I recently read a blog article about how writing one's own blogging engine is equivalent to writing yesterday's "Hello World" program. Everyone does one at some point. So here I am with my version of a blogging engine. My "interpretation" is a bit different than others perhaps in that I've expressed my engine as an ASP.NET user control. This packaging has advantages and disadvantages and you'll have to decide if it's right for you. One thing I can say is it has been fun to write and I've learned much about ASP.NET, a platform I have not programmed in before. I hope you find it useful and fun as well and always, send feedback. - Mike

While developing the Blue Onion Software Web site I ran into an interesting problem. At one point I wanted to add a blog only to find that there was no blog control included with ASP.Net. A quick survey of the Internet revealed that there really wasn't anything much in the way of ASP.Net blog controls available. Furthermore, the blogging applications that did exist were designed for multi-author systems requiring database support and administration overhead that I really didn't want to deal with. Wasn't there a simple blogging control I could just add to my existing page layouts and that didn't require an expensive SQL Server and an investment in time to learn new templates syntaxes or setup user accounts? I couldn't find anything satisfactory so I bought a book on developing ASP. NET controls and went to work.

I set few goals up front, which I've tried to adhere to:

• It had to be simple to install. If you look at a control like FreeTextBox it requires you to copy a single assembly to your /bin directory and to add two lines of code to your ASP.Net page. I wanted the same for Bloget.
• It should use plain text files to store data. Don't get me wrong, databases have their uses, but a single user Web log doesn't seem like one of those uses. SQL Server is expensive to own, setup and operate. If you are using an inexpensive hosting service, it generally doesn't provide SQL Server support or if offered, it's often at additional cost. Databases are almost always administered separately with another program also provided by the ISP. And backing up is a chore as well. Again, it just seemed like a lot of work for a something so simple.
• It had to have easy to use backup feature.
• It had to have many of the features of modern blogging software like categories (sometimes called tags), posting comments and of course RSS. However, I wasn't going to try to go feature for feature with the big boys. I wanted something useful and light. For instance, many blogs have a calendar which highlight the days that have postings. Is this really a useful item?  
• It had to be fast. I know you hear this all the time. What I mean by fast is it has to be responsive. That means making intelligent use of caching  and avoiding being stupid when possible.
• And most of all, it should just work.

Bloget is a Web log (often referred to as just 'blog') control for use in ASP.Net 2.0 Web sites. Bloget is implemented as a control meaning you have to insert it into an ASP.Net 2.0 Web page in much the same way you insert other ASP.Net controls. This allows you to integrate your blog into your Web site rather than designing your Web site around the blog software.

Bloget is a whimsical name which is designed to make you feel good about the product and inspire you to throw wads of money at the author (did it work?).

• ASP.Net 2.0 (1.1 won't work, don't try, don't ask, don't say I didn't tell you)
• A willingness to forgive the author for blunders, missteps, omissions and sometimes just plain stupidity.

Step 1:
Copy the Bloget.dll  assembly to the /Bin folder of your ASP.Net 2.0 Web site. If you don't have a /Bin folder, simply create one.

Step 2:
If you site does not have one, create an /App_Data folder. Bloget requires read/write access to this folder.

Depending on your hosting environment this can be done in several ways. Many hosting providers provide a control panel where folder permissions can be set. If you have access to Windows security options on your host you can set up permissions so only IIS and ASP.NET processes have write access. On IIS 5.0 (Windows 2000) the account used to execute Web applications (IWAM_xxx or IUSR_xxx) needs read/write/modify permissions. The ASP.NET worker process, usually {machine name}\ASP.NET on IIS 5.0 (Windows 2000) or NETWORK SERVICE on IIS 6.0 (Windows 2003) also needs read/write/modify permissions.

Step 3:
Create or use an existing .aspx Web page and add the following two lines of code.

The first line goes near the top of the page usually just under the Page directive.

And further down the page where you want the blog to appear:

Step 4:
Open the Web page in your browser and revel in the glory of your blog. Actually, you'll see a license agreement. Basically it says you're responsible for your own Web site and that you do not hold the author and Blue Onion Software liable for anything no matter how miserable things become for you.

After you accept the license agreement you'll see your first posting. Well OK, it's my posting but it has some really useful stuff in it to help you start using your blog and it only begs for money a little at the end.

Step 5:
Proceed to the Administration Panel (hint, there's a link in the first posting). The default password is "Bloget" (pretty clever, eh?). At a minimum, you should change this password immediately. If not others, less friendly than I will plunder your blog and lay waste to it faster than a pizza delivery driver on a Friday night.

