I have to admit that I’m happy with myself for sticking with Ubuntu even through the frustrating bits. I’ve managed to work out a solution for just about every problem that I have faced so far. With that being said, here is something that is irritating me:

There is not a single decent up to date blog post writer/editor (or whatever you want to call the program type) for Linux. On Windows I was using Windows Live Writer, and yes it has a lot of amazing features – but how is it that NOTHING on Linux even has the basic functions to post properly to a WordPress blog?

How dare I say such a thing on twitter or I get “helpful” comments about how I’m wrong and how there are some great programs for Linux and blogging. Let’s go over a few, shall we? Remember, I’m talking about LINUX ONLY – Firefox addons and other various options not included in this list.

KBlogger: This one showed promise when I first opened it. Then it crashed. And again. And again. And again. If you handle it VERY LIGHTLY and also remember not to import any pictures, it might not crash for a while. Then if you can finally post with it, IT DOESN’T SUPPORT TAGS FOR WORDPRESS. It also fails to give the option for a custom slug. Between the crashing and the lack of options, no thanks.

BloGTK: This one might have been great back when it was being properly updated and worked on. Personally I can’t even manage to open the program – it crashes immediately. I can get the errors from the console and a quick Google search shows plenty of other people with the same experience. Looking into it, the program is outdated anyway. The next update (BloGTK 2.0) will be available “eventually” and it has been that way for a long time.

Drivel: Another program that showed promise, but when I opened it I discovered that it didn’t have WordPress available as an option directly. Once I logged in, I quickly discovered that it had no options for tags, categories, or a custom slug. At least this one didn’t crash on me! Another quick Google search brought up the fact that this one has not been worked on since 2006. That would explain the lack of features!

There are some other options available, but these three are the main ones. The other options are a lot more simple (such as gnome-blog and tomboy blogposter) and for that I will cut them some slack – they weren’t designed for heavy usage.

Having typed all of that, let me say that I realize there are some good cross-platform options available. ScribeFire for Firefox is a great example! The problem with that is that there should be something available FOR Linux users specifically. There are tons and tons of great opensource applications available, so why isn’t there just one good one for blogging? I’m not looking for something that is as featured as Windows Live Writer (though if one becomes available, I WANT IT!), and I’m not comparing programs TO Windows Live Writer. I just want something fully functional.

With all of the great programmers making tons of tetris and pacman remakes (among other duplicate programs) for Linux, you’d think somebody would bother to work on a useful (and up to date) blogging application.

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Filed under: Blogging
Tags: « Blogging • Linux • Ubuntu • WLW »
by N.G. Woosh