Thumbs down for Windows Live Writer

Having given Windows Live Writer a run for its money I have decided that I will not be using it. It simply fails to meet my requirements.

I run three blogs: this one, an analogous one on Blogger and my French language blog. I would therefore need a blog editor which 1. makes it easy to post an article written for WordPress to Blogger (and perhaps vice versa); 2. has both English and French spelling checkers.

I have found that if I write an article for WordPress, there is no obvious way to post this also to Blogger using WLW. I would have to copy and paste the code either from the WordPress section of WLW or from the blog to the Blogger editor. I suspect, though I haven’t checked this, that if I did this, the resulting text would not necessarily be optimized for Blogger, though I might be wrong about that.

Realizing there was no French dictionary but that there was a drop-down window in the dictionary section of the spelling checker settings, I assumed that all I had to do was to go onto the Windows Live site and download a French dictionary. I assumed wrong.

Not finding a French dictionary nor any mention of one in help, the FAQs or the user forum, I decided to email support. The reply I received was so sweet that I will quote it in full here.

Hello SilverTiger, Thank you for writing to Windows Live Writer Technical Support. My name is Alvin and I understand that you are inquiring about having a French spelling dictionary in Windows Live Writer. I realize the importance of addressing your concern. By default, the spell checker/dictionary that you will have depends on the Writer version/ language you have installed. If you downloaded the English/ US version of Writer but want to have French dictionary, then, you have to install the French version of Writer. For the instructions on how to do this, please visit: http://social.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/writergeneral/thread/ccdbddd7-8822-45bd-bcaa-0f22b11953f0/ We appreciate your continued support as we strive to provide you with the highest quality service available. Thank you for using Windows Live Writer. Sincerely, Alvin Support Specialist Windows Live Support Team

While I was tickled pink that he “realize[d] the importance of addressing [my] concern”, I had to email Alvin back telling him that he had understood half of my concern and that I required dictionaries in both English and French. I suggested that if I followed his advice, the French version of WLW would install over the English version, rendering it inaccessible.

During the night, a reply reached me. Maybe Alvin was too embarrassed to write or maybe he had gone off duty. Either way, the author of this email was a certain Geri. Geri agreed with me that the French version would merely overwrite the English version, but maybe you would like to read his/her reply for yourself:

Hello SilverTiger, Thank you for writing back to Windows Live Writer Technical Support. My name is Geri. I understand that you need both an English and a French spelling checker. SilverTiger, we currently do not have an option to install or use both different versions of Windows Live Writer to use the dictionary feature. Once you update it to a different language, you can no longer use the English language version. However, I will see to it that this concern will reach our product development team as a feature request. While I cannot provide specific details on when this feature might be included, we are always looking for opportunities to improve your Windows Live experience. Your feedback is of great help in our drive to continually improve our products and services. We appreciate your continued support as we strive to provide you with the highest quality service available. Thank you for using Windows Live Writer. Sincerely, Geri Windows Live Writer Technical Support

So my “concern” will be passed on to the product developers who will no doubt drop everything and rejig the program so as to meet my requirements, right? You may think so but I won’t be holding my breath.

To check spelling in both languages I would have to compose and check the spelling of at least one language in another editor and then copy/paste it into WLW but that would be ridiculous. What’s the point when I can compose and spell-check in both languages in my text editor? No point at all.

I would also have to fiddle with the source code in order to put captions on my photos. Yes, I could do that using tables but in that case I would have have to add a lot of extra text if I wanted to change the size of the font in the caption, for example. And what’s the point of doing that when I can do it much more easily in my text editor? No point at all.

There are a few other niggles with WLW that I won’t bother you with but which hinder rather than help me. All in all, then, this is not the tool for me and I will not be using it.

Was it a waste of time to try it, then? Not exactly: it at least allowed me to eliminate this software from consideration which, if a negative result, still has its uses. It also showed me that the way I do things, with my home-grown templates, is at least as efficient as the average blog editing software.

