Windows Live Writer, developed by Microsoft

Microsoft

Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...

, is a desktop blog-publishing application that is part of the Windows Live

Windows Live

Windows Live is the collective brand name for a set of services and software products from Microsoft, part of their software plus services platform. A majority of these services are Web applications, accessible from a browser, but there are also client-side binary applications that require...

 range of products. It features WYSIWYG

WYSIWYG

WYSIWYG is an acronym for What You See Is What You Get. The term is used in computing to describe a system in which content displayed onscreen during editing appears in a form closely corresponding to its appearance when printed or displayed as a finished product...

 authoring, photo-publishing and map-publishing functionality, and is currently compatible with Windows Live Spaces

Windows Live Spaces

Windows Live Spaces was Microsoft's blogging and social networking platform. The site was originally released in early 2004 as MSN Spaces to compete with other social networking sites, and re-launched in 2006 as a part of a shifting of community services away from the MSN brand...

, SharePoint blogs, Blogger, LiveJournal

LiveJournal

LiveJournal is a virtual community where Internet users can keep a blog, journal or diary. LiveJournal is also the name of the free and open source server software that was designed to run the LiveJournal virtual community....

, TypePad

TypePad

TypePad is a blogging service from company Say Media . Originally launched in October 2003, TypePad is based on Six Apart's Movable Type platform, and shares technology with Movable Type such as templates and APIs, but is marketed to non-technical users and includes additional features like...

, WordPress

WordPress

WordPress is a free and open source blogging tool and publishing platform powered by PHP and MySQL. It is often customized into a content management system . It has many features including a plug-in architecture and a template system. WordPress is used by over 14.7% of Alexa Internet's "top 1...

, Telligent Community, PBlogs.gr, JournalHome, the MetaWeblog API

MetaWeblog

The MetaWeblog API is an application programming interface created by software developer Dave Winer that enables weblog entries to be written, edited, and deleted using web services....

, the Movable Type API

Movable Type

Movable Type is a weblog publishing system developed by the company Six Apart. It was publicly announced on September 3, 2001; version 1.0 was publicly released on October 8, 2001. On 12 December 2007, Movable Type was relicensed as free software under the GNU General Public License...

, Blogengine, Squarespace

Squarespace

Squarespace is a web publishing company that sells a software publishing platform and file server service to individuals and businesses, providing them the tools and assistance to create and maintain well-designed websites...

 and all blogs that support RSD (Really Simple Discoverability)

Really Simple Discovery

Really Simple Discovery is an XML format and a publishing convention for making services exposed by blog, or other web software, discoverable by client software....

.

Windows Live Writer introduces the Provider Customization API that enables both rich customization of Windows Live Writer's behavior as well as the opportunity to add new functionality to the product. Currently Windows Live Spaces

Windows Live Spaces

Windows Live Spaces was Microsoft's blogging and social networking platform. The site was originally released in early 2004 as MSN Spaces to compete with other social networking sites, and re-launched in 2006 as a part of a shifting of community services away from the MSN brand...

, WordPress

WordPress

WordPress is a free and open source blogging tool and publishing platform powered by PHP and MySQL. It is often customized into a content management system . It has many features including a plug-in architecture and a template system. WordPress is used by over 14.7% of Alexa Internet's "top 1...

, and TypePad

TypePad

TypePad is a blogging service from company Say Media . Originally launched in October 2003, TypePad is based on Six Apart's Movable Type platform, and shares technology with Movable Type such as templates and APIs, but is marketed to non-technical users and includes additional features like...

 have all taken advantage of this API to expose additional service-specific features within Windows Live Writer.

Windows Live Writer is currently available in 48 different languages.

History

Windows Live Writer is based on Onfolio Writer , a product Microsoft obtained from Microsoft's acquisition of Onfolio. The final release of version 2008 was released on November 6, 2007. There are numerous changes from previous builds that are obvious on first run in this version, including:

• New Authoring Capabilities, including inline spell checking, table editing, ability to add categories, page authoring for WordPress
  WordPress
  WordPress is a free and open source blogging tool and publishing platform powered by PHP and MySQL. It is often customized into a content management system . It has many features including a plug-in architecture and a template system. WordPress is used by over 14.7% of Alexa Internet's "top 1...
  
   and TypePad
  TypePad
  TypePad is a blogging service from company Say Media . Originally launched in October 2003, TypePad is based on Six Apart's Movable Type platform, and shares technology with Movable Type such as templates and APIs, but is marketed to non-technical users and includes additional features like...
  
  , support for excerpts and extended entries, improved hyperlinking and image insertion, and a new "Paste Special" function
• Improved Integration, including SharePoint 2007 support, new APIs enabling custom extensions by weblog providers, automatic synchronization of local and online edits, integration with Windows Live Gallery
  Windows Live Gallery
  Windows Live Gallery was a part of Windows Live range of services. It was a center for gadgets, extensions and add-ons for Windows and Windows Live services.Windows Live Gallery was officially retired on October 1, 2011.-History:...
  
  , and support for "Blogger Labels"
• New User Interface, including a brand new design and improved accessibility and keyboard support

Windows Live Writer version 2009 was released on December 15, 2008 as part of the Windows Live Essentials

Windows Live Essentials

Windows Live Essentials is a suite of freeware applications by Microsoft that aims to offer integrated and bundled e-mail, instant messaging, photo-sharing, blog publishing, security services and other Windows Live entities...

 suite. On June 24, 2010, a beta version of Windows Live Writer "Wave 4" was released to the public, featuring the new Ribbon

Ribbon (computing)

In GUI-based application software, a ribbon is an interface where a set of toolbars are placed on tabs in a tab bar. Recent releases of some Microsoft applications have embraced this form with a modular ribbon as their main interface. The Ribbon is a contextual interface that offers functionality...

user interface. On September 30, 2010 the final version of Windows Live Writer 2011 was released.

External links

• Windows Live Writer
• Windows Live Writer Blog