Zoundry Blog Writer™ User Guide
Thank you for downloading the Zoundry Blog Writer. This guide will walk you through setting up and using the many new features of the Blog Writer. This is a work in progress and we will continue to update it. If you have additional questions, please visit our Support page.
1. Setting up your Blog Writer
Set up your blog account(s)
Configure your Zoundry ID
Configure your media repository
2. Using your Blog Writer - The Editor
Composing and formatting text
How to undo changes
Choosing a blog
Choosing categories
Choosing tag words and tag spaces
Entering a trackback URL
Choosing post date and time
Saving an entry
Opening a saved entry
HTML formatting
Removing HTML formatting
Pasting HTML source
Keyboard Shortcuts
Spellcheck
Extended text entry markers for WordPress and MovableType
3. Using your Blog Writer - Image Management
Inserting an image
Moving an image
Modifying an image
Aligning an image
4. Using your Blog Writer - Links
Creating links
Creating a product (affiliate) link
Linking to tag spaces, reference services, and search engines
Linking to a previously published post
Editing a link
Removing a link
5. Using your Blog Writer - Audio and Podcasting
Inserting audio files for podcasting
6. Using your Blog Writer - Preview
7. Using your Blog Writer - Posting
Posting
Posting to multiple blogs
8. Using your Blog Writer - Sidebar
What are the sidebars
The Blog Entries sidebar
9. Using your Blog Writer - Download Recent Posts
10. Using your Blog Writer with the Zoundry Toolbars
11. Using your Blog Writer - Advanced XHTML Editing
XHTML Editor
Using Tool bar buttons in XHTML mode
Autocompletion
HTML Tidy
Validating
12. Localization - Help us translate Blog Writer to other Languages
13. Technical Notes
Making a backup of your data
Command line parameters
How fonts are used in Blog Writer
1. Setting up your Blog Writer
Set up your blog account(s)
Go to the Getting Started sidebar (access via View -> Sidebar -> Getting Started) and click on Blog Accounts, or go to the Tools menu and select Blog Account Settings. Click on the New Account button in the middle of the dialog box.
This starts the New Blog Account wizard. The New Account Wizard supports Real Simple Discovery (RSD) to aid in finding your blog server API settings. Enter the your blog URL (if known) to let Zoundry discover the settings. When you press the Next button, the wizard will try and obtain the blog settings based on RSD. If you did not enter the blog URL or if you blog does not support RSD, then you will have to manually configure the settings (see table at the end of this section).
The first field, Account Name, is just an arbitrary label that you enter so you can identify this account later. Next, select the account type and enter your blog account username and password, and if your account type requires it, the XML-RPC URL or Atom URL.
In most cases, the account type and API URL would have been discovered by Zoundry using your blog server's RSD document. If RSD was not successful or if you think it is incorrect, you will have to manually configure the settings. To manually configure the settings, un-check "Use Settings From Auto-discover " and select the appropriate account API type setting. Please review the chart below to find which account type and endpoint URL you should use for your blog server/service.
| Blog Platform | Account Type | API Used | Endpoint URL and notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Blogger.com | Blogger | Atom | URL not required. File upload and categories are not supported. (Need FTP to host images.) |
| MSN Spaces | MSN Spaces | XML-RPC | URL not required. File upload is not supported. (Need FTP to host images.). MSN Spaces allows only one category per post. Post entry date and time can not be set to a future date and time. MSN Spaces will always use the current date and time in this case. |
| Typepad.com | Typepad | Atom | URL not required. Supports fileupload. |
| WordPress | WordPress | XML-RPC | The URL to the xmlrpc.php. For example, http://example.com/xmlrpc.php. Supports fileupload. (File upload should be enabled via WordPress Admin page). |
| Movable Type 3.x | SixApart Movable Type | XML-RPC | The URL to the mt-xmlrpc.cgi. For example, http://www.example.com/blog/mt-xmlrpc.cgi.
If you are using a Typepad server with xml-rpc, the URL is http://www.typepad.com/t/api.
Fileupload is supported on Movable Type 3.x servers.
Please read this note regarding API authentication for MT 3.2 servers. |
| BlogHarbor | BlogHarbor | XML-RPC (Custom MovableType) | Use the URL https://www.blogware.com/xmlrpc.cgi. Supports fileupload; however, Blog Harbor does not allow you to upload the same file twice (overwrite not allowed). Files begining with an underscore are also not allowed by the BlogHarbor Server. |
| Drupal v4.6 | Drupal | XML-RPC (Custom MovableType) | Enter the URL to the xmlrpc.php file, e.g., http://example.com/xmlrpc.php. Supports fileupload. |
| Nucleus v3.2 | Nucleus | XML-RPC (Custom MovableType) | Enter the URL to the xmlrpc API php file, e.g., http://example.com/nucleus/xmlrpc/server.php
Note: The fileupload in Nucleus v3.2 server's xml-rpc implementation does not work. This has been fixed in Nucleus v3.22. |
| LiveJournal.com | LiveJournal | L.J. XML-RPC |
API endpoint is http://www.livejournal.com/interface/xmlrpc.
