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Writer Videos: Come and Get 'Em!Instructional video demonstrations for how to use Windows Live Writer are now available. Check them out on Soapbox and YouTube! 1 – Getting Started2 minutes, 26 seconds 2 - Basic Authoring2 minutes, 16 seconds 3 - Pictures, Videos, Maps and Plug-ins (oh my!)5 minutes 4 – Open, Save, Publish and Help2 minutes, 44 seconds
5 - Windows Live Writer11 minutes Enjoy! Writer Tip: Working With ImagesFor those of you who frequently include images in your blog posts and find that you often apply the same settings, there is a convenient feature in Writer that enables you to save those settings as the defaults for all future images. How it works
Now, the next time you insert an image it will be using the settings that you just saved following the steps above. Settings that get savedNot all settings get saved when you use this feature. Settings that will be saved are:
Defaults per blog accountThe defaults are saved uniquely for each blog account. That means if you have Writer configured to multiple blog accounts you can specify settings for images that are unique to each account. Revert to default settingsAnd for those of you who tend to get a little crazy formatting your images and take it a little to far, it's easy to wipe the slate clean and start over by clicking "Revert to default settings" at the bottom on the Image Properties sidebar. This will remove any changes that you've applied to the image and set it back to whatever the images defaults are for that account. Get back to the defaults that came with WriterIf you changed the image setting defaults for your account and want to change them back to the defaults used by Writer do the following:
Windows Live Writer Gets Love at BlogHer Business 2008Here's some live footage from the Microsoft Windows Experience Lounge during the 2008 BlogHer Business Conference. Thanks Sara Ford!! One correction to the video: Writer is not in Beta anymore. You can install the official "out of beta" version at http://writer.live.com/.
Troubleshooting: Writer Fails to Publish Posts on Blogger (Fixed)The Picasa Data API newsgroup has reported they have fixed the issue that was causing posts that contain images to not publish on Blogger (thanks Jeff Fisher for the quick response!). We have verified that the fix does addresses the issue Writer was having publishing to Blogger. If you continue to have problems with Writer please post on our newsgroup. Thanks to everyone for their patience and sorry for the inconvenience. Troubleshooting: Writer Fails to Publish Posts on BloggerToday, the Writer team learned of changes to Blogger that cause Writer to fail when publishing posts that contain images. When attempting to publish a post that contains images, Writer will show the following message:
We're currently investigating a fix for this issue and will post an update as soon as we have more information. Thanks to everyone who reported this issue. Windows Live Writer Update (KB 946058)Yesterday we released an update for Windows Live Writer. The update primarily addresses a problem in Windows Live Writer that prevents support for posting drafts to Blogger. More information about the update is available in this knowledge base article. This update is being distributed via Microsoft Update, so if you have chosen to have important updates automatically installed, you should receive this update automatically. If you aren't automatically getting updates, you can open Windows Update, check for updates, and the update will appear in the list of available updates. Once the update has been successfully applied, the Windows Live Writer version number will be updated to 12.0.1367.1128, so the about dialog will look like this:
In addition, once the update has been applied, the option to post drafts to Blogger will be available and working correctly. Beta 2 / Beta 3 Upgrade to FinalToday we will be starting to distribute the final version of Windows Live Writer as an Important update on Microsoft Update. This means that users of Windows Live Writer Beta 2 and Beta 3 will see the update available in Microsoft Update, or have the update automatically installed if they have opted to have Important updates automatically installed. You can learn more about the update here. If you are a Beta 2 or Beta 3 user and you aren't seeing the update, make sure that you have opted in to Microsoft Update. Of course, you can also just download and install the final version of Writer directly, if you'd like. Windows Live Writer Final is the same Writer that you know and love, but with the final fit and finish applied. Thanks everyone who used a Beta version of Writer—we hope you like the final version. Technorati Tags: Windows Live Writer, Update Windows Live Writer: Out of Beta
Thank you to everyone who tried out the beta releases of Writer over the last year and gave us feedback. Over 1.5 million of you downloaded our last beta release, and your input helped make Writer the product it is today. Our goal from the start has been to help make blogging more powerful, intuitive, and fun for everyone. Today, we’re proud to announce that Windows Live Writer 2008 is now available!