A visit to Hackney

Hackney Town Hall

This is where we went today. First, however, we went along to Giraffe in Essex Road for breakfast. We like having breakfast there because the staff are friendly and the food is good. It’s also handy for the bus stop for Hackney.

The present town hall, built in the 1930s is a good piece of Art Deco design. The old town hall, presumably outgrown as the borough increased in size,  is now occupied by a betting shop.

Old Town Hall

I had to photograph it from the side because the traffic on the main road made it impossible to get a proper photo from the front. The traffic was extremely heavy all afternoon.

Next to the old town hall is the church and churchyard of St John at Hackney, now rearranged as a park. In the park stands the Tower of St Augustine.

St Augustine’s Tower

Built in the 13th century, the church was dedicated to St John in 1660 and the church building itself demolished at the end of the 18th century.

The park was made by removing most of the gravestones to the wall, leaving some of the more historically interesting in place.

Tombstones stacked against the wall

Suddenly, a large flock of pigeons flew down and surrounded me. I was quite surprised and can only think that they hoped I was going to feed them.

Surrounded by pigeons

We walked on into Homerton where the church of St Barnabas has a rather unusual clock in its tower.

St Barnabas’ church tower and clock

Further along, we came upon this striking pub, built in 1915. There is an unusually fine relief of Eve offering the apple to Adam, above the pub sign. For a close-up, click here.

The Adam and Eve

We took a bus back to the centre and near the town hall discovered the fine building that houses the public library and the museum. The address seems rather appropriate for a library!

The library and museum

We visited the museum and found that photography was allowed. The emphasis is on the community, its ethnic and cultural mix, and its history. One of my favourite exhibits was this hand-pumped fire appliance.

Hand-pumped fire appliance

The museum is also currently hosting a photographic exhibition entitled Growing up Black by Dennis Morris. This material is of course copyright and photography, quite reasonably, was not allowed.

You too can take a look at the museum by watching the online Hackney Museum Virtual Tour. It starts outside but then continues inside, so keep watching! There are also “hot spots” to click on.

Hackney, of course, is where the famous Hackney Empire theatre resides, viewed here from in front of the town hall.

The Hackney Empire

The light was beginning to fade and it was spitting with rain. We went in the Old Ship for coffee and then caught the 38 bus back to Angel.

The Old Ship

This evening, as we had not put the slow cooker on, we went out for our evening meal. We went somewhere we hadn’t been for a while, to Denise’s Restaurant in Southampton Row. We had a good meal, I must say. Quite a good way to round off the day.

Captions with Windows Live Writer

It looks as though it is just about possible to have captions under pictures in posts written with Windows Live Writer. It’s a bit fiddly as it involves inserting some extra code.

The famous sculpture at St Pancras

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That might answer my needs and still allow me to use this editor.

Trying new things

Every now and again I like to try new things. Take blogging, for instance. I have never used the online editor for two reasons, firstly, it isn’t sophisticated enough for my purposes and, secondly, there is always a danger that the connection will drop or there will be some hitch on the server and all my work will be lost. That has happened to me more than once when writing comments on people’s blogs. When that happens, I am likely to give up rather than start all over again.

So how do I write my blog posts? I write them in a plain text editor using HTML tags to set the formatting and the positioning of pictures. I view the result in a Web browser as I go to check that it looks as I want it to look.

When writing a post, I first load a format text which contains all my commonly used HTML formulae, ready to be copied and modified as necessary.

This works pretty well and gives me the flexibility that I need. It can be time-consuming, however, to do everything in this hammer-and-chisel manner.

The "modern way", of course, is to use a blog editing program. I have tried a number of these and found them all wanting. If they worked and gave me the flexibility I want, then they would save me no end of time. The trouble is that these simple conditions are not met. In fact, I am surprised at how poor most of the softwares are.

The blog editing program that everyone raves about is Microsoft Live Writer, so I decided to try it. I am writing this post with it.

The pictures obviously have nothing to do with the topic I am discussing. They are there to distract you from what is no doubt a boring text and to test MLW’s image insertion abilities.