Native fileupload is supported only on paid LiveJournal accounts i.e. you must have access to LJ Scrapbook. Note: Blog Writer supports some of LJ features such as moods. Please see note below on how Blog Writer interfaces with LJ. |
| LifeType (pLog) | LifeType | XML-RPC (Custom Metaweblog) | Enter the URL to the xmlrpc.php file, e.g., http://your-plog-installation-dir/xmlrpc.php. Supports fileupload. |
| LivingDot (Movable Type) | SixApart Movable Type | XML-RPC | The URL to the mt-xmlrpc.cgi.
For example, if your LivingDot MT site is http://www.example.com, then
the XML-RPC url is http://www.example.com/cgi-bin/mt/mt-xmlrpc.cgi
File upload is supported on LivingDot/MovableType. Please read this note regarding API authentication for MT 3.2 servers. |
| LivingDot (WordPress) | WordPress | XML-RPC |
The URL to the xmlrpc.php.
For example, if your LivingDot WordPress site is http://www.example.com, then
the XML-RPC endpoint URL is http://www.example.com/xmlrpc.php
Supports fileupload. (File upload should be enabled via LD/WordPress Admin page). |
| Squarespace | Squarespace | XML-RPC | Metaweblog API is http://www.squarespace.com/do/process/external/PostInterceptor |
MSN Spaces users:
Here are special instructions on how to set up the Blog Writer to post to your MSN Space.
First, turn on email publishing for your MSN Space. Sign in to your MSN Space and go to Settings>Email Publishing. On that page,
enter a secret word where prompted.
In the New Account wizard, enter the following:
1. Account name: Whatever name you want to display in the sidebar for your MSN Space
2. Account type: MSNSpaces
3. Account username: the name of your MSN Space, typically found at the end of your MSN Space URL,
e.g. http://spaces.msn.com/members/(your name here)
4. Account password: the secret word you entered on the email publishing page.
LiveJournal users:
If you have a paid account on LiveJournal, you can choose to use the Blog's file upload feature
to upload your images. In this case, images will be uploaded to your Live Journal Scrapbook (fotobilder)
under a gallery named 'Blog Writer Media'. Note that the uploaded images are marked as public -
i.e visible to everyone. If you are using a free account, you should choose FTP as the fileupload method.
Since BlogWriter is a generic posting tool designed to work with multiple blog servers, it uses the following 'hybrid' approach
to support LiveJournal.
1. LJ 'moods' are BW categories (you can choose only one category/mood).
2. LJ private entries are shown as 'drafts'. If you post as draft from BW, then it will be a private post in LJ.
3. LJ tagwords will appear under a new tagspace for Live Journal.
4. When posting to LJ, BW will assign any tagwords found in any of the tagspaces to LJ.
For example, if you had 2 tags under technorati and 2 under delicious and one under LJ, these five tags will
be applied to LJ tags when posting. You can assign tags specifically for LJ by choosing the LJ tagspace.
Custom Atom Users: If your blog server supports the Atom API and you wish to use it, select Custom Atom for the account type.
The following is an example of using Movable Type's Atom API.
Account Username: Your Movable Type username
Account Password: Your Atom Authentication Token found in your Movable Type profile
Atom URL: http://www.yourhost.com/path_to_mt_cgi-bin/mt-atom.cgi/weblog, where you enter your host's domain
and path to the MT cgi-bin information for the section labeled
"host" and "path_to_mt_cgi-bin".
For example:
1. http://www.yourhost.com/cgi-bin/mt-atom.cgi/weblog
2. http://www.yourhost.com/cgi-bin/mt/mt-atom.cgi/weblog
Note: In the second example, your MT cgi-bin path is /cgi-bin/mt. Some hosted services may use this format.
Check with your site Adminstrator for more information.
If you have any problems, send an email to support@zoundry.com.
Click Next to continue in the wizard and the Blog Writer will find all your blogs on this server.
On the confirmation page, select the blogs from where you want to download
recent posts from.
Next, choose FTP if you have an FTP server that you can use to upload images; otherwise, you
can choose your blog server's file upload option using XML-RPC if supported by your service.
Most blog servers (except for MSN Spaces and Blogger) support XML-RPC based image upload.
If you are not sure, select the first option.
Click
here to see other options if you do not have an FTP server or your blog service
does not support file uploads.
Repeat the above process for any other blogs you may have at other services.
Configure your Zoundry ID
(You can skip this section if you do not have a Zoundry ID.)
If you have an account with the Zoundry service (upon invitation only for the beta), enter your username (your email address.) If you do not have an account, you can request one by clicking here. You can also go to our Charity List to select a charity to receive your commissions - enter the charity's Zoundry ID here for your Blog Writer. Another option is to enter a Guest ID from a friend or organization to receive your commissions. Lastly, you can leave the Zoundry ID field blank and any commissions you earn will go into the Zoundry donation jar to help us with our expenses.
Configure your media repository
(You can skip this section if you are using your blog server's file upload feature.)
The Blog Writer's media repository uploads any local images you insert in your blog to a remote FTP server
that will host your images online. If you do not configure your media repository, any
local images that you insert in your blog may appear OK to you but will appear broken to anyone
else. If you do not have an FTP server, you can either use your blog server's file upload feature (if available) or
click here to see other options.
