Kazi Blog User Manual

Version: 1.0
Date: 24th Jan, 2013

BLUE LINK TECHNOLOGY LTD

Unit no. 18 Fatima Court, Marcus Garvey Rd.,
P.O. Box 70203 00400, Nairobi, KENYA.
Tel: +254 (020) 2612659 | Mob: +254 722 551420
Email: info@bluelinktech.com| Website: www.bluelinktech.com

1|Page

INTRODUCING KAZI BLOG

Kazi Blog extends Joomla 1.6-2.5 content sharing ability! Kazi Blog can be used for managing
personal blogs or for creating a Team Blog (One blog site, updated by various actors).
Kazi Blog is inspired by content sharing and search engine optimization (SEO). The blog is integrated
with popular social network sites like Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and LinkedIn to enable both blog
article sharing and posting blogs automatically from the component; while creating blogs, there are
provisions for supplying keywords and metadata descriptions which are fed to search engine crawlers
for SEO purposes.
Kazi Blog is a complete blog component with modules and plug-ins that have been developed in
adherence to Joomla 2.5! MVC coding standards. Kazi Blog will work out of the box and integrates
smoothly with other Joomla components, modules and plugins. KaziBlog also takes the style (CSS) of
your website template therefore NO design modification needed for the blog to work.

KAZI BLOG MAIN FEATURES

1. Team Blogging
Ability to create both Personal and Team blogs. With Kazi Blog extension multiple bloggers can
contribute their blogs to you website if they are registered and assigned to the appropriate user group.
2. User-Friendly Dashboard
The Kazi Blog component comes with an easy to use dashboard for blogging which enables easy
management of blog content e.g. creating blog categories, creating blog posts, sharing on social
media sites and scheduling when to publish the blogs.
3. Social Media Network Integration
Kazi Blog has inbuilt social media integration plugin to popular social media sites, like: Facebook,
Twitter and LinkedIn. This integration enables easy sharing and promotion of blogs on the social
media. The website blogs also have an easy to use social bookmarking feature to facilitate visitors to
propagate/share the blogs with friends on their networks.
4. Commenting System
Kazi Blog component has inbuilt commenting system that is integrated with Disqus to facilitate easy
commenting by website visitors. This comments allows site visitors to leave feedback and it can easily
be moderated.
5. Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Kazi Blog component is designed to facilitate search engine friendly content. Blogs and blog
categories, have provision for defining the keywords and metadata description. The component is
developed in adherence to latest SEO coding standards defined by search engines like GOOGLE,
BING, MSN e.t.c. This ensures blog articles are well indexed and ranked by search engine bots.

2|Page

INSTALLING KAZI BLOG COMPONENT

Using the Joomla main menu:
1) Go to Extensions->Extension Manager
2) Click in the field Package File
3) Find and choose com_kaziblog_v.XX.zip on your computer
4) Click the button Upload and Install
Kazi Blog is now successfully installed on your website.

USING THE BLOG ACCESSING KAZI BLOG ON JOOMLA!

1) Login to the Joomla! backend (http://www.yoursite.com/administrator)
2) In the top menu find Components and click on Blog drop down menu
This shall load Kazi Blog main page as shown highlighted below.

Lists all blogs created on the component, indicating

their blog category, created by and if they have
been posted on social media networks
1. Blogs: Lists all blogs created in the Kazi Blog component and acts as the main page for the
component. It is a simple interface, listing the blogs and providing relevant information like
category for each blog, author of blog and if blog is shared on social media networks.
2. Blog Category: This sub-menu provides an interface for creating blog categories, to facilitate
presentation of blog articles based on their subject/category.
3. Blog Menus: For creating, editing or deleting blogs.
4.

Options/Blog Setup: For configuring the blog to enable sharing and promotion of blogs on
social media networks.

3|Page

OPTIONS/BLOG SETUP - CONFIGURING SOCIAL MEDIA SHARING & COMMENTS

Before you start using Kazi Blog, please ensure you configure your component especially if you intend
to be posting/sharing your blogs on your social media networks. To configure, click the options button
4 as highlighted on the screenshot above. The window below shall be displayed.

a. General Configuration: Disqus is the plugin used to handle the blog comments. By default,
comments are enabled for blog articles. If you want to disable blog commenting, select radio
button No corresponding to Use Disqus to comment; by default, on publishing an article it is
also shared/posted on twitter; you can select not to post on social media.
b. Disqus Configuration: on clicking this tab, the screen shown below is displayed; please
provide

the

disqus

name

available

after

registering

with

disqus

via

this

link:

http://disqus.com/admin/signup/

c.

Bitly Configuration: sign up with bitly (https://bitly.com/a/sign_up) to facilitate URL shortening

for posting on links on social media networks. Enter the bitly username and key as provided
after successful registration.

d.

Twitter Configuration: For configuring twitter account which the blog is posted or tweeted to.
To facilitate broadcast of the blog post to multiple social media networks, you can connect
your twitter account with Facebook, LinkedIn e.t.c. For version 1.0 we have only integrated
Facebook

and

Twitter;

you

can

follow

this

tutorial

on

connecting

the

two

https://support.twitter.com/articles/31113-how-to-use-twitter-with-facebook
Future versions shall address integration with more social media networks, but feel free to
explore inter-connecting your twitter account with other social media networks and the blog
component shall be able to broadcast to all the networks connected.
4|Page

To get twitter configuration information, access this link https://dev.twitter.com/apps using the
website twitter account and create a new application by providing the website details. Enter
all the details as available upon successful registration.

BLOG CATEGORY
On clicking the blog category sub-menu, the window below is displayed, it lists all blog categories
defined in the blog component.

User can add new category

or select an existing one for
editing or deletion.

Lists all blog categories

defined in the component

BLOGS
On clicking the blogs sub-menu, the window below is displayed; it lists all blogs defined in the blog
component.

Lists all blogs defined in the

component

1. On clicking New (1) to add a new article blog, the window below is displayed, from where the
user is able to create the blog.
5|Page

Enter blog article title

and the blog category it
is associated with.

Use the WYSIWYG

editor to create the blog
article.

Enter necessary article

Meta tags to facilitate
locating articles using
metat tags.

6|Page

Save the article

appropriately.
Set if blog is
published, if to be
shared on social
media, when it
should start/end
publishing and its
author.

Input the blog Meta Keywords

and description, which is
important for Search Engine
Optimization purposes. The
Meta details shall be fed to
search engine crawlers.

For any clarification or feedback, feel free to contact us.

BLUE LINK TECHNOLOGY LTD

Unit no. 18 Fatima Court, Marcus Garvey Rd.,
P.O. Box 70203 00400, Nairobi, KENYA.
Tel: +254 (020) 2612659 | Mob: +254 722 551420
Email: info@bluelinktech.com| Website: www.bluelinktech.com

7|Page