Comments for Weblog Tools Collection

Comment on WordPress for the Desktop… Would You Use It? by Kirk M

Kirk M — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 18:05:12 +0000

@joecr

Windows Live Writer has always been capable of editing existing posts since the beginning. Assuming you have the latest version (Windows Live Writer 2009-Version 14.0.8050.1202 I believe) on the toolbar below the menu bar click on “Open” and a dialog box will pop up where you can choose your blog (if you have more than one), posts or pages and how many you wish to list. Once the download of titles is complete click on the one you wish to edit and it will be loaded into the editor.

Comment on WordPress for the Desktop… Would You Use It? by joecr

joecr — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 15:43:11 +0000

I would use it as I have my site on a shared host & because the WP admin hits the CPU a ton while you are in the write/edit page for posts & pages causing issues that have shut down my site temporarily because of the issue. My issues with Windows Live Writer I haven’t found a way to edit existing posts or pages & The spell checker in Windows Live Writer is only better than wordpad because wordpad doesn’t have one. So because I have issues with spelling properly I end up having to post it as a draft so that I can run after the deadline in my web interface on it.

Comment on WordPress for the Desktop… Would You Use It? by Laurie Ashton Farook

Laurie Ashton Farook — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 13:11:28 +0000

I’ve been using desktop blogging apps since I started blogging in 2003. Especially now that I live in a country where Internet access is slow and, well, not always working, it’s even more imperative. I’m currently making the rounds through a bunch of desktop blogging clients, and thus far, the majority are buggy while the stable ones all seem to be missing key (for me) features.

I will. never. rely on the web interface to write my posts. Never.

Key features for me:
- able to import WordPress data – including all posts and pages so I can edit them later if necessary.
- able to write a post with all the editing options that exist from within WordPress itself, including the ability to assign categories and tags and edit in HTML. Must be able to handle images (in-line as well).
- stable. No crashes.

Windows Live Writer can do most of what I want except importing data and maintaining an ongoing database of posts and pages on my computer. Qumana can do most of what I want except native WordPress tagging, some image stuff, and importing more than 200 old posts.

Comment on Watch Out For The Gumblar Botnet by Gary Sims

Gary Sims — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 07:07:44 +0000

Thanks for the heads up everyone… Gary

Comment on Watch Out For The Gumblar Botnet by Jason Diehl

Jason Diehl — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 04:33:11 +0000

I work technical support for a good sized hosting company, and stolen FTP credentials are the number one way that accounts are being broken into this year. The methods that malicious people are gaining FTP credentials seem to be two pronged.

1) Website owners using easy to guess passwords. You can whine all you want about a hard password being hard to remember, but let me guess you are whining about your site getting attacked too. Passwords like “letmein” or dictionary words like “coyote” are a big hit for some reason.

2) The next one is connecting to your website via FTP using a compromised computer. This one appears to be the most popular this year. Spyware, and malware on your computer monitors outgoing connections and snoops those passwords being sent in plain text. The fix for this one is easy, don’t use FTP use sFTP if possible. sFTP is encrypted, encrypted is good. If you don’t have sFTP available to you just make sure your computer is clean and safe.

Hope this helps at least one person out there. Your websites are a target, and more than likely you are it’s weakest link, stay smart, stay safe.

Comment on The Best-Of Series: Download Managers by James Dimick

James Dimick — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 02:14:46 +0000

It’s a great plugin. Thanks for creating it!

Comment on The Best-Of Series: Download Managers by James Dimick

James Dimick — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 02:13:47 +0000

Well, I'm not aware of any official places to demo the plugin but, you can get an idea of how the front-end looks if you look at my use of it here and here. As I mentioned in the post, I currently use Drain Hole on my site. Not sure if that helps but I'm not aware of any way to demo the plugin without installing it.

Comment on The Best-Of Series: Download Managers by James Dimick

James Dimick — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 02:07:53 +0000

I can’t say from personal experience but you could always give these download managers a try. May have changed since since you last tried.

Comment on WordPress Warriors From Across The World by Blog Reads « Thomas W.P. Slatin

Blog Reads « Thomas W.P. Slatin — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 01:57:58 +0000

[...] WordPress Warriors From Across The World (Weblog Tools Collection) [...]