To configure your media repository, go to the Getting Started sidebar (access via View -> Sidebar -> Getting Started)
or to the Tools menu and click on Media Repository.
Fill out the fields shown and click OK. Once configured, the media repository will
automatically upload any local images you place in your blog to the FTP server during the
publishing process. The media repository settings are as follows:
The media repository settings are as follows:
Host: Your FTP server's host name or IP address.
Port: FTP Port number. Leave this blank to use the default port 21.
Username: Your FTP server login username.
Password: Your FTP server login password.
URL: The web location (URL) to where the images are stored. This must be a valid URL starting with "http://".
Path: The directory path to where are images are stored in your FTP account. (starts with a "/")
FAQ: How can I check if my media repository FTP settings are correct?
Back up2. Using your Blog Writer - The Editor
Click here to view a larger screenshot of the editor (with annotations).
Note:
To show only the editor, close the sidebar by clicking on the 'x' button on the top right of the sidebar (or uncheck
the sidebar item in the View menu). If you do not frequently use trackbacks and the calendar, then you can
also hide this by toggling the '>>' button located in the far right corner of the tagwords field.
See screenshot of the simplified interface.
Many of the composing, linking and tagging related functions can be found in the right click context menu.
A sample of the available content-menu options is shown below:
Composing and formatting text
Type within the Blog Writer's editor as if you were using a word processor. You can apply style formatting by highlighting text and selecting style buttons from the editor's toolbar or choosing from the Format menu.
Pressing Enter key starts a new paragraph (html <p></p> elements). Normally, most
browsers including the editor visually separates consecutive paragraphs with a larger line spacing (unless
overridden by CSS styles). If you wish to simply start a new line with in the same paragaph, then press
Shift+Enter.
Pressing Shift+Enter inserts a line break (<br/>) within the same paragraph.
This is equivalent to pressing Enter key on other text editors such as Notepad.
We recommend that you do not use line breaks (Shift+Enter or <br/>) purely for layout reasons.
Your Blog's template style should be used define the presentation of your markup.
How to undo changes
You can undo changes by going to Edit -> Undo from the menu or Ctrl + Z..
Choosing a blog
You can select a blog for publishing from the pull-down menu from the editor toolbar (above the title) or you can select the blog from the Publish dialog when you are ready to publish the entry to your blog.
Choosing categories (not supported in Blogger)
You can select the categories for the post by clicking on the button to the right of the blog selection menu in the editor toolbar. (Categories are currently not supported in Blogger.)
Choosing tag words and tag spaces
You can add tags for the post to a number of tag spaces. First select the tag space from the pull-down menu below the title in the editor toolbar. (Technorati is the default option.) Next, enter your tag words with a comma separating each tag. For example, if you have two tags such as "Zoundry" and "Blog Writer" (excluding the quotes), enter them as "Zoundry, Blog Writer". Note the comma separating the two tags.
You can also click on the button to the right of the tag field to select from tags that you have used previously. (this displays all of the tag words you have previously used, including tags from the recently downloaded post entries).
The tagwords added in the toolbar (or in the Publish dialog) will appear at the bottom of your post once it is published. If you need to add in-line tags i.e. within your text, see Linking to tag spaces, reference services, and search engines.
Entering a trackback URL
If you are writing your post in response to a post on another blog, you can enter the referenced post's trackback URL into the Trackback field in the editor's toolbar or enter it later during the publishing process. When you publish your post, the other blog's publisher will be notified of your post and can choose to display a link and summary of your post under the referenced post.
Choosing post date and time (not supported by BlogHarbor)
You can set the date and time of your post. The current date and time is the default but you can choose to have your post appear on your blog anytime in the past or future. (You currently cannot change the post date or time at BlogHarbor.)
Saving an entry
You can save an entry before publishing to your blog by going to File -> Save in the menu or clicking on the Save button. All unpublished entries are listed in the Blog Entries sidebar under "Unpublished (local machine)".
Opening a saved entry
You can open a saved entry (either unpublished or published) by going to File -> Open in the menu or browsing for entries in the Blog Entries sidebar.
HTML formatting
The Blog Writer can help you apply two kinds of HTML formatting without your needing to edit HTML source directly.
The first is Block Quotes. Block quotes are a formatting option that indents a selected passage of text on both sides to give it more
visibility within a post. Many bloggers like to use block quotes for longer quotes, for example, an entire paragraph.
To apply a block quote, select the entire text for the block quote, then right click and choose Apply Block Quote Formatting.
The second is Code formatting, which allows you to format software code in your post. To apply code formatting, select the entire
text, then right click and choose Apply Code Formatting.
Removing HTML formatting
To remove block quote or code formatting (on the current element under the cursor), click on any part of the formatted text, right click and select Remove Formatting.
Pasting HTML Source
To insert valid HTML source fragment into the WYSIWYG editor:
1. Copy the valid html source to your Windows clipboard (Ctrl + C)
2. In Blog Writer, choose Edit->PasteAsHtml menu option.
Blog Writer will insert the content as html if the content a is well formed html fragment, otherwise
the content will be inserted as plain text.