It's worth taking the time to fill out the RSS section at this time since you'll more than likely want to produce an RSS feed for your site. The Title and Description appear in the RSS. The blog link is just that, the Web address of your blog. Again this only for the RSS feed.

Step 6:
Start posting! Returning to the posting in your blog, you'll see links for adding a new posting. Add a few test entries to get a feel for how the process works (you can remove them later). You can add additional controls, enable RSS, Pingbacks and MetaWeblog. See the related sections for more information. 

Most blogging engines today can be characterized as Web applications. You download, install and "your site" is up an running. This is a great approach if all you want is Blog and a few other pages. Bloget takes a different approach and is implemented as a control (actually a collection of controls). As such, you have to add it to an existing Web application structure. Like all design designs, this one has both strengths and weaknesses. On the plus side, you can plug Bloget into existing sites and have a fine degree of control over appearance and interaction. On the downside, you have to decide what that appearance will look like.

One of the unique aspects of Bloget is that you can express an entire blog in a single file. The tag line "One file, one binary, one blog" expresses this intent. The One file is the ASPX page you intend to display your blog in. One binary refers to the one binary (Bloget.dll) you need to add to your Web application's /Bin directory. There are no complicated install routines, database setups or Web.config modifications required. Of course "One blog" refers to the blog you produce with Bloget.

Because Bloget is so simple to install, it can be integrated into many places. Often, Bloget is used as a running descriptive log for build environments. As changes to the build configuration are made, the configuration manager can add blog entries describing the changes instead of circulating emails. Bloget can easily integrate into Web based systems like Cruise Control.

Membership support is supplied by ASP.NET's membership services. This means you can use existing ASP.NET 2.0 membership providers with Bloget. See Membership Services for more details.

RSS feeds are automatically available in Bloget. RSS feeds are 2.0 compliant. In addition, RSS feeds support templates so allowing you to control the appearance and content of feeds without the use of plugins like other blog engines sometime employ.

Bloget blogs also support MetaWeblog API. This allows you to use offline blog authoring tools like Windows Live Writer and BlogJet.

Bloget does not have user accounts (I'm reconsidering this one). It is not a multiple author blog (also on my list). This makes sense when you consider it's a "control" and not an application. That said, it is possible to have multiple blogs by simply replicating the blog structure described above and pointing to a different data file.

The Bloget control is the most important control. It displays postings, indexes, allows editing, displays logs, etc. It's essentially an entire blogging system in a single control. It is controlled by using query parameters and can be extensively modified using templates.

Bloget is controlled through CGI query parameters. The parameters are:

• m = (Bloget mode)

  edit

  Edit a single blog entry. If p is specified, the blog entry corresponding to the p ID is displayed for edit. If no p entry is specified, then a new entry is presented for edit.

  admin

  Display the administration form. A password challenge is issued if you are not logged in.

  index

  Lists all entries in reverse chronological order. Can be controlled using the p and c parameters.

  drafts

  Lists all blog entries marked as draft. A password challenge is issued if you are not logged in.

  licenseagreement

  Displays the license agreement

  login

  Displays the login form.

  logout

  Logout current user.

  log

  Display event log

  rss

  Display rss feed. For feeds by category use c (example: mysite?m=rpc&c=2).

  rpc

  RPC (Remote Procedure Call) Service Url

  search

  o is the query

• p = The ID of the post.
• s = The index of the first item to display. Used for paging with modes that list blog entries.
• c = The ID of the category to filter by. Categories (often referred to as Tags) are logical groupings of blog entries. They are defined by the blog author.
• o = Sort order - ASC or DESC (Log View only)

Parameters can be prefixed with a string value which is useful if should you have more than one Bloget control rendered on a page. It can be overridden using the Prefix property. For example:

You can set the target link of the links in your blog by using the Url parameter. Url overrides the link setting in the blog's settings.

Templates

Out of the box, Bloget provides a useable, if somewhat plain, blog. However, the appearance of Bloget can be customized through the use of templates. Templates are HTML elements that define the layout of a particular portion of Bloget. Here's an example:

If you have used any of the ASP.NET server controls that supports templates like the GridView or DataList control, the above example should look familiar. (note to self, this section needs to be expanded greatly). There are a large number of items from your blog that can be referenced. Please refer to the example web site and intellisense to discover these items.

