Testing Windows Live Writer
Well, this is my first time ever using this software program available for free from the Microsoft site. The software is part of the Windows Essentials suit, which is available for free. The suit includes Windows Mail, Movie Maker and a couple of other programs. But anyway, this post won�t be about how to use it or about all the features it offers. What it will be about is testing the software�live.
Windows Live Writer comes with many features and options, it seems, and it�s rather easy to use (if you�ve used Word before). I can save this post as a draft to my WordPress blog if I later want to edit it there or I can just save it as a file on my computer, just like I plan on doing. The reason I don�t post much is because of the hassle of having to go to my site, then login in, and then going to the Post section just to start.
With Windows Live Writer, all I have to do is open the program from my taskbar�and that�s pretty much it! I can either start a new post or continue from a work-in-progress post within mere seconds. This will give me the freedom of writing more often without getting lazy. Sweet deal!
Links
As you have probably noticed, there�s a link to Windows Essentials on the second sentence of the first paragraph. What I want to mention about that is that I can even use �rel� attribute on links without switching to HTML mode to code it myself on this writing software. That�s very convenient as well! If you don�t know what rel is, it�s an attribute for Search Engine Optimization (SEO for short). Sorry, it would require a lot explanation, which I won�t get into. Haha. Anyway, it�s very handy for SEO purposes. There�s also other options like �Title� and if I want users to be directed to a new window or not when clicking on the link.
Pictures
Let�s see how pictures will look like:
I inserted this image from my computer, but I have no idea if it�s going to be uploaded to my uploads folder on my web�s server or if it will appear as a broken link. I�ll know once I publish this post!
[The picture went to my uploads folder!]
Videos
I�ll embed a video from YouTube:
Nifty. I get a preview of the video before embedding. However, it seems cut off from the bottom. I hope it looks different on the site. Hmm. As for the video options, it seems I can login to my YouTube account through Windows Live Writer so I can post new videos from my computer so that YouTube can host them for me on the net. Pretty cool.
[Dang, the video is cut off on the bottom. Well, just the preview. When viewing, it fixes itself. I�m sure there must be a way to fix the preview, though.]
How Will it Look?
Now it�s time to post it online to my blog and see how it looks. I added some �H2� and an �H3� tags as well. There�s more features and options but only time will let me use them appropriately. I�m able to post this under a category of my choice and also tags (which I don�t use). I can also chose to post a specific date, it seems.
Oh, wow, I can also see a preview on how it would look like as already posted on my blog. This thing has its own web browser, it seems. There�s also a Source tab next to Preview so I can manually add some HTML, CSS or other web language codes. I�m liking this software very much already! I hope I don�t get disappointed later on!
[Well, it seems that everything is in place! I�ll probably struggle with some things later on — but so far so good!]
[Awesome! Windows Live Writer knows that I edited this blog post and that publishing it again only alters the original post!]