Keyboard Shortcuts
| Action | Shortcut |
|---|---|
| Open Post | Ctrl + O |
| Open HTML File | Ctrl + Shift + O |
| Save Post | Ctrl + S |
| Save Post as HTML File | Ctrl + Shift + S |
| Publish Post | Ctrl + P |
| Download Recent Posts | Ctrl + D |
| Bold (Strong) | Ctrl + B |
| Italic (Emphasize) | Ctrl + I |
| Underline | Ctrl + U |
| Insert Link | Ctrl + L |
| Insert Product Link | Ctrl + Shift + L |
| Insert Picture (file) | Ctrl + M |
| Insert Image Tag | Ctrl + Shift + M |
| Cut | Ctrl + X |
| Copy | Ctrl + C |
| Paste | Ctrl + V |
| Paste as HTML (formatted) | Ctrl + Shift + V |
| Undo | Ctrl + Z |
| Redo | Ctrl + Y |
| Run Spellcheck | F7 |
| Find and or Replace | Ctrl + F |
Spellcheck
To bring up the spell check option, choose Tools->Settings menu option and select Spelling section. Select your language, and press OK or Apply. This will begin the download of the dictionary. (You can cancel any time if you wish to continue the download at a later time.). If the dictionary for your language is not listed, please let us know.
To begin the Spell Check, press F7, or select Tools->Spelling menu or ("abc") button on the tool bar. Spell check is not currently supported in the XHTML editor.
Extended text entry markers for WordPress and MovableType
MovableType and WordPress API supports the notion of a extended entries (WP text <!-- more --> marker). In Zoundry, this is supported in the WYSIWYG editor via a green horizontal (dashed) line. In the XHTML editor, this is represented as a <!-- more --> comment.
To insert the extended entry marker, place the cursor at the block of text where you want the marker, and press the Extended Entry toolbar button (see screen shot).
Note: The marker is added at the end of the text block (based on xhtml 1.0 schema). For example, at the end of the current paragraph.
To move the marker to a new location, place the cursor at the new location (paragraph) and press the marker toolbar button.
To remove the marker, right click on the marker (horizontal line) and choose the Remove option.
3. Using your Blog Writer - Image Management
Inserting an image
To insert images from your PC, you can either drag and drop (recommended) an image from your desktop, or click on the Insert Picture File
button (Ctrl+M) on the toolbar or from the right-click menu. When you publish your post, your Blog Writer's media repository will
automatically thumbnail (place a small version of the image in your post and link to the full image) and upload both the thumbnails
and full images to your remote image host. (Note: You must configure your media repository first or use your
blog service's file upload feature if available.)
You can also insert images from the Web, called image tags, using one of three methods:
1. Select the image and drag and drop it from your browser. If the image is hyperlinked, cut and paste it instead*.
2. Right-click on the image in your browser, select copy and paste it into the Blog Writer.
3. Select Insert Image Tag from the right-click menu (or Ctrl+Shift+M) and entering the URL of the image tag.
(Note: before inserting images from the Web, make sure you obtain permission from the copyright holder first.)
You can find the URL of an image tag by right-clicking on an image in the browser and selecting Properties. Find the location of
the image and enter it into the URL field within the Insert Image Tag dialog box. The Alt Text field is optional text that the browser
will display before it loads the image.
* If you are using Mozilla Firefox, you can simply drag and drop any image tag regardless of whether it is hyperlinked or not.
* Flock browser - since Flock is based on Mozilla (Firefox), you can drag and drop images and content. In addition, you can also drag and drop items from Flock's Shelf window.
Moving an image
There are two ways you can move an image within your post:
1. You can drag (and drop) the image within your post. That is, click on the image and move it to the location you want in the post.
2. You can cut and then paste it to the location you want. (Place your cursor where you want to insert the image before pasting.)
Modifying an image
You can edit images by right-clicking on the image and selecting Picture Properties.
This will bring up a dialog box showing supported image properties, including alt text, alignment, and the html width and height
attributes. Alternatively, you can change an image size in the editor by clicking on the image, selecting one of the image handles
around the image, and stretching it as needed.
If you change the image size using Picture Properties, then a new thumbnail will automatically be generated. If you change the image
size by stretching, then you should manually re-thumbnail by selecting Re-Thumbnail Picture from the right-click menu.
You can also change the margin and border style from the Picture Properties menu.
To add space around the image:
1. Right click on the image and choose Picture Properties.
2. Select the Style tab.
3. Enter 2 for the left, top and bottom margins. Enter 5 for right margin. (Assuming left alignment.)
4. Optional: enter 1 for the border width.
Aligning an image
Image alignment (e.g center, left or right) property can be set via the Picture Properties dialog. Alternately, you can also right click on the picture and choose Align image option from the context menu.
4. Using your Blog Writer - Links
Creating links
If you want to create a hyperlink under a word or phrase in your blog, first highlight the text, then press the Insert Link button (Ctrl+L)
or right click and select Insert Link. Enter the URL and choose whether you want the link to open in a new browser window.
Alternatively, here are some other ways to create links:
1. Drag and drop a URL from your browser to the Blog Writer's editor.
2. Copy a URL from your browser to your clipboard. From the editor, choose Create Link (Ctrl+L). The link should be already
prepopulated from the clipboard.
