Mrs. Mecomber’s Scrapbook

If you plan on doing any html work in your Blogger blog, it is wise to backup your template. Here’s a very quick and easy way to do it:

Sign in to Blogger and go to your dashboard. For the blog you want to change, choose “Layout.” This will take you to the Layouts page, showing many options. The page you automatically go to is “Page Elements.” You’ll see other pages, like “Fonts & Colors,” “Edit HTML,” and “Pick a New Template.” Choose “Edit HTML.”

You’ll see an option that says “Backup/Restore Template.” Underneath, it says “Before editing your template, you may want to save a copy of it.” This is what you want to do. Click the link “Download Full Template.” Choose a safe place, like My Documents, to store this file on your computer’s hard drive.

If you make a mistake or don’t like the work in your new template, you can always come back to this page and upload the file you stored. This will take you back to your template.

Now, I have uploaded, downloaded, copied, and pasted a lot of templates. I have noticed that when I do a complete template change with a non-Blogger template, Blogger wipes out my widgets. Therefore, I recommend that you save all the information in your widgets before switching to a new template. I regularly save the information in them, anyway, as a precaution.

Note that just changing a few things in your existing template does not wipe out your widgets. And changing a Blogger default template (for example, you had Minima and now are going with Blogger’s Rounders) does not wipe out your widgets, either. It only occurs when you switch to a different, non-Blogger template.