Ok, I have stumbled on a new (new for me remote blog client) that I feel is as good or better than Windows Live Writer.

The latest version supports dasBlog (including images without FTP) it does not use RSD (Really Simple Discovery) but since complete support of dasBlog is built in, that does not matter!

(Note: BlogDesk expects you to have the older 1.8 series dasBlog installed which BlogDesk only supports images with FTP, so re-edit your blog profile and tell it to support direct images and it will, older verions of dasBlog may not work as well, but the current dasBlog build 1.9+ is 100% supported)

This post was made with BlogDesk!

Your need to check it out! BlogDesk

Except from site:

"No need to use those annoying HTML Tags in the WYSIWYG editor. Images can be directly inserted and are automatically uploaded. Even publishing simultaneously to multiple blogs is a matter of a click.

With the ImageWizard you can not only insert images to your posts - it's possible to edit them as well (crop, resize, rotate, shadow etc., see Examples). Even Thumbnails can be created - the preview will be shown in the blog and a click on the image will open it in its original size (just like here in the right column). Linking and uploading those images is automatically done by BlogDesk."

DasBlog 1.9.6264.0 now supports CoComment   

Track: coComment keeps track of all the online conversations you're following in one convenient place, and informs you whenever something is added to a conversation.

Share: Publish your conversations to your blog in a click, or send them to your friends via email.

Explore: Check out the top commenters, what articles and posts are generating the most comments, who's  commenting on the same conversations as you.

Cross Post from http://dasblog.info

With the current release we provide dasBlog buttons and badges for the first time. The whole set with many other formats including png is available here.

Simple jpg:

Reflection jpg:

Simple gif:

Reflection gif:

 Cross Post from http://dasblog.info

OK today, I have started updating http://dasblog.info for the new 1.9 info and I thougt there would be no better time to try out Windows Live Writer.

(Windows Live™ Writer is a free, downloadable beta program from Microsoft that will help you include rich content in your blog posts and know exactly what your blog will look like.)

Well I love Windows Live Writer but today's postings were not as easy as I thougt they would be!

Everybody is raving about Windows Live Writer, and it is great but it does have some pros and cons.

Pros:

• You can include images without an FTP upload setup. (yawza that beats Blogjet here!)
• Super easy to setup with dasBlog 1.9 (but not hard with earier versions)
• There is no easier blog post engine, and I have tried about 20...

Cons: If these are fixed I will be a super WLW fan!!!

• You can't refresh the category list - (the only thing I was able to do to get a refresh was delete the blog site and reinstall, apparently this only happens if you have a big cat list!)
• The category list just scrolls on and on down the page, - (I can live with that?)
• You can't add a new category with a post -(this is very important to me, as I use categories as menu items at http://dasblog.info and almost every item has a new category)
• You can't delete a post, -

Deleting would not be important, but the system throws an error if you manually delete a post at the blog site and then try to repost the same data again from WLW. You can work around this by cycling to another blog account and back and the WLW post id will clear.

• You can not include png images??? - (I could not include the new dasblog png badges in a post today!)

Cheers

OK it's official the dasBlog team has released dasBlog 1.9!

See Scott's post for all the details.

P.S. I appreciate the nice words there about your's truly!

Cheers

Tom

Download here:  Documentation here:  Forum here:

daily builds here: (including ASP.NET 2.0 VS2005 versions), stay with ASP.NET 1.1 unless you have a developer need.

(daily builds with EST local server time here:)

I have updated http://dasblog.info the dasBlog Documentation site to dogfood the lastest beta release of 1.9.6251.0 and have created a new custom theme to commerate the event.

I have also made the old theme and all the generic themes available to use at the site!

Updated postings for 1.9 features coming soon!

Cheers

Tom

Please note these new features are a DasBlog contribution by Justice Gray.

Note that the macros below (with the exception of PrevNextSeparator) are currently implemented on Justice Gray's ( http://graysmatter.codivation.com), so you're welcome to take a look there and see how they work.

Previous Entry and Next Entry

These display a link to the previous entry and the next entry.  They *only* display if the user has loaded a page with a single entry on it, i.e. a permalink.  After all, it's pretty useless to have previous and next links if you're on the main page of the site, or looking through a full category worth of entries.  Obviously, if you are on the most recent post the Next Entry Link will not display, and if you are on the very first post you ever made the Previous Entry Link will not display. 

Both of these macros take a string for an argument (which can be empty) that is prefixed to the Previous Link's text or appended to the Next Entry's text. 
e.g. <%previousentrylink("&lt;&lt; ")%> = "<< [Previous Post Title]"
<%nextentrylink(" &gt;&gt;")> = "[Next Post Title] >>"

PreviousNextSeparator

Depending on your formatting desires, there is also a PreviousNextSeparator macro that will display a separator string of your choice if:
a) the user is on a page with only one blog post (e.g. a permalink)
b) that page is not displaying either the most recent blog entry or the earliest (because, obviously, you're not going to have both a previous and a next at the end of the spectrum).

e.g. <%previousNextSeparator(" | ")%> = " | " when in the situations described above.