3. Copy the URL from your browser and pasted directly into the editor.
4. In the case of local files, drag and drop the local files (e.g., mp3 files) from Windows into the editor.
FAQ: What does it mean to open a link in a new window?
Creating a product (affiliate) link
We give you three easy ways to create Zoundry product links to a wide range of products. Click
here to see our current list
of supported merchants and which link creation methods we offer for each one. (Note: You must be connected to the Internet in
order to create product links using the Blog Writer.)
First, use our Zoundry Product Chooser to search and create links easily for a wide range of products:
1. Highlight the text where you want to place the link (be careful not to highlight any extra spaces.)
2. Right click on the highlighted text and select Link to Product (or press Ctrl+Shift+L).
3. Review the merchants and categories of search results in the Zoundry Product Chooser. Click on the plus sign to expand a
merchant and/or category to see its items (click on the minus sign to collapse an expanded merchant or category.)
4. Click on any item to review its information and see a thumbnail image if available.
5. When you find the correct item, select any checkbox options and click OK.
Or, use our Link Converter to create individual product links manually for some of our merchants, before we add them
to our Zoundry Product Chooser:
1. Go to the merchant's site and find the product.
2. Copy and paste (or drag and drop in Mozilla Firefox) the product page URL into the Blog Writer.
3. Right click on the link and select Convert (Merchant) link into a Product Link.
4. After the Blog Writer successfully formats the link, enter the text for the link where it says Enter Product Text and click OK.
Lastly, you can create affiliate links for general product types or entire categories at selected merchants. For example,
if you wanted create an affiliate link to an entire product category, such as digital cameras, at Amazon, you would do the following:
1. Highlight the term "digital cameras" and right click.
2. Select Link to merchant store front -> Amazon.
When your readers click on the link, they will go to a page at Amazon showing all matching products. If a reader clicks and
purchases any product on that list, then you would earn a commission on the sale.
FAQ: What's the difference between a Zoundry product link and a regular link?
Linking to tag spaces, reference services, and search engines
If you want to create a link to a tag space, such as Technorati,
then select the text you want to link and then right click and choose Link To ... -> Technorati. The link created will be a tagged
link. Similarly, you can create links to other places such as Wikipedia (reference) and Yahoo (search).
To add a link to a tag space which is not supported currently through the Blog Writer:
1. Select the text you want to link.
2. Right click, choose Link to ... -> Custom tag space.
3. Enter your tag space URL, e.g., http://del.icio.us/tag.
4. The tag words are the text you had selected, and this is shown in the "Link Tag" section.
Multi-word tags should be separated by a space, i.e.,
you do not need to use the "+" or "%20".
Linking to a previously published post
To insert a link to one of your published posts, you can either:
1. From the document sidebar, right click on the post and choose "Create a link to this post".
2) Or, from the document sidebar, right click on the post and choose Entry Properties. From the Entry Properties dialogs you can create.
a link to either the post, an image within the post, or links within that post.
3) Or, finally, the third option is select the text in the editor and choose Link to Posts from the right
click context menu.
This inserts a link to the selected post at the current cursor position. If you had selected some text in the editor,
then the selected text will be hyperlinked to this post.
Editing a link
Click on the link in the editor, right click and select Edit Link Location. Edit the URL
and choose whether you want the link to open in a new browser window. Note: you cannot edit a Zoundry product link.
If you want to edit the link text, you can make changes in the editor.
Removing a link
Click on the link in the editor, right click and select Remove Formatting. You can then delete the link text if you want.
Back up5. Using your Blog Writer - Audio and Podcasting
Inserting audio files for podcasting
You can drag and drop an audio file (e.g., mp3) from Windows into the editor or manually create a link (Ctrl+L) and click on the File
button to browse to your audio file. When you publish the post to your blog, a reader will be able to click on the link to download
and play the file. Note: You will need to configure your media repository or select the file upload option at your blog server first.
The Blog Writer automatically formats your mp3 links with the podcast enclosure. To set up your podcast, you must create an
RSS 2.0 feed for your blog. Click here to learn more about podcasting.
6. Using your Blog Writer - Preview
Using template preview
The Blog Writer allows you to preview your posts using your blog's template. Click here to learn more.
7. Using your Blog Writer - Posting
Posting
See screen shots for Tags,
Weblog Ping, and
Trackback tabs.
When you have finished writing and formatting your entry and you are satified with the preview, you can publish it to your blog server
by going to Post -> Publish Entry from the menu or clicking on the Publish button on the editor toolbar. Under Post Settings on the
General tab, select the blog for posting. (You can also select the blog for posting from the pull-down menu below the editor toolbar.)
Select the categories for the post (if supported by your blog) if you did not previously set them from the editor, and also set or
verify the post date and time.
Optionally, you can go to the other tabs to enter or verify the following information:
1. Tags - enter or verify tags that you entered from the editor toolbar.
2. Weblog Ping - check any services that you want to notify with your new post.
3. Trackback - enter or verify a trackback URL.
You can also choose to post the entry as a draft (currently not supported in TypePad or Movable Type) or leave
the box blank to post online. If you were editing a previously saved/published entry, you can choose to update the entry or publish it
as a new post.