The declarative syntax for Bloget is as follows:

Title Control

The Title control can be used to display the title of your blog. In its default configuration it places the title of the blog in an H1 element and the description in a paragraph element. It can be enhanced with a stylesheet or customized using a template. The Title is invoked as follows:

<bloget:BlogetTitle runat="server" ID="myId" DataContext="~/App_Data/Bloget.xml"> It can be customized using a template. For example:

<bloget:BlogetTitle runat="server" DataContext="~/App_Data/Blog/Bloget.xml">
  <HeaderTemplate>
    <h1>
      <%#Container.BlogTitle%>
    </h1>
    <p>
      <%#Container.BlogDescription%><br />
      <small><%#Container.BlogCopyright%></small>
    </p>
  </HeaderTemplate>
</bloget:BlogetTitle> Declarative syntax:

<bloget:BlogetTitle
  DataContext="string"
  Prefix="string"

  <TitleTemplate>
    <%#Container.BlogTitle%> ...
  </TitleTemplate>
</bloget:BlogetTitle>

Bloget supports categories (sometimes called tags). You can associate one or more categories with any blog entry. The Category control lists all categories present in the blog and their respective entry counts. The Category control is invoked as follows:

It can be customized using a template. For example:

Declarative syntax:

The recent posts control lists the most recent posts in the blog. It can be filtered by category. Here's an example:

It can be customized using the <IndexTemplate> template.

The archive control displays a list of links by months that contain blog postings. The control display a month/year list but can be customized in a fashion similar to other Bloget controls using templates. Below is an example of customized archive control. The Length parameter limits the number of entries to display.

Declarative syntax:

Bloget supports the MetaWeblog and Pingback API's. These API's allow your blog controlled by sending XML-RPC commands. Many third-party tools and popular Web sites (like Digg) can interact with blogs that support these API's. The procedure for enabling RPC in bloget is similar to RSS example above. You will create a new Web page and with only the following two lines.

Like most good blogging engines, you can allow users to leave comments on you postings. You can enable comments on a per posting basis or on globally. When enabled, postings will include an area near the bottom of the post where the user can submit his comment. Comments are a mixed blessing. On the good side, they allow interaction with your readers and can add value to your blog. On the bad side, there is comment spam. Comment spam usually does not pertain to your post but instead contains links and advertisements to other sites. Often these spam comments are inserted by other programs called robots or spam-bots.

Bloget takes some basic measures to suppress these messages but is by no means bullet proof. In addition to turning-off comments, you can limit the number of comments per posting and the amount of time the posting will accept comments. Also you can easily delete comments by viewing the posting while logged-in. You'll see a delete button under each comment entry that allows you to quickly remove any offending comment.

To further combat spam-bots, Bloget requires confirmation from the comment author. This requires Javascript to be enabled. Most spam-bots do not support Javascript and thus will fail to post a comment.

Bloget also rejects comments that have hyperlinks in them. 

Bloget logs significant events such as new postings, changes to administration settings, comments, pingbacks, etc. Log files are saved in "~/App_Data/yyyy-mm-dd.bloget.log" where "yyyy-mm-dd" is the date in sortable format. You can change the name and location where log files are saved by adding a entry to the <appSettings> section of your Web.Config file. This folder path must start with "~" or it will be rejected and files will go to the default location. Furthermore, the path must exist and be writable (Bloget will not automatically create the folder).

All entries start with a 3 digit code indicating the category of the log message followed by the time, control ID and message. The category codes are as follows:

If you forget your password, you're doomed. Well not really, but there is no password recovery. You'll have to open the Xml file in the AppData folder and edit it. Here's a sample XML provider data file that comes with the standard distribution.

This will reset the password to "admin"

Bloget uses a data provider type mechanism. Currently, the only data provider is an XML, file based provider but if you look at the code I think you'll see that a data provider is a simple item to implement. I chose to stick with an object model which will make things slighty more interesting for anyone writing a database provider.

In the XML data provider, all data in Bloget are stored in files using XML. The specifics of the formats are not all that interesting. How the files relate to each other is more important. The file specified in the Bloget declaration is the main file and contains information that pertains to the entire blog. In addition, it contains an index of all the blog entries. Blog entries are identified by a computer generated number called a GUID (Global Unique Identifier). A GUID is a 128-bit integer (16 bytes) that can be used across all computers and networks wherever a unique identifier is required. Such an identifier has a very low probability of being duplicated.

The Bloget index contains the title of the blog entry, the identifier (the GUID), the date it was created, the date it was last updated, and a list of category ID's. The actual blog entry and associated comments are stored in a separate file. The name of the file is the blog entry identifier (again, the GUID), prefixed with the letter 'C'. It is stored in the same directory as the Bloget main file.

