So, Blogger (as you may know) doesn’t have an ability to do trackbacks. Automatic trackbacks are nice — if one of my blog posts references a post from blog A, then in blog A’s comments box, a URL can be placed linking to my post. So if I reference you, a trackback lets you automatically reference me.

Why can’t a just add a comment to blog A’s post, linking back to my blog? First, it’s nice to differentiate between comments and trackbacks. Comments add information, trackbacks add context & provide related links. Second, a blogger may be monitoring & not like comments, but trackbacks are (supposed to be) honest & valid. So using trackbacks can allow you to actually get a legitimate cross-link. Lastly, some blogs keep stats between comments & trackbacks, so it’s good if you can help keep the two differentiated.

There’s a web page a found that will help you do trackbacks here. The only tricky part is knowing what the “trackback URL” is. Here’s how: first, make your blog entry linking to someone else’s blog post. Now go to that person’s blog post in a browser & view source. Look for a line like

trackback:ping="http://www.peterprovost.org/services/trackbacks/3008.aspx"

It’ll probably be in comments, that’s ok. That URL in there is what you want to use for the trackback URL, the first field in the Wizbang form. The second field should be a direct link to your blog post (not your main blog home page). The rest of the fields are self-explanatory, although the Excerpt field can be left blank. Once you submit the form, you may see a blank page, but go to the person’s blog post & you should probably see in the comments section a link going back to your blog post.

Maybe one day I’ll make a trackback tool, but for now…