BlogDesk is on My desk

Thanks to a write-up yesterday by TDavid, I downloaded and started using BlogDesk for posting entries to my blog.

TDavid’s blow-by-blow account of the setup makes great documentation for this product — Johannes should really include something like that in the help file where he currently has just these two paragraphs:

Selecting Manage Blogs in the File menu will open the list of your blogs. Here you can create, edit, delete and import entries.

If you create a new blog, the Blog Wizard will guide you through the configuration process. Normally you just have to enter the blog-address (URL) and login & password – the Wizard will do the rest for you. One click later you will be able to write and publish new posts.

Unlike TDavid, I had no problem setting it up to talk to my blog. Everything just worked.

At first it looks like just a desktop knock-off of WordPress’ dashboard “Write” page. But because it’s a desktop application instead of a web app, most functions operate much more smoothly than composing through WordPress’ dashboard. For instance, switching to HTML and back happens right in the Post window, instead of popping up another window that for some reason never seems to get sized right (WordPress in Firefox). It would be nice if the “View Source” menu option was available on the right-click popup menu, though. Otherwise, everything seems to be exactly where I would expect it. I like having everything about the post visible, too. Like the “Trackbacks” window in the lower right corner:

Several nice extras: spell-checker, frequently used phrases, notebook (scratch pad), and Technorati tags generator.

Using a desktop app instead of a web app avoids the problem of losing your post when the browser or server goes down while composing. Even more frustrating for me is when I accidentally navigate away from the “Write” page while looking for a link. With a separate desktop application, I won’t be doing that anymore.

Probably the greatest strength of this tool is its handling of images. I inserted the image above directly from the clipboard. You can also load from a local file, or reference a URL. Man, the clipboard and local file options will save me some time and encourage more images. Before, I had to FTP the file up to the web server or publish it in Flickr or elsewhere and then type in the URL.

Plus, BlogDesk offers some powerful tools for editing the images. Lets just paste in another screen shot, shall we?

Take a look at the options for sizing, etc. in the right-hand toolbar. That’s going to eliminate a lot of editing before you bring the image into your blog. Pretty sweet.

And. It’s free. My kind of pricing.

Yep, this is my new favorite blogging tool. Unfortunately, the only client platform is Windows, so if I ever make the jump to Linux for my workstation I’ll be screwed. Unless Johannes can be convinced to do a port?