Lastly, you can choose to upload thumbnails only if you do not want the large (original size) image uploaded and hyperlinked
to from the thumbnail.
When you are ready to publish, click on the Post button.
The messages and warning section shown at the bottom may also show error messages. For example, if you did not select a blog, If you see a error message, click on the error message to switch to the correct tab.
Posting to multiple blogs
If you want to publish the same entry to multiple blogs, you should uncheck the Close after posting box at the bottom of the Publish
dialog. After you publish the entry to the first blog, select the second blog in the Post Settings and set the categories. Repeat
as needed.
Note: Publishing the same entry to multiple blogs does not create multiple instances of the entry in the Blog Entries sidebar; the
same underlying document is used for all posts. If you want to create multiple copies of the entry, then you have to select the
entry in the Blog Entries sidebar, then select File -> Create Copy from the menu, and save the document as a new entry.
8. Using your Blog Writer - Sidebar
What are the sidebars
The Sidebar is a window that you can choose to display on the left side of the Blog Writer. You can select from three
different Sidebars by going to View -> Sidebar name:
1. Getting Started - a shortcut to the Settings options that shows what you have and haven't configured.
2. Check for Updates - a convenient way to check if any newer versions of the Blog Writer are available for download and see what's new from Zoundry.
3. Blog Entries - a list of your saved drafts and posts for easy browsing and editing.
To close the Sidebar, click on the X at the top right of the sidebar window. To switch quickly between sidebars, you can click on the
down arrow next to the close button and select from the pull-down menu.
The Blog Entries sidebar
The Blog Entries sidebar is organized by your blog accounts first, then blogs under each account, and then the posts for each blog. Click on the + or - signs to expand or collapse the nodes for each of your blog accounts to see your blogs and posts. Unpublished (local machine) documents are saved drafts that have not been posted to a blog server.
When you select a post by clicking on its title
in the sidebar, toolbar buttons will activate, allowing you to perform the following functions:
1. Open/edit the post.
2. View the post online.
3. Create a link to the post.
4. View the post properties.
5. Delete the post from the Blog Writer and/or your blog server. Note: if the same post was published to multiple blogs, then you
will have the option to delete from any or all blogs.
Note that when you post a single entry (document) to multiple blogs, you are actually posting the same (physical) copy. That is, all blogs use the same underlying document. If you need a new copy of it, then choose Open-as-UnpublishedCopy to a copy of the published entry.
The Blog Entries sidebar can organize your posts by blog, tag, or link. You can change the view by using the pull-down menu below
the close sidebar button.
The entry properties option shows you the properties about the document.
It shows a summary of blogs where the entry has been posted to, the links, images etc. found in the post.
You can also insert a link found in this dialog directly into the current edit document by choosing insert link.
9. Using your Blog Writer - Download Recent Posts
Download recent posts
You can download a limited number (due to limitation with the CMS you use) of previously published posts from your blog server to the Blog Writer. This allows you to create a backup of your posts and enables you to edit them while you are offline. Go to Post -> Download Recent Posts from the menu. Select the correct blog (click on + or - to expand or collapse the nodes) and choose the number of posts to download (starting from the most recent.)
The download process also imports all of the tag words (e.g. Technorati) found within each post's content.
Note:
After the download process has completed, you can view the downloaded documents from the side: From the sidebar entries
tree view, select (expand) the account followed the Blog you had selected.
10. Using your Blog Writer with the Zoundry Toolbars
Blog This
With our Zoundry browser toolbar plugin, you will be able to create a blog post quickly from any web page within Internet Explorer or Mozilla Firefox. When you are at a web page of interest, highlight the text from the page and press the BlogThis button in the Zoundry toolbar. This will launch the Blog Writer and paste the selected text, including any links) within the editor.
If you are at a product page at one of our supported merchants, you can press BlogThis (without needing to highlight any text) and the Blog Writer will automatically copy any available product text (plus image optional) and create a Zoundry product link to the page with your Zoundry ID.
The Blog Writer will also attempt to auto discover trackback URL information. If more than one trackback is found, then a list of available trackbacks are shown. The selected trackback will be associated with your post.
To learn more about the Zoundry Toolbar, click here, or go directly to the Zoundry Toolbar download section.
11. Using your Blog Writer - Advanced XHTML Editing
XHTML Editor
The XHTML editor now allows you to edit your ppst at XHTML code level.
Basic features include brace matching, and tag/attribute color coding. Advanced features including HTML Tidy, Auto
completion and Validation.
Note: The content of the editor should content of a XHTML <body>. Do not enter <xhtml>, <head> and
<body> tags. Only children of the <body> should be used.
Pressing ctrl and + (plus) or ctrl and - (minus) lets you increase or decrease the XHTML editor font size.
Using Tool bar buttons in XHTML mode
Most of the editing buttons and keyboard shortcuts (e.g. Bold or Ctrl+B, Link to.., Link to Post on the sidebar etc.)
are available in XHTML editor.