Comment on Watch Out For The Gumblar Botnet by Unblogged Bits for Friday, 06 November 2009 | ***Dave Does the Blog

Unblogged Bits for Friday, 06 November 2009 | ***Dave Does the Blog — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 00:01:34 +0000

[...] Watch Out For The Gumblar Botnet – A note to my Wordpress kinfolk … [...]

Comment on WordPress as a Contact Manager by tunghoy

tunghoy — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 18:07:47 +0000

The third line on the plugin’s home page says:
“Note: WP Contact Manager is no longer being actively developed.”

For me, that means Do Not Install. Abandonware is never a good thing.

Comment on The Best-Of Series: Download Managers by Kenji

Kenji — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 17:16:35 +0000

Where can we see Drain Hole in action?

Comment on WordPress 2.9 Revamps Hello World by Benoît

Benoît — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 17:13:52 +0000

Good idea !

Comment on WordPress 2.9 Revamps Hello World by Andrea_R

Andrea_R — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 16:40:55 +0000

TOTALLY forgot: this is a non-issue in WPMU. Site admins have the option already to set the default post for users. DOH.

Deanna S reminded me.

Comment on WordPress for the Desktop… Would You Use It? by aaron

aaron — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 16:03:57 +0000

Desktop applications have come in handy, especially for some of our less techno-savvy authors, but I’d love to see a cross-platform open-source solution. Instead of thinking “Wordpress for the desktop”, I wish people would think terms of an open standards solution that would stand the test of time even if Wordpress didn’t.

Comment on Watch Out For The Gumblar Botnet by Jeffro

Jeffro — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 15:35:22 +0000

Thanks for the quick reply and your uncanny post diving into this attack.

Comment on The Best-Of Series: Download Managers by Lester Chan

Lester Chan — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 15:34:51 +0000

Thanks for featuring my WP-DownloadManager, I will be testing against WP2.9 when the beta is out =)

Comment on Watch Out For The Gumblar Botnet by Denis

Denis — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 15:34:07 +0000

I copy my answer to Jeff’s question from my blog:
—————–
They don’t specifically target WordPress. They infect any PHP driven websites.

However, the PHP code they inject into existing files doesn’t take into account complex WordPress architecture, which leads to “redeclaration errors” and breaks compromised blogs.

So any version of WordPress can be broken. Just like any other complex PHP sites (i.e. Joomla, Drupal, phpBB, etc.)

In this attack, hackers use FTP credentials stolen from computers of webmaster, so WordPress itself is not to blame.

Comment on WordPress 2.9 Revamps Hello World by Jesse Friedman

Jesse Friedman — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 15:26:02 +0000

I’d like to see an array of html elements in the “Hello World” post. Stuff it with h1’s – h6’s, p, blockquote, an image, table, ul, ol, etc…

This way we can design our blogs and we don’t have to create test posts to make sure we’ve styled all the possible html elements.

Comment on WordPress for the Desktop… Would You Use It? by Rachel

Rachel — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 15:10:05 +0000

If you want to run your blog locally, portably, on your desktop or on a thumbdrive, don’t cast a vote, sign a petition, or make a wishlist.
I ALREADY run all my wordpress sites locally using Xampp lite and Wordpress on a thumb drive. It’s totally portable; when I’m near a decent wifi connection, I just upload to my sites using FileZilla.
The Xampp setup I use is OpenSource and runs on Windows, Apple and Linux.
Because it’s private and local (at least till I upload it) I can really play with designs, graphics and writing. I have 5 sites in my thumbdrive, and if I wanted to, I could plunk the whole thing on my desktop and run it like a proxy.
I can play with themes, graphics, widgets and plugins; the freedom of knowing that no will ever see unless I upload the post is incredibly liberating to the creative process. I can write a private blog using wordpress and save it on my thumbdrive; making it truly confidential.
If you’ve never played with the command line, php, or apache the process can look a little daunting.
So surf over to this guy’s site: educhalk.org
and check out his YouTube video:
http://educhalk.org/blog/how-t.....ing-xampp/
and he’ll walk you thru it step by step.
While you’re at his site check out the tons of free videos and guides he’s written on the technical aspects of wordpress.