You might ask yourself if a system like this is scalable. Honestly, I don't know. I found that scaling is as much trial and error as it is design (those of you who have done this know what I mean). Still, I do take some measures to make Bloget efficient. I routinely test Bloget with 10,000 blog postings to test response times and stability. On occasion, I've bumped this up to 100,000 postings. I would wager that most blogs have fewer postings than than my tests. Bloget takes full advantage of ASP.NET's caching facilities. If a posting is accessed frequently, it likely will be in the cache.

Bloget also tries very hard not to corrupt files. All files are serialized in memory, reparsed to check validity and then committed to disk. Backup files are created of the previous version as further insurance. This works well for Blogs because most file operations are read. File writing is are less frequent. To date, I have not lost a single posting. Of course your milage may vary but consider I use this software every day for my own blog.

September 19, 2006

By using, copying, or distributing the accompanying software you indicate your acceptance of the following Bloget Freeware License Agreement. If you do not agree to any of the terms of this License, then do not use, copy, or distribute Bloget.

1. LICENSE. Blue Onion Software hereby grants you a non-exclusive, transferable license to use its software product and accompanying documentation on the following terms. You may:

a. use Bloget on any computer in your possession;
b. make copies of Bloget; and

(i) You may NOT distribute the software by any means; You may NOT charge any amount for distributing Bloget. You are specifically prohibited from charging, or requesting donations, for any such copies, however made, and from distributing the software and or documentation with other products (commercial or otherwise) without prior written permission. You may NOT distribute Bloget as part of or in a bundle or package with any other product;

(ii) You may NOT sublicense, rent or lease any portion of Bloget;

2. LIMITATIONS ON LICENSE. You shall not make use of the Blue Onion Software name and/or any trademarks, service marks, trade dress adopted and/or used by Blue Onion Software.

3. TITLE. Title, ownership rights, and intellectual property rights in and to Bloget, and each copy thereof (including all copyrights therein), shall remain in Blue Onion Software. Bloget is protected by the copyright laws of the United States and international copyright treaties.

4. WARRANTY AND LIMITATION OF LIABILITY. Bloget is free of charge, and there is no warranty for the software. Blue Onion Software provides the software 'as is,' and Blue Onion Software disclaims all conditions and warranties of any kind, either express, implied, statutory, or otherwise, including, but not limited to, any conditions or implied warranties of merchantability, satisfactory quality, and fitness for a particular purpose. Should the software prove defective, you assume the cost of all necessary servicing, repair or correction.

Under no circumstances and under no legal theory, tort, contract, or otherwise, shall Blue Onion Software be liable to you or any other person for any general, direct, indirect, special, incidental, consequential, or other damages of any character arising out of this agreement or the use of or inability to use the software, including but not limited to personal injury, loss of profits, loss of data, output from the software or data being rendered inaccurate, failure of the software to operate with any other programs, damages for loss of goodwill, business interruption, computer failure or malfunction, or any and all other damages or losses of whatever nature, even if Blue Onion Software has been informed of the possibility of such damages.

5. INDEMNIFICATION. You shall defend, indemnify and hold harmless Blue Onion Software, from any claim, demand, liability, damage award, suit, judgment, or other legal action (including reasonable attorney's fees) arising out of your use, distribution, modification, or duplication of Bloget.

6. TERMINATION. The license granted hereunder is effective until terminated by Blue Onion Software. You may terminate it at any time by destroying Bloget. This license will terminate automatically if you fail to comply with the limitations described above. On termination, you must destroy all copies of Bloget. The termination of your license will not result in the termination of the licenses of any distributees who have received rights to Bloget through you so long as they are in compliance with the provisions of this Agreement.

7. EXPORT CONTROLS. None of Bloget or underlying information or technology may be downloaded or otherwise exported or re-exported into (or to a national or resident of) any country in violation of the laws and administrative regulations of the United States relating to the control of exports of commodities and technical data. By downloading or using Bloget, you are agreeing to the foregoing and you are representing and warranting that you are not located in, under the control of, or a national or resident of any such country.

8. MISCELLANEOUS. This agreement represents the complete agreement concerning this license between the parties and supersedes all prior agreements and representations between them. It may not be amended. If any provision of this agreement is held to be unenforceable for any reason, this agreement shall terminate. This agreement shall be governed by and construed under MI law as such law applies to agreements between MI residents entered into and to be performed within MI, except as governed by U.S. federal law.

Bloget is Copyright © Blue Onion Software 2006. All rights reserved. The documentation and all computer files are also Copyright © Blue Onion Software 2006. All rights reserved. Bloget™ is a trademark of Blue Onion Software. The trademarks are the property of Blue Onion Software. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.