Should I include a sidebar in the design of a blog?

Question

I am designing a blog and I am trying to decide if I should have a sidebar or if I should just move that content to the header/footer.

What is your opinion on this?

Do you have any opinion on the header/footer total height?

Answer 1

Keep the header low; few things annoy me in webdesigns when the upper half of my screen is taken up by static non-content, and the real content is hidden under the lower edge of the screen.

Apart from that, I can see no issues with a sidebar-less design.

Answer 2

It depends entirely on how much "Stuff" you have in your sidebar. If you can reasonably and cleanly stick it in the header, go for it. For anything you are putting in your footer, make sure its something you don't think people will need very often, because especially on a long long blog page, almost nobody is going to see it.

Answer 3

I suppose it depends on what kind of informatio is in the side bar that you are considering moving. Typically the header and footer are used for navigational elements wherease sidebars are used for some more rich content. If you are liiking to move information such as links to home page, archives, tag lists, about this blog page, etc then moving them to the header might be the way to go. However, if you have tag clouds, archive links, latest post links, etc, you probably want to keem them in a sidebar. You have limited space in the header or footer with which to use and will have more flexibility in the side bar.

As for header and footer height, we try to keep the header (including advertisements) of a side to less than 25% of the visible page when viewed in a 1024x768 browser. We don't use standards for a footer just because a large footer doesn't push down content from visibility, so we offer some more flexibility there.

Answer 4

I think you'll need a sidebar... blogs just have way too much information to stuff it all into a header.

Answer 5

The most important thing to consider is the CONTENT of your blog. If its a design blog, a nice flashy header (done professionally, not in paint :P) can be attractive to your visitors. If its a business blog, your readers would usually want a nice plain design so that they can infact get down to business.

Then you have to think about what you want the sidebar to show.

A blog roll? Archives? Search or Login?. What about two sidebars on the same side. One for less important things like ads, and one for the juicy stuff like latest articles and twitters (well some find twitter important: i dont tho).

Like i said, its all in the content and your target audience. Dont try to sell meat to vegetarians. :)

Answer 6

I prefer seeing a sidebar at the right for 2 reasons: the "About me" box lets me know at a glance who the person is (if I landed on a new blog via search/referral), and if I am interested in one topic, a "Categories" list lets me explore the posts related to my interest.

The common UX principle is Steve Krug's "Don't make me think". If I want to see who you are or the content categories/monthly archive, I don't want to hunt for them.