This is my 101st post, so I thought I’d use it to share with you some of the things I’ve learned about blogging while writing those 100 posts. As opposed to ‘blogging tips’ (link to everyone all the time; make lists; plug your blog everywhere you can; blah de blah) which I’m sure you’d be able to find on millions of websites and I am a long way from qualified to give out, I thought I’d simply share a few details about the tools I use to blog and how they make it easier to keep motivated and keep having fun with it.
Incidentally, the perfect quote about blogging-on-blogging appeared today on Kung Fu Grippe. The language is a little choice, so I shall refrain from repeating it here.
So, without further ado, if you wish to know about the tools and processes I use after 3 months of learning and blogging – my ‘Blogging Workflow’, so to speak – click on, dear reader!
A Mac
Obviously. Goes without saying. I use an iMac mainly (much like the one in the picture), but also have a Macbook (largely to prevent arguments with the wife). Truth be told, the MacBook is the best computer in the world for writing on, something about the keyboard is just perfect. It does, however, suffer from only having a 13” screen (as opposed to the iMac’s 20”), and is not quite as fast, so it’s not as good for design work. I also use my iPod Touch for on-the-go reading and writing,
Blog Software: Wordpress
Choosing your Blogging software is quite important, because it’s difficult to move smoothly from one platform to another. I use Wordpress in part because it was by far the quickest and easiest platform to get installed and running correctly.
It also has an impressive array of plugins and themes, allowing a huge amount of customisation and cool things. The admin section is well designed and relatively easy to use, and it’s not hard to get a blog going very quickly. Wordpress.com will host a blog for free – although you won’t be able to add your own plugins, and there’s very limited scope for customising your site beyond picking a theme (actually, this is probably best for most people, I’m just a geek).
Blog Reading: NetNewsWire.
Brent Simmons’ NetNewsWire, from NewsGator is, simply put, the best blog reading software ever. Having a separate feed-reader makes organising your reading, keeping up with news and blogs and more importantly separating blogs from the rest of your life so much easier. When you want to use the computer without constant distraction, just quit the newsreader.
Even better, NNW keeps read and unread items synchronised across all your computers, and the (a little feature-light) iPhone version can download unread feeds for later offline perusal. And it’s free. I believe that the closest equivalent for Windows is called FeedDemon, but I have heard it said that NetNewsWire is one of those programs that is just worth switching to a Mac for. I can believe that, if you spend a lot of time reading news.
Writing: MarsEdit and WriteRoom
Writing properly inside a text box in a browser can only work for so long. The issues are just too numerous to list. Enter MarsEdit from Red Sweater Software, which connects to your blog, allows you to keep relevant information about your blog and write offline drafts, before publishing to your blog when you’re ready. It also includes really neat and customisable shortcuts which make more complex tasks like adding Amazon Affiliate links much easier – once you’ve set it up right! Again, there’s a Windows equivalent app (which also includes a WYSIWYG Editor, which is nice) from Coding Robots, called BlogJet
On top of a simple and really useful interface, MarsEdit integrates really well with NetNewsWire, so if you read a post you like, you can grab a section and click ‘Post to Weblog’, which will make a new post with the relevant quote and a link back to the article straight away. That’s efficiency. MarsEdit works with Wordpress, Blogger, Moveable Type (and therefore TypePad), Vox, Drupal and many other blogging systems (though notably not Tumblr).
For really long posts which require serious writing (like this one), WriteRoom from Hog Bay Software offers ‘distraction-free writing’, blanking out everything on your computer and presenting a simple, clean, customisable words-only screen.
As a sidenote, I’ve started using Textile for my markup. I think it’s much more natural than writing HTML, particularly for things as simple as blog posts. Obviously it’s not like using a WYSIWYG editor, but it’s not much harder and once you get used to the syntax it’s probably quicker. You can experiment with Textile using the live preview feature on comments boxes on this site, or by following the above link.
Web Design and Management: Coda
Panic Software’s Coda is, simply put, the best web design application in existence. Effortlessly combining a HTML/PHP/Javascript editor, a CSS property editor, an SFTP client and a Terminal application, Coda also includes clever features like ‘Sites’, where you can store all sorts of information about a project including the FTP and SSH passwords and retain state information between sessions so that you can always return to where you were. It’s a dream of a program. At $79, it is the most expensive shareware program I’ve ever bought, but it was worth every penny.
Conclusion
None of these tools are strictly necessary for blogging or managing a website (except the blog software), but each of them makes the task feel less like a task and more like a fun thing to do. The other great thing about these tools is that they’re totally modular – you can use MarsEdit to write your blog, but not bother using a feed reader like NetNewsWire. You can also swap out any item on my list of tools for one that you prefer – don’t want to use WriteRoom? Use Scrivener or BBEdit or TextWrangler or even Notepad. Don’t like Wordpress? Fine, try TextPattern or ExpressionEngine or Blogger. Don’t like Mac? Well, clearly you’re just mad. The choice of systems is as unique and personal as your blog should be.
Above all, relax and stop obsessing about what tools you should use. Get back to writing, or maybe even get a life.
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