If you do not have any text selected when you invoke one of operations (e.g. Bold or Ctrl+B), then the relevant
markup is inserted with the cursor positioned between the open and close tag. For example, the Bold button would
insert "<strong>[cursor]</strong> " (without quotes). (Insert Link or Ctrl+L,
insert image or Ctrl+M/Ctrl+Shift+M works well if you want to insert links/images at the current cursor position).
If you had any text selected then the relevant markup will be wrapped around the text selection. For example, if the
text is "Hello World", then the final markup would be "<strong>Hello
World</strong>". As another example, to create a hyperlink around some text, select the text and
choose Ctrl+L (or for quick links such as Technorati tagging, choose LinkTo.. option from the tool bar).
Note: be careful when you apply markup on selected text as the markup is applied to the whole selection even if the
selected text had partial markup. For example if the selected text is
"em>[cursor]</em>" (i.e. includes partial text for <em> open tag),
then after applying Bold, the final markup would look like
"<strong>em>[cursor]</em></strong>" (notice that the
<strong> tag was applied over the partial <em> tag since it was part of the
selection).
Auto-completion
Auto completion is provided based on the current position in the document and its context to XHTML 1.0 schema. To invoke Auto-completion, press Ctrl + Space. The Auto completion list is shown only if it can be generated based on the current context. The Ctrl+Shift+Space will show you the Call Tips - but this is incomplete in this release.
To invoke Auto completion for a start tag, press Ctrl+Space right after the < character. The list of
available tags are then shown. Note that these tags are based on the XHTML 1.0 schema (Strict or Transitional). For
example, at the top (root) level, you will only see block level elements (based on the selected schema).
Once you are inside a tag, Ctrl+Space will show the list of available attribute names for the current element.
If you are in a style attribute, Ctrl+Space will show the list of available CSS style names and or
values depending on the context. Similarly, attribute value options for href, class
attributes are shown when available.
Note: Font size values are based on your current font size unit preference (EM, PX, CSS sizes etc). See Fonts section
in Tools->Preferences.
The auto-completion on a close tag character sequence </ will show the matching closing tag (when
possible i.e. as long as your content is well formed).
HTML Tidy
Zoundry expects content to be well formed xml. Typically content generated by other sources such as MS Word, and many
blog CMS are not well formed. Zoundry has been using HTML Tidy since its (Blog Writer) first release since an
internal model of the content is used in memory (DOM). We have exposed this an optional operation for the users to
use. To run HTML Tidy, press the Tidy button. Note that the line and column numbers may not exactly match the line
numbers on the editor - except where there were severe errors during Tidy.
Note: Tidy is also automatically run you switch between the WYSIWYG and XHTML editor tabs.
Validating
You can now validate your post entry using XHTML 1.0 Strict or Transitional by pressing the Validate
button. The warning/error line numbers should match the editor. Click on the error or warning to highlight the
corresponding marker (on the margin, next to the line numbers) on the editor. To clear the error and warning
messages, press the Clear button.
Note: validation is performed against your post - and not against your Blog site. You should make sure that your Blog
site is XHTML compliant (most are based on templates).
12. Localization - Help us translate Blog Writer to other Languages
We have externalized all our UI related messages, captions, strings to a resource bundle in order to support
localization. We do not yet have any official translations as yet. The resource bundle is a simple name-spaced xml
file (UTF-8 encoded), located in the install directory. The file name takes the form
zBlogWriter_[LanguageCode].xml or zBlogWriter_[LanguageCode]_[CountryCode].xml (for a
specific country). For example, zBlogWriter_en.xml (for English) and zBlogWriter_en_GB.xml
(UK, English).
We have also integrated a very simple tool to enable volunteers translate the original language pack to a different
locale. To bring up this tool, choose the Tools->LocalizationTool menu option.
To begin a new translation, press the New button. This will show a dialog box for you to select a language. Leave the
Country as "All Countries" unless the translation is very specific to a country.
To work on an existing (previously saved) language pack, select Open option and choose the appropriate language pack.
To use the translation tool, simply entry the translation for each entry in the list. Do not forget to save your
work. The file is saved to install_directory/zBlogWriter_[LanguageCode].xml
Note on Date Formats:
The default date formats used in various locations use the U.S. convention - which is month, day and year.
Note on Calendar Control:
The date field next to the calendar control displays the date as MM/DD/YYYY externalized with date format
string "MMDDYYYY" (without quotes).
The resource key for this string is blogui.wx_datecontrol.
The other two valid formats you can use (depending on your locale) for the calendar control are
DDMMYYYY and YYYYMMDD.
To switch to a different resource bundle. choose Tools->Settings
menu option and select the Language section. This panel will list the available language packs (both locally on your
machine as well as available for download). To switch, simply select the latest version of the desired language pack
and press OK or Apply button. You may need restart the application.
Once you are finished with the translations,
1. Locate the your translation xml file (e.g. zBlogWriter_en_GB.xml). This file is normally kept
in the Zoundry install directory. For example, C:/Program Files/Zoundry Blog Writer.
2. Zip the xml file.
3. Email it to us at support at zoundry dot com
Once we receive it, we will try to consilidate/merge your changes and once it is ready, we will make it available
for Zoundry users. Credit for your hard work will of course be posted on our site.
(New string bundles/language packs are normally shown in the Settings->Languages dialog from where the users can download).