Most of our work over the last few months has been focused on raising the quality of Writer and putting the final fit and finish on the product. However, there are still a few new features in this release to check out:
Spell checking in four languages
Generic AtomPub Support We have heard from many of you about the pain and frustration in the last beta release when support for installing on x64 systems was not supported. We're happy to share that this has also been fixed and now installation on Windows Vista x64 is fully supported. As always, we're eager to hear feedback and learn about what you like and what you don't like. Later this week you'll have an opportunity to tell us in person. Members of the Writer team will be attending BlogWorld Expo in Las Vegas. We’ll have a product booth with this release of Writer for all to try. Come by and chat with us! The Windows Live Writer Team Writer will be at BlogWorld ExpoLater this week member of the Writer team will be attending BlogWorld Expo in Las Vegas, NV. You can find us hanging out at our product booth. We’ll have a computer with the latest version of Writer available for “test drives”. We’re looking forward to talking with folks and hearing what you think about Writer. Welcome Stephan to the MVPs!Congratulations to Stephan Walcher, one of Microsoft's newest MVPs! (The Microsoft Most Valuable Professional program recognizes leaders among our users who voluntarily share their knowledge and expertise with the community.) Stephan started the German-language Live Writer Blog. This popular site features the latest Writer news, workarounds for known problems, and reviews of Writer plugins. He's also a regular on the Writer MSN Group. From all of us on the Writer team, thanks for all you do for the Writer community--and congratulations again! Windows Live Writer Beta 3 Now AvailableWe have received a lot of great feedback since our last release and have done our best to respond in this with this update. This is the last beta before our final release so please give Beta 3 a run and keep the feedback coming in! Version 12.0.1277.0816 Some highlights of this release:
Also part of the Windows Live release today are new beta versions of Messenger, Mail, Photo Gallery, Toolbar, and OneCare Family Safety. Take all of these products out for a spin and let us know what you think! The Windows Live Writer Team Talk to us
Thank you scottisafoolI wanted to send out a little love out to Scott Lovegrove (http://scottisafool.spaces.live.com/) on behalf of the Writer team to recognize all the contributions he has made as a member of the Writer community the over the last year. Many of you are probably familiar with some of Scott’s popular Writer plugins, which include:
Scott is also a big contributor to our Writer forums, where he and Joe Cheng battle to see who can help our users faster. As a developer on Writer, Joe tends to have the edge because he actually writes the product, but Scott is always quick to catch on if the question comes up again. Scott has come in to meet with the Writer team a few times since our initial launch and has provided a lot of feedback about what we’re doing well and what we should fix. He has also written several articles for LiveSide highlighting features of Writer and creating Writer plugins. His efforts over the last year have helped us make this product better, and we really appreciate his contributions. <cheer/><cheer/><cheer/>for Scott! Spike Washburn Upcoming Changes May Affect Plug-in DevelopersIn an upcoming release of Windows Live Writer, we are changing the location that Windows Live Writer’s program files are installed into as well as the location of our registry settings. These changes could have an impact upon plug-in authors, though we have done our best to maintain backward compatibility. This post describes the changes in more detail and specifically discusses the impact that this will have upon existing plug-ins.
Writer Tip: Automatic Server Pinging
To use this feature in Writer click on Ping Servers in the Options dialog (navigation: Tools | Options | Ping Servers). Then add the names of the servers you want to ping. Some names of some popular search engines you could choose are: You can also use a pinging service like Ping-o-Matic (this service will automatically ping a number of popular sites for you). Just put the following in the list of ping servers: You can get an extended list of ping servers from the Ping Server entry on Wikipedia and the Ping-o-Matic website. A note on pinging etiquette: make sure to only ping specialized services if they're relevant to your blog, otherwise you'll cause an undue burden on them. [edit: Moved Ping-o-matic into a separate section since it actually relays pings to various servers. Thanks for the suggestion, Joseph! ] [edit: Corrected the NewsGator ping URL, which was incorrect.] Troubleshoot Issues with Writer (Beta 2)After the release of Writer Beta 2 last week, we were made aware of two issues in the product. One impacts installation of Writer and the other causes the computer to hang when Writer is running. We have determined solutions and both problems will be addressed in the next release of Writer. In addition, steps to work around these problems are described below. The entire Writer team would like to apologize to all of our customers for these unfortunate issues and any inconvenience they may have caused. We rely on your feedback to ensure that problems such as these get fixed and we appreciate all of your time and patience getting through these issues with us. If you continue to experience problems, please contact our support team for additional assistance. Problem 1: Writer Installation Fails Symptoms When trying to install Writer, the installation silently fails and does not complete or appears to take a very long time. Cause If you attempt to install Windows Live Writer after having installed Windows Live Writer, Windows Live Mail or Windows Live Messenger in another language, this problem can occur because the installer for the other language versions is preventing Writer from installing (even if you uninstalled the applications). Solution Remove the installer preventing Writer from installing and send your log files to the Writer support team. To do this: 1. Create a new folder on your desktop and name it Log Files. 2. Copy 3 log files on your system to the new folder you created If you are using Windows XP (SP2) the log files are located at the following locations:
If you are using Windows Vista the log files are located at the following locations:
3. Click this link: http://download.microsoft.com/download/2/3/0/23036331-516d-4c7e-b9ac-31554a2fec06/WL-Beta-remove.zip. 4. When prompted, click “Save” to save the ZIP file to your desktop.
