Every now and then a little change is good. As you may be aware, many of my blog posts stopped appearing. The reason is the software that I tested simply did not fill the bill for my standards.
Some of the considerations that I gave to the software were:
Ease of posting information – There is a difference between working on your local system as opposed to working on the server. For instance, usually a local copy of whatever you’re doing runs faster on your personal system at home even though the same task can be accomplished working online within your browser.
Quickly linking to other sources – Working directly on the server requires one to either open another browser window or tab and then go to a particular website for information that you might want to incorporate into your post for linking purposes. Although not a real problem because I usually have several browser windows open, each with multiple tabs showing information, it does become a bit of a pain shifting from one browser window to another when, say, ten of them are sitting in the tray at the bottom of your screen.
Connecting to the Server from a local copy of your blogging software. This is a major problem for many people who are using a Microsoft based operating system. One cannot easily install, for example, a copy of WordPress (WP) in a Vista or earlier operating system without major modifications because WordPress is based on a language called php. No version of a Microsoft based operating system can interpret that language – Microsoft has used, for several years, asp and asp.net and only recently over the last few years, incorporated java.
Much of the blog software out there that is available does not use asp or the net framework.
At this point I must point out that Microsoft produces a program called Windows Live Writer (WLW). It is a nice little program that allows you to set up a blog (or connect to one that you already have running) and post entries. I, who has used Microsoft software since the first version of DOS appeared, actually started a blogging site with it and it seemed to work ok – at least for a while anyway. Then it decided to give me problems when I shifted over to Vista. Thus, one of the reasons I stopped entries. Windows Live Writer is a FREE program that you can download!
Other than the problems mentioned above, there were some other things that had problems. The first major problem dealt with something called themes. There are many sorts of themes out there and a sizeable number of them are free. I like free, do you? Sometimes WLW would not recognize a specific theme or simply altered the appearance of the theme for whatever reason – I suspect the css file was not interpreted correctly.
So, how does one make all this stuff work with the least amount of work and problems?
What to do on the server…
Your hosting company will allow you access to your account either via the web or ftp. For the most part you’ll use the ftp for transferring files over to the server. I’m not going to address that here.
The part that concerns us is installing two pieces of software. First, you need to ask if your host has php installed on the server. If they tell you no, we have iis6 or iis7 installed, then ask them to install it for your account. You need php to run WP.
After php is installed, you’ll need to have WP installed. Usually one phone call can accomplish both installs for you.
During the install of WP you’ll need to tell the install software where you are setting up your blog i.e. what the name is of the subdirectory off the root. Pick a name – any name will do for now.
The install program will create any directories that it needs to run WP on the server. Make note somewhere (on paper) exactly where you set this up.
Login as admin right away and change the password. Write your new password on a piece of paper and put it in a safe place.
Logout and then login using your new password.
At this point, you might like to create a new user – the name you’re going to use for all your writing. Give yourself admin permission so that you can do everything as a administrator without logging out of your account and then logging back in as the admin.
Go pick a theme you like. You’ll find this under "Appearance" –> Add New Theme.
Install the new theme.
What to do at home…
You’re almost ready to start blogging. The next step is pretty simple.
Download WLW and install it.
When you run the program you’ll be presented with a series of windows that will help you set up your blog. You can modify things later, if you choose. Play around with the menu items, specifically, the Blogs menu item. As a subset of that menu item, you have "Add Blog Account". This allows you to create another connection to a blog that you already have online somewhere or create a new connection.
Once you finish this connection, you should see your new theme in WLW. Begin writing and enjoy. You can can do things from your home computer and publish them to a WP blog.
I hope this helps someone out there.