The first thing you will notice is that there are no captions. That’s a definite downer as far as I am concerned because I like to put captions on my pictures. This is not easy to do, even with HTML, but it can be done. But not with MLW, apparently. Boo.

I can of course insert the necessary HTML but if I do that, what do I need MWL for? I can as well go back to my plain text editor.

So, for now, the jury is out. I have to admit that actually writing the post is easier and quicker this way but the formatting and captioning of my pictures is important to me, and that may prove to be the killer.

The two top pictures were taken from the bus stop in front of Austen Reed in Liverpool Street. The first one looks towards the station itself and the lower one to the left at the shops and office buildings.

The bottom picture is of the Millennium Bridge (which some unkind but amusing people nickname the Wibbly Wobbly Way) and it was taken (sharp intake of breath) in February 2002. It’s practically historical!

Technorati Tags: Windows Live Writer,Liverpool Street,Millennium Bridge

A bed called Octopus

The new bed arrived today. Yesterday I received a text informing me that delivery would occur between 11:30 and 13:30 and that I would receive a telephone call one hour beforehand. How organized, I thought; and how modern!

Of course, it didn’t quite work out as they said but it was so near to it that it would be churlish to complain. I received a call at 12:45 informing me that the bed would arrive “within the hour”. It arrived at 13:29, just inside the promised deadline.

I went outside to meet the delivery man who thrust a form into my hand, saying “Sign and print, please” and disappeared again. After a few minutes he reappeared with a long thin cardboard box on his shoulder. He carried this into the bedroom and asked whether he should stand it on end or lay it flat. Flat seemed the better option.

I was about to ask him where the rest of it was when he grabbed the form off me, tore off my part, and left the house. The long thin box was apparently all there was.

I wasn’t altogether surprised. This is, after all, the Age of the Flat-pack. I’m surprised they don’t deliver you car, your fridge or your wide-screen TV as flat-packs. It’s probably only a matter of time.

I am not keen on flat-packs because, firstly, the plans are often difficult to read and, secondly, the item usually ends up wonky, no matter how carefully you put it together. However, the bed has an all-metal frame and so I assumed it would fit together nicely. I set to work straightaway.

The opening paragraphs of the instructions said “Build the bed on a perfectly flat floor.” Uh-oh, I thought. Where can you find a perfectly flat floor? Not in any house I know of and especially not in a house that was built in the Georgian era and has been converted, possibly several times.

“Leave the bolts and nuts finger tight only until the whole thing has been constructed,” advised the pamphlet. Yeah, right. I’m going to put it all together loosely and then crawl around on the floor under the bed trying to tighten up bolts that are nearly inaccessible. I decided to build the bed in sections and to tighten up after completing each one.

I managed to construct the head board and the foot board and join them together with the two side struts before it was time to go and pick Tigger up from work. That was good, firstly because by that time I felt like a rest and second because I guessed Tigger would like to take some part in the building process. OK, I’ll admit it: the later stages looked complicated and Tigger is much better than I am at working out from dodgy manuals what you have to do.

On reaching home, we set to, but were stymied straightaway: we could not find the screws we needed. We were supposed to use 36mm screws but there were none of that size. There were longer screws and shorter screws but no screws 36mm long. Then I realized that the quoted lengths were for the shafts of the screws, excluding the heads. D’oh. Now it made sense.

We eventually got it all screwed together. It rocked like a boat. The bed has four legs, one in each corner, and it also has four other legs down the middle of the bed underneath. That’s 8 legs. (Tigger already refers to it as the Octopus.)

As your friendly neighbourhood mathematician will tell you, any 3 points define a plane or, putting that in plain English, anything with three legs can stand on any floor without rocking. Add even just one more leg and you are unlikely to get a rock steady bed but with 8? No chance. We shall have to devise a system of wedges to put under one or two of the main legs. That should do it.

There is space under the bed, notwithstanding the central legs. We will be able to keep things under it. That was part of the reason for buying what is really just a modern take on the traditional iron bedstead. Sleep on top, store stuff underneath.

After more than two weeks of sleeping on a mattress on the floor, sleeping on a proper bed again will be an interesting experience.