specific example)

But wordpress does seem to be improving it's track record. I'm still skeptical but I may have to give it another shot in the near future.

vangogh
03-03-2009, 02:56 PM
I think you're reaction is understandable. I won't deny WordPress has had it's issues over the years and I've bookmarked several posts on deal with security and WP. Weird Secunia wouldn't consider writing files as critical, but maybe they consider it more critical for the host and not necessarily WordPress. A lot of applications need write permissions to do their thing. I don't think that's going to be limited to WordPress.

I still think for the most part the weak link in security is us and not the software. Fir example with WordPress you need to run their installer files initially. The install instructions very clearly say to delete those files after you're done or at the very least rename them. How many people actually do that though. I don't think you can blame WordPress for someone not following the directions.

I certainly understand your skepticism. If you're interested here are a few posts I bookmarked at Delicious dealing with WP and security (http://delicious.com/vangogh99/wordpress+security)