For my needs, Windows Live Writer (WLW) is the best desktop blogging application I’ve found.¹ WLW makes it easy to insert elements and format posts, even allowing you to write using your blog’s stylesheet so you know exactly how the post will look once it’s published. I also appreciate the easy access to drafts and former posts, though WLW won’t sync all posts with your blog database as some other tools will. Still, its interface is slick and familiar, its WYSIWYG editor is smart and produces fewer code errors than most others, it communicates well with most blog platforms, and it has a growing selection of plugins to improve its functionality. Importantly, it’s also free.

Before I discovered WLW, I used browser plugins like ScribeFire for Firefox or Flock’s built-in Blog Editor. They’re both nice, but neither are as feature-rich or as slick as WLW. ScribeFire’s best feature is that it can split the browser window and sit on the bottom, allowing you to search, write, and pull text and images right into the post without having to switch windows. Flock’s Blog Editor can do the same thing with the Blog Plus addon, and the Flock browser has the handy Web Clippings sidebar to help you collect text, images, and videos for a post. Unfortunately, neither tool handles images very well and both lack the extended functionality that WLW plugins offer.

For collaborative blogging projects, online tools like Google Docs or Zoho Writer will post the final draft directly to your blog. Being able to access the drafts from any networked computer, view the history of the drafts, and collaborate with other writers are great features, but in my experience, the formatting wasn’t always preserved when the document was sent to the blog. Also, unless there’s a need for collaboration, if I’m going to compose a blog post online, I’m probably going to use the “write” page of my blogging platform to take advantage of any features it might offer.

There are many other tools out there, some free, some not.² One tool I find particularly impressive, and my “runner up” for blog-writing tools, is Zoundry Raven. It’s open-source freeware that lets you manage multiple profiles and multiple blogs, sync all of your posts with the desktop version, and browse posts by categories, tags, links, or images. If you’re a WordPress user, Raven will even manage your pages. Its composing features are rich and work well, and it can even be installed on a flash drive so you can take your posts with you. WLW still wins for its plugins, stability, and the ease of use of its features, but Zoundry Raven’s management features and portability make it a close second.

1. Obviously, if you’re a Mac user, you might not feel the same and will probably opt for Ecto or Mars Edit 2. [back]
2. Deepest Sender (a simple Firefox plugin), Thingamablog, Rocket Post 2, w.bloggar, Qumana, and BlogJet, to name a few [back]

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