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After gathering all your information through Newsfire and formulating the post in your head, it’s time to take that idea and put it on “paper.” Writing can be the hardest for those that are not used to writing on a regular basis, and writing via the online tools like Blogger and Wordpress may not be what that person needs. Even if you are a great writer, sometimes you have ideas you want to put down and an online connection is just not something you can find at the moment. Sure you can open Microsoft Word and take matters into your own hands, but there is an alternative.
A very popular tool that I use a regular basis and one that I’m using right now is called Ecto. Ecto is an offline blog writing application that allows you to have all the tools that a standard blog application would have, except you do not rely on an internet connection. The application is intuitive, easy to use, and once set up (which you do need an internet connection for), Ecto is yours to create with.
For starters, once you’ve installed Ecto you will be asked to go through a series of steps to add your blog or blogs to the application. The system is fairly easy to follow as you are guided through all the steps.
Notice the window above, Assistant is what you want to click to start your additions, and as you can see above, I’ve added just four of the sites that I write for. Once you’ve taken care of your accounts and you’re ready to write, you can close this window, and you will be greeted with another window listing your blog sites and the uploaded articles that currently reside on that site.
It’s a great way to keep track of all the articles you’ve written. The screen shot below will show that I currently have Lost in Technology selected and my one post that I am typing this very moment.
The options above the pane are where you will run most of your options. You can select new to start a new blog post, publish once you are done, and because you’ve already set your pre-set blogs, it will upload on the one that is selected in dark grey at the time of hitting publish. You can also view the site by clicking the “View in Browser” button to see what your post looks like now that it has been uploaded to the site.
Up to now, Ecto has been your one stop shop for everything offline. The benefit of being offline is because online sites may lose signal or something can happen where the site is no longer saving your progress. You could lose parts of the post or the entire post all together. It can be devastating, as it’s happened to me on several occasions.
This is not something you have to worry about with Ecto, because it’s offline. It saves when you choose for it to be saved, and if you lose the internet connection, no worries, you’re offline application will stay with you and not publish until you are ready. To get an idea of what the writing pane looks like, see below:
Take notice that on the left hand side are the categories that the uploaded blog already has in place, so it makes it easy for you to select and be aware of just where you are categorizing your article. At the top you have a variety of choices, but most interesting are the Amazon and Flickr buttons. You can include anything from Amazon or Flickr from within Ecto.
This, of course, does depend on an internet connection. But I especially love the Flickr option because I’ve been so used to having another tab open just so that I can jump back and forth finding just the right photo for my post. This is no longer an issue.
At the bottom left hand side you also have some unique options available to you. The first is the ability to disable comments. With one press your post will not allow anyone to make a comment on it, while that might seem heavy handed, perhaps wise with posts that might stir controversy.
The next is the allowance for trackbacks, but the last is the most important. The last is the announcement tool which looks like the “volume” button on most computers. This will send out announcements when your article has been published and is a great way to get some advertising for your site without having to lift a finger.
Overall this final tool is a necessary one for me. I find that I interact with it much better than the online posting tools. Because it’s offline I do not have to worry about accidentally losing my post, or not having it saves as a draft. For now, Ecto is in version 3.0 and available for 10.5 and above. You can find later versions of the application for older versions of the MAC OS.
You are allowed to play with Ecto for a limited time, but then there is a $17.95 charge for the application, which is a one time charge for a lifetime of ease. I think it’s worth, it, but I’m interested to hear what other MAC fans are using out there.
Make sure to stay tuned for Tool #3!
Luis Sandoval is a media professional and consultant who shares his insights on social media and technology on his blog The Daily Slackr.
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I think a good number of people (particularly code-literates) would swear by MarsEdit. It doesn’t have a visual mode (I think), but is otherwise excellent.
I evaluated both ecto and MarsEdit, and I know arguing them is like arguing religion or politics. However, I too found ecto to be my preferred app. Lately, I have been looking at Blogo which looks awesome! I don’t think it was available when I was picking between the other two. It’s a little pricier, but I have to admit the interface is very seductive.
http://www.drinkbrainjuice.com/blogo