Putting a Code Box On Blogger Posts

This is largely derived this blog post from 2009, but the code was slightly borked, so here’s a fix. (If you’re looking at this on Facebook or somewhere else and it looks strange, swing by https://ideatrash.net/2012/11/putting-code-box-on-blogger-posts.html to see it properly.

If you’ve ever tried to paste a commandline or HTML into a Blogger blog, you’ve ended up with missing characters, weird linewraps, and “smart quotes” where there shouldn’t be any.  This frustrates readers and makes you look like an idiot.

There’s a couple of ways to get around this.

The first is to store snippets of code in something like Pastebin (which I’ve used in the past), but a better (and more professional) option is to use GitHub.  While GitHub is a bit overpowered for code snippets alone, it allows you the flexibility to do and save a lot more if you ever get into it.  Make a free account, and then click on the “Gist” button at the top.  You’ll get a nice place to post your code.  And I think this is cool – you can also “star” the gists you use to help keep track of them later.

But what if it’s just a commandline?  You’ve got some options:

NOTE: If you experience problems with brackets and ampersands, you would want to use this online urlencoder. It’s how I created the little bit of code below.

1. Ad-hoc simple (but ugly) solution:
   Click the HTML tab at the top of the compose window. Then paste these lines:

<textarea name=”textarea” cols=”40″ rows=”4″ wrap=”VIRTUAL”>
YOUR CODE GOES HERE
</textarea>

Example of what it looks like.

1. Edit your blog’s HTML code.
   a. Follow this guide to get to where you press “Edit HTML”.
   b. Then Find (press CTRL+F) this: ]]></b:skin>
   c. Add this code ABOVE ]]></b:skin>

d. Click Save Template.

Then when you go to post your code, click the HTML tab, and just paste this code:

<div class=”code”>
YOUR CODE
</div>