Windows Live Writer & BlogCFC Part II

In Part I of this tutorial we took a look at why you or your customers may want to use Windows Live Writer as well as how the XML-RPC specification fits into BlogCFC. In part II I want to focus on installing the application as well as configuring it. I decided to make this a screen shot tour so you can all see exactly how the install and configuration is done and because it is such a great looking application. I am also utilizing the great imaging features that are apart of Windows Live Writer. When you insert an image you have the option of inserting the original or different sizes. I am using small because of the amount of images in this article, but you can click on each image to view the full screen shot.

1. Download the application: http://get.live.com/betas/writer_betas

2. Run The Installer

3. Installation Preferences: You can customize your installation preferences. I did not choose either of the options.

4. Installation Complete: The installation was completed successfully, time to move on to configuration.

4. Configuration - Step 1: This first step is the welcome screen and will give you the option to create a Windows Live Spaces Account. If you would like to you can set one up now but we will not be using it for this tutorial.

5. Configuration - Step 2: This step is asking for the type of weblog we are using. BlogCFC users select Another weblog service.

6. Configuration - Step 3: Here we need to setup our homepage and login. The homepage is the URL of your blog. Next you need to enter your username and password. This is needed to verify yourself for connectivity between Live Writer and your weblog.

7. Configuration - Step 4: This step just verifies your settings. If there are any problems connecting to your weblog here, you will have a chance to go back and correct your settings.

8. Configuration - Step 5: In this step we will be selecting a provider. For our BlogCFC installation we will chose the MetaWeblog API. I am pretty sure this is just the generic XML-RPC type.

9. Configuration - Step 6: This step is just verifying your settings from the previous step.

10. Configuration - Step 7: If you made it to this point that you are ready to go. The last thing you may want to do is enter a descriptive weblog name in the entry box. This makes it easy to configure multiple weblogs inside of Live Writer.

That is all there is to it. I have to say for being a guy who really does not mind publishing articles from a text area this has been a pleasing experience. I want to thank Scott Pinkston again for all his help getting this running. If you get an error while trying to publish an article, Scott found a fix for that. While he is looking into what caused it there is a quick fix. If you get any errors please leave me a comment and I will post a fix. Also I might have a Final Post coming up on this topic with more screen shots and an In depth review of the software.

Update: Scott Pinkston found a small bug. The latest version of windows live writer doesn't play well with the xmlrpc code. Haven't dug too deeply but there is a registry change that will let it work with BlogCFC.

Open regedit
Click on Edit - Find
Enter Windows Live Writer
Expand Weblogs
Should be IDs - expand those out
Find your blog and goto manifestOptions
Delete the characterSet key
Restart Windows Live Writer