5. Go to your desktop and open WL-Beta-remove.zip. 6. Extract all the files to your desktop (this should create a folder named WL-Beta-Remove on your desktop if not, skip to step 8). 7. Go to your desktop and open the folder named WL-Beta-remove (there should be a file named WL-Beta-Remove.cmd in the folder). 8. Double-click on the file named WL-Beta-Remove.cmd. 9. If prompted by the Open File – Security Warning, click “Run” (after clicking “Run” a window will open and you will see commands running in that Window, when the commands are finished the window will automatically close).
10. Go to http://get.live.com/betas/writer_betas and install Writer again. NOTE: If you had Windows Live Mail or Windows Live Messenger installed you will also need to reinstall those applications:
11. Go to the Writer support page and submit the log files that you saved in step #2. 12. Delete WL-Beta-remove.zip and the folders named Log Files and WL-Beta-remove from your desktop. Problem 2: System hangs when running Writer Symptom For some users, starting Windows Live Writer causes the computer to become unresponsive. In Task Manager, the Processes tab shows that a svchost.exe process is using close to 100% of the CPU (NOTE: Task Manager may not be able to start once the computer becomes unresponsive, so it would be necessary to start Task Manager before starting Writer). This symptom can re-appear if Windows Live Mail or Windows Live Messenger is installed after performing the solutions steps below. It is advised to peform the solution below after installing Windows Live Mail or Windows Live Messenger. Cause When Windows Live Writer starts, it uses the Windows Live Setup Service to check for updates. This Setup Service in turn uses Microsoft Update to check for updates. On some configuration this particular mechanism for checking can cause the symptom described above. Solution Disable the Windows Live Setup Service. To do this: 1. Click “Run…” on the Start menu. 2. Type “cmd” and then click “Open” (this will open a Command Prompt windows).
3. In the Command Prompt window type the following:
4. Close the Command Prompt window and any other applications in use. 5. Restart your computer. 6. Start Writer and use it as you would normally. Windows Live Writer Beta 2 Now AvailableThe Writer team has been working hard on a new release and we're excited that it is now available for download!
This release incorporates a ton of feedback from our discussion forums and your blogs. Here are some of the new features you'll find in Beta 2:
We're also excited to announce that Windows Live Spaces, WordPress, and TypePad have all taken advantage of our new Provider Customization API to expose additional service-specific features within the Writer UI.
If you are a weblog provider check out the API documentation here and don't hesitate to contact us with your feedback and questions. Final note: Along with Writer, new beta releases of Windows Live Mail and Windows Live Messenger are also available today. Hope you enjoy the new releases and keep letting us know what's on your mind so we can make all of the products better! Windows Live Writer Team Talk to us
Blog This for Firefox 2.0 now available on Windows Live GalleryThe Windows Live Writer Blog This extension for Firefox has been updated to officially support Firefox 2.0 (in addition to Firefox 1.5.x).
Spike Washburn Blogger Beta Update AvailableStarting last Friday, Writer had problems posting to Blogger Beta. Since then, we've been busy getting a fix made and tested. We've fixed the issue and have updated our Beta (to version 1.0.1 build 6 if you're keeping track). If you're using Blogger Beta, you should download and install the latest version of Writer. You can just install over your existing version of Writer, it will upgrade it automatically. Once you’ve installed the new version, you should re-add your Blogger Beta account and everything should work fine. Sorry to everyone who was affected by these issues. -Charles Teague Another Blogger Beta UpdateWe’ve had a month of blissful trouble-free integration, but today’s update of Blogger Beta is giving Windows Live Writer indigestion. As far as we know, if you're already using Build 145 and it's working with Blogger Beta, it should continue to work. But if you try to add a new Blogger Beta blog, you'll likely find that style detection will fail and none of the posts you publish will actually show up on the blog. We're working on an update to address this issue, which we plan to deliver sometime next week. Sorry for the inconvenience. We’ll keep you posted. Joe Cheng (Thanks to JTB for initially reporting this issue.) Blogger Beta UpdateIn our latest Beta update release (build 141), we added support for Blogger Beta. However, just after we completed our final testing, Blogger Beta released an update that caused Writer to not work correctly. We have fixed the problems and have updated our Beta (in build 145). If you're using Blogger Beta, you should download and install the latest version of Writer. You can just install over your existing version of Writer, it will upgrade it automatically. When you configure your Blogger Beta account in Writer, everything should work fine and you shouldn't be required to take any manual steps. Sorry to the users who ran into problems with this. Thanks very much for reporting the problems and for your understanding! Charles Teague |
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