So Why Not Try?
When I went to write about Thord Hedengren’s article in The Blog Herald, I found he had so convinced me that I had only typed three characters into WordPress before I thought, Why not write this post in Google Docs to see if you agree?
Great Find: Docs & Spreadsheets as a blogging tool
Permalink: http://www.blogherald.com/2006/10/24/docs-spreadsheets-as-a-blogging-tool/
Target Audience: anyone who uses word processing or blogging software
Content: I’m only this far, and already I’m saying, “Thank you, Thord.” This is so cool. The screen is brighter. I can see. I’m enjoying the experience like kid with a new toy. I can link to a URL, an email, a bookmark, or another Google Doc or Spreadsheet. You’ll be pleased to know THERE IS EVEN A SPELL CHECKER — it’s fast and painless.
As Google says I can “Create and share your projects online and access them from anywhere.” I can also post right from here to my blog, if I want. There’s even a Preview Screen. My only wish was that it didn’t save automatically, quite so often. Here are some screen shots of what I was looking at making this document. Click to enlarge the images to full size.
Read Thord’s review, believe what he says, and leave him a comment that says I agree.
— ME “Liz” Strauss
Related
Great Find: SlideShare
Fun Find: Blog Juice Anyone?
Great Find: PDF Online ââ¬â Free
Uh, yah .. I wouldn’t say it over there (because it might get to Thord’s head 🙂 but .. I’ve been enjoying all of his stuff! Ditto with Tony. Good acquisitions for the BlogHerald. And good tips for the rest of us.
They are great additions to the Blog Herald. That place is becoming quite something!
So, I went and tried this and I really like the idea of using Google D&S for this, but I didn’t see a way to file your post in any specific categories or add technorati tags. If they add those two features, or if I can find out how to get it to implement these features, then I would probably start using it instead of paying for ecto.
Besides being web based, why is Google Docs better for blogging than Microsoft Word? Thord’s post only really seems to mostly get into spell check (which I’m seeing FF 2.0 does quite nicely too since I switched the other day).
And how does Google Docs compare to more blogging specific apps like Performancing or Qumana?
I didn’t like that Performancing addon for firefox, in fact I hate it. Never tried Qumana. Personally, if you want a good blogging tool – try Blogdesk .. it will publish directly to any of many blogs, you can change the dates, have categories selected, have pictures, modify pictures, and more! I personally use it with only a few site that use graphics – for the others I just prefer to type it directly into WordPress and see how it looks when I periodically and “manually” save it every few minutes.
But – google docs also works in conjunction of your gmail account and if you have a gmail drive it’s drag and drop.
Good point, All Evolve. I don’t want to post direct so that’s not a problem to me. 🙂
Chris, two things.
Word puts in ASCI characters that cause problems in feeds and Google keeps your documents online so you can access them from any computer.
Those are my reasons. 🙂
HART,
You have so many blogs; your system sounds so much better for you than this. I hear Qmana is very good. But I’ve never tried it.
I used Quamana for a while. But after the umpteenth time it crashed when I went to move a photo I tried Performancing. I’ve been content with that. But I still end up posting as a draft, then tweaking in WP like HART is talking about before I publish.
It seems the few times I’ve tried posting directly in WP were the few times my hosting company had server issues and I lost the post.
HART, when you use graphics in your posts do you FTP them to your server first, or can you change where Blogdesk puts them when it uploads them via your post? (I have subfolders for my images to help me find them again.)
Well, I can’t see this being of much use to me. I do almost all my writing offline, and then post to my blog.
My spellchecker, when I need one, is a dictionary 😉
Actually, most of the errors in my pieces tend to be of the typo variety, especially, for some reason, “teh” for “the”. However, I’m pretty good at catching those.
Eek! What happened to my post? Did it go into moderation? Did I use a forbidden word? Arrghh!!
Chris .. when I do use Blogdesk … which is only infrequently .. I UNTICK the “Publish after Upload” box so it remains in Draft mode inside WP when posted by Blogdesk. However, any picture inside Blogdesk – and modified by Blogdesk – gets uploaded automatically to your default directory in WP (e.g. wp-content/uploads/) so when you do post inside WP it’s already coded correctly.
For my “LVR” series of blogs, where I mostly post ezine and other text articles – it’s easier to just copy/paste directly inside WP and not use Blogdesk. If I need pictures, I just use the wp2.0.4. add pictures on the go – make sure my mouse clicks at the spot where I want the picture .. add my closing (/a) .. change the height=96 to width=400 .. etc.
For my older blogs still on v1.5.2. I write until I want a picture directly inside WP. Then, I SAVE and exit and upload the picture (includes thumbnail at 400px) and then go back into the WRITE and add it. It ends up always at the bottom and I CTRL-X cut/paste to the right position in the post if I have to.
HART, it sounds like we have similar techniques. I do all my writing in Performancing, send it to whichever blog as a draft. Then I FTP the picture to the directory I want (I got this weird thing about jumbling everything in default directories, seems untidy) and insert it via WP 2.whatever-it-is-I’ve-got-now.
Then I set the tags and categories I want, proof read it in the preview window and publish.
Of course I just now went poking about in Performancing and realized I can actually set whatever I want the default path to be for it to automatically upload the images. Maybe I just learned to save at least one step!
Thanks HART! 🙂
Scorpia,
You read my posts. The forbidden word was probably spellchecker. 🙂
HART and Chris,
You seem to have the discussion under control.
Still Liz, it’s really strange. I went back and re-read the post. Can’t see anything “bad” about it.
I know, Scorpia. It’s done it with two or three today. It must be from the over-work Tuesday. 🙂 Unless the little server issues . . . maybe there were slips and glitchs.