13. Technical Notes
Making a backup of your data
The current version of Zoundry application (1.0) does not make automatic backup of your data (known issue). If you uninstall Zoundry, then this information will also be removed. Zoundry Blog Writer stores your posts and data in xhtml (and xml) files. To back up yours posts and settings, simply copy/backup the data directory.
The data directory is located in users directory under the application installation directory.
For example
C:/Program Files/Zoundry Blog Writer/users/[your_username]
where [your_username] is
your Windows login username.
Command line parameters
You can launch Zoundry from external tools such as RSS news readers. In most cases, you will need to pass some data back to Zoundry via command line parameters.
The general format is:
codepath_to_install/sys/pyth/zBlogWriter.exe -cmd -option1 -option2 ...
where the codepath_to_install in the installation directory and
cmd is blogthis.
The blogthis command launches Blog Writer with the given content placed in the editor.
Launching with a temporary xhtml file:
To launch the application with a xhtml file, use the format
-blogthis -title "optional title" -file "full_path_xhtml_file"
For an example, see FeedDemon Settings in our FAQ.
Launching with content as a parameter:
To pass the x(html) or text content as a parameter (instead of using a temporary file), use
the format
-blogthis -title "optional title" -url http://url_of_content -text "plain text data"
The title and url are optional. If the url is present, then it
may be used to autodiscover as well as to cite the content.
The value of -text option should be either plain text or (x)html.
If the data is formated as well formed (x)html, then include option -format xhtml.
For example:
-blogthis -title "optional title" -url http://url_of_content -text "html formatted data" -format xhtml
For an example, see RSS Owl Settings in our FAQ.
The other options that are available when passing content via parameters are:
autodiscover:
If the url is present, Zoundry will run auto discover to determine trackbacks and post summary.
To switch it off, use -autodiscover no. It is switched off for RSS Owl.
Our web browser toolbar plug-ins uses the autosdiscover
feature. The File->BlogThis Url menu option also utilizes trackbacks.
author:
Normally, the author information is found via autodiscover. But, you can also supply one.
This will be displayed in citation of the content.
quote:
All text content is normally cited and quoted (ie. xhtml blockquote).
If you do not want to quote the content, then include the parameter -quote no.
How fonts are used in Blog Writer
Zoundry Blog Writer uses CSS when possible in order to keep the post entry well structured. The HTML <FONT> tag is not used in Zoundry. This tag has been deprecated in XHTML 1.0. If your posts had a <FONT> tag, then it will be converted to use CSS styles. Here is some information on fonts and how the fonts work with Zoundry (and with most browsers) .
Font Size:
If you use a relative font unit such as Em (e.g. "1.0em"), Percentage ("100%"), then most CSS
compliant browsers will display and apply the font relative to the parent HTML element. For example, lets say, your
HTML and body font-size is 100% (baseline). If you then add a <P> or a <SPAN> with font-size=65% (really
small), then the elements displayed will be 65% of the baseline. Now, if you nest another element within this
paragraph, say with font-size=120%, the browsers will render the font size as 120% of its parent size (in this case,
the parent font size is 65%). Which means, it does not make it look really large as expected (the value calculated by
the web browser would be about 78%).
Another relative unit is Px (pixels) (e.g. "14px") - in this case, the browser renders the font size
relative to the base unit of the display unit (your monitor). So, for most users, this is equivalent to a
"absolute size" since their display monitor is fixed.
The actual absolute size specified by CSS is the CSS font size keywords (e.g. font-size="medium").
If you had a older post with the deprecated HTML FONT tag, it will be converted to a SPAN with in-line CSS font style
information. You can set your preferred font size unit (em,px,percent, css-keyword) on Blog Writer by going to the
Settings dialog and choosing the Fonts section.
The available font sizes in Zoundry user interface (drop down font-size list) are Smallest, Smaller, Small, Normal,
Large, Larger and Largest. The actual font size applied to the HTML is based on the chosen font size unit or length.
The default font size unit is em. You can change this via Preferences->Fonts option.
We recommend you use a relative font size such as em or percentage. The available fonts sizes (Smallest through Largest) are scaled approximately by a factor of 1.2 from Normal, except for the Smallest size (due to readability issues) where it is limited to 75%, 9px, 9pt or 0.6em depending on the chosen unit or length.
Font Names:
You will notice that Blog Writers list of available fonts do not reflect what is installed in your system. For
example, you may have 100s of fonts installed. Blog Writer does not display all these fonts, instead, it chooses a
few "popular" fonts (from each family). Above the list of your fonts, Zoundry displays five fonts based on
the CSS generic font families (Serif, Sans Serif, Monospace, Fantasy, and Cursive). Currently, the font applied when
selecting a CSS generic family is fixed. E.g.: selecting Serif, applies the font family "'Times New
Roman',Georgia,serif" to your HTML.
If you had a older post with the deprecated HTML FONT tag, it will be converted to a SPAN with in-line CSS font style information. Also, when importing HTML with font families, Blog Writer will try to match the closest font family available in the system - similar to what a web browser does. If a match is not found , Blog Writer will attempt to find the generic family. For example Lucida (on the Mac) will be matched to Lucida Grande on Blog Writer (Windows).