Blog Post Layout: Side-bar Forces Comments Off Page
Asked by Chris Trueman:

The default blog layout means that for short-posts (anything less than the height of the side-bar) there is a lot of wasted page space. The attached screenshot shows what I mean. How do I keep the side-bar but bring the comments into the space to the left?


Answers:
author: Manuela Raschke
body: We had the same effect in spaces with the documentation theme, when we were still using 3.5.x (or maybe it was 4.2.x - I don't remember that well).

Since the comments use the whole width of the page, they only start after the list of blogs of that month. If you have as many blogs each month as you seem to have, you will need to scroll.

We did not find a solution to this problem, but then it wasn't necessary for us since it didn't really happen often.

But maybe this hint helps others to see where the problem roots and to help you find a solution.

comments: author: Chris Trueman
body: What version are you running now? Do you still have the problem? If not then it sounds like it's time for me to upgrade. I've been putting that off while we're mid-project. But just knowing that the problem is gone in a later version will help for now. Thanks.


author: Manuela Raschke
body: We are running 5.1.3 at the moment. Unfortunately the problem is only partly solved.

With Documentation Theme blogging actually got worse - the box that pushes your comments all the way down is gone and there is no substitute for navigating the blogs.

But with Standard Layout blogging is really great. The navigation for blogs was moved into the sidebar and is really good. There you have a monthly view of all your blogs (like a pagetree). And the whole page is left for the blog (and the comments).

I don't think that changed in the newer versions, but can only judge from reading the release notes.

Greetings Manuela


author: Davin Studer
body: Ok, then are you manually adding that right column in the body of the blog post? The big question is figuring out how that right column is being added because when I look at blog posts in my vanilla install it doesn't look like that. Since you are using the documentation theme you could edit the blog post layout and create a container around the body and footer and then have a side bar with that side data. This should probably be edited at the layout level to do this.

comments: author: Chris Trueman
body: I haven't changed the layout to add the right column. I will see about wrapping the post and comments in a container. Thanks for the suggestion.


author: Chris Trueman
body: The space is using the documentation theme. I tried switching that back to the default - it made no difference. I see no customization of the layout. Is there a way to reset it just in case? All our spaces show the same layout behaviou. I've looked at the space in IE, Chrome and Firefox. All the same.


author: Davin Studer
body: Hmm. I've never seen theblog posts look like that. Do you have a customized template? If you go to confluence admin -\> Look and feel -\> Layouts, if the Blog Post Layout customized?


author: Chris Trueman
body: Here's the screenshot. See all the wasted space below the post to the left of the navigation side-bar. Comments don't show up until you scroll vertically past the end of the sidebar. It makes no difference if I make the browser window much larger (1980).

![](../../upfiles/Confluence_Blog_Post_Layout.png)


author: Davin Studer
body: To the left of what ... the content, into the navigation bar? Not sure where you want comments to show. A mockup of what you are looking for would be most helpful. You should be able to attach an image ... I've done it before. Otherwise maybe upload it to another photo sharing site and put a URL to the image.


author: Chris Trueman
body: Sorry but it seems I can't upload the screenshot.