RecentEntries (FrontPageTitleList)

There were two reasons I didn't like using FrontPageTitleList:
a) The table cells it created are all automatically aligned to the center using align=left, making it impossible to override this even in CSS given the precedence levels.
b) It's a bit disorienting for a user who hits your blog via an old entry to click on a recent post link and all of a sudden be jumped into the middle of nowhere (at least this is apparent in my blog's design).

Hence I made RecentEntries, which is pretty much FrontPageTitleList with two changes:
a) the alignment setting has been removed so that CSS can be used to align it
b) the links it produces are now permalinks to individual entries (which happens to work well with the previous and next links)

This docuementation was generated by Justice Gray on the DasBlog Developer E-Mail list.

Cheers

Tom

If you don't know what dogfooding is, its to Eat one's own dog food. To say that a company "eats its own dog food" means that it uses the products that it makes.

Well I can't say I made DasBlog, but I sure helped a little with this version!

I really like all the new features, and I am not even sure of some of them, we had so many contributors and new features it will take me forever to get up to speed to help users with this new version and to start writing up the features at http://dasblog.info.

If you have an article on a new feature, or are some kind of expert on a feature, or are said contributor, please send me your articles, or give me permission to pinch what you have elsewhere! 

Version 1.9xxxx coming to a host near you soon!!!!!

Cheers

Tom

Just want to let any DasBlog developer types who may not have heard that the lastest test code is availble here: http://dasblog.info/dbftp/

Remember the real approved final vesion/s will be released at SourceForge here: http://sourceforge.net/project/showfiles.php?group_id=127624 

Enjoy!

Well I've got to just rip off a quick post, I have been so busy supporting the DasBlog community that I just about don't blog anymore <sad>.

Anyway I have fairly recently released a new DasBlog theme which I submitted to be included in the next DasBlog release and it failed the FireFox test. Boy was I embarrassed. I had called myself checking it out but I will admit not very closely at least in FireFox.

At any rate I spent untold hours trying to track down the problem, and along come  Justice Gray one of the better DasBlog developer contributors and volunteered to help me out.

He found 99% of the problems in 10 minutes. Apprantley he has and uses all those fancy FireFox development tools. YEAH!!!!!

I got Scott Hanselman to check the theme in this afternoon and by all appearances, the level of activity at Sourceforge we should see DasBlog 1.9 any day now!

Soon I will be hip deep in trying to support the role out and the user community.

Take Care

New Dasblog Theme "Nautica022 Liquid" is available for download here: nautica022

Here is a sample site using the theme with no mods:
www.auburnhighschool.us 
(Pretty much what you see is what you get!)

My family blog site using the theme with mods:
www.tomwatts.com

Originial Web Site Design by: www.studio7designs.com
CSS Coding by: mejobloggs 
The Original CSS Template is at: OpenWebDesign

Yes the DasBlog Conversion is by:Tom Watts, (Also documented at www.dasblog.us)

OK folks I have decided to refocus this site as a tech only and 99% Dasblog site.

There will be no more family postings here, I have created a new family blog site at TomWatts.com to support family blogging.

The TomWatts.Com blog  site is also based on the Dasblog engine and the theme is a conversion of the CSS web template “Nautica02.2 Liquid”  from Open Web Design (OWD). I think it came out very well!!!

I did duplicate some of the old family posts from Robosapient.com for a foundation for the family blog.

I promise you will find more of the lessons learned from my efforts at dasblog.us posted here with maybe some what better background, and easier to find references. I love the forum for the support it offers, but it is not the platform to pontificate about a particular issue raised there, or resolved there!.

I will also try to read the dasblog tea leaves from my hanging around the dasblog developement team and report what I think is going on from the "user" perspective.

See ya later.

Tom

Ok just a few rambles here,

#1. I continue to test Newz Crawler, so far it is one of my favorite RSS writer / remote blogger engines! ( I wish it had a built in spell checker, at least a browser based one, but so far I have not found one! This post will be another test of Newz Crawler...

#2. I review a lot of dasblog sites in my admin support duties (self appointed) over at dasblog.us , there are some very interesting blogs out there! I am partial to technical blogs, but I have found one that is artist centric ran by a techie that has caught my fancy. That blog would be @ http://idleminutes.com

#3. Scott has an interesting post over at his blog, "Is OPen Source a Crap Idea?" http://www.hanselman.com/blog/IsOpenSourceACrapIdea.aspx I hope that last leading question doesn't mean he is considering moving away from dasblog and on too newer greener pastures. If that's where he's headed, (I would understand if he did), I just hope he's looking to pass the baton.

/End Musing v0.12345

I received the following comment at http://dasblog.info the other day, so I thought I would try this product for myself.

Comments page: http://dasblog.info/CommentView,guid,B5B8DD8C-9A11-4237-8438-514D819FB274.aspx

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

So far so good, it does appear that the default endpoint for custom /RPC is just fine and that the html reference is http://domain/blogger.aspx.

Going to hit the post button now.........

Added some help images: