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Test Post From Flock Blog Editor

Posted on March 27, 2007

Here there. This is just a test post from the Flock blog editor.

The reason for the test is that I am looking for a blog editor to go on my MacBook. I currently use Window Live Writer on Windows but it does not work on OS X (of course).

The biggest item for me that is important in a blog editor is how it handles images. WLW does this amazingly well. Unfortunately images within Flock are a different story.

First, I could not find how to add an image until I consulted the help section. I found out that you add images through the main browser window which connects to your Flickr account. Second, once you get the image to your post you cannot resize it without distortion. Third, there are no controls (that I could find) to align the image either left or right.

While it seems like Flock is cool by adding the function to blog it just does not seem very usable.

Final Note: While manually editing the above picture to float to the right and have some space on the left side I noticed Flock added some unnecessary markup to the HTML. Some of these things included a rough span tag and several break tags within paragraph tags. With that I find it to be totally unusable.

P.S. I went back and edited this post with Windows Live Writer because the above picture just looked terrible.

Technorati: Blog Desktop Client, Flock, Windows Live Writer

Testing Windows Live Writer with WordPress 2.1

Posted on January 30, 2007

I got a following email from Microsoft on whether the issue that I was having with uploading images was resolved with the latest version of WordPress.

I am happy to say that the image to the right was uploaded via the xmlrpc.php as opposed to the FTP option that Window Live Writer offers.

I guess this was user error and I am sorry for the false alarm.

My props goes to Microsoft for actually seeking out feedback on their product and trying to fix issues that come up.

Zoundry Launches Blog Writer 2.0 Blog

Posted on January 9, 2007

One on my favorite Desktop Blog Editors is Zoundry has just launched a development blog for their version 2 (code name “Raven”) blog writer. The idea of the blog is to create some buzz about their next generation blog writer and to get other developers to start creating plugins to make the tool more versatile.

Lately I have been using Windows Live Writer only because of it’s awesome image capabilities but always have always like Zoundry. They are constantly improving their software and are always looking for input from their users.

I am really looking forward to the 2.0 release.

Live Writer Works with WordPress.com

Posted on December 14, 2006

Ok, so I tried uploading an image to WordPress.com this morning and now it works – kind of weird. Maybe WordPress.com was having an issue.

I am now testing Windows Live Writer with this blog and uploading images because I was having image upload issues here. This is my official test post to do so. I did check my server and played around with some of the permissions so we will see what happens.

So here it goes.

No go. I think it has something to do with WordPress 2.1 or something. I will send my info to Microsoft and let them check on it. In the mean time it is FTP instead.

Microsoft Responds to Windows Live Writer Issue

Posted on December 14, 2006

I have received a response to my post - Windows Live Writer = Love / Hate - where I talked about the issues that I as having uploading images via xmlrpc to WordPress.com.

I was really surprised and totally stoked that 1.) they are out there seeing what people say about WLR, and 2.) that they actually want me to send them detail on the issues that I am having. This is my post to try and demonstrate the issue for them (you will probably not see anything here in this post).

Anyway I will let you now how things go with them.

Web Based Blogging Clients

Posted on November 1, 2006

So about 6 months to a year ago I was really big on using Blog Desktop Clients as opposed to the web based back ends that were included in most blogging software.

In an attempt to not blog from work as much I installed the desktop clients that I used on a regular basis. I still felt the need to blog on my breaks and lunch though and found myself logging in and using the web-based editors.

My biggest issues that kept me from using the web based editors was the lack of inline spell check and the automatic or semi-automatic addition of Technorati links. Well WordPress 2.1 (still in Alpha) addressed the spell check issues and then so did Firefox 2.0. Read the rest of this entry »