Qumana's Corner

Thursday, 20 July 2006

How Qumana Changes Blogging Work Habits
Topic: Blog Editor

Here's how I used to do things before I started using Qumana regularly:

I'd be browsing, and I'd be reading something which triggered a thought and then the desire to blog about it.

I'd leave the page, open my blog page, go to "Post New Entry", which would take me to the blog software's editor (which had taken me a while to learn).

Then, I'd put in a title, and maybe write a sentence or two. I usually quote an excerpt from what I have been reading, so I would have to go back to the web page I was on previously, highlight the excerpt, and then go back to the blog software editor .. where I would paste what I copied.

Then, I write some more to flesh out the post. And then, if I wanted to include some links, I'd have to start the round trips back and forth between the web pages where I would copy the links, then go back to the blog software editor and type in all the <a href> tags, and any WYSIWYG effects such as italics or bold, etc.

And THEN, on top of all that, I would have to preview and proof read, because I am not a hugely accurate typist.

AND THEN ... what if I wanted to include Technorati tags ? I still don't know how to include Technorati tags in a Blogware blog post using the Blogware editor.

Lots of work, demanded lots of concentration ...

Now, using Qumana ... here are my newly developed blogging work habits:

I'm browsing, and I read something which triggers a thought and the desire to create a blog post around the quote.

I highlight what I want to quote, drag and drop it onto the DropPad .. double-click on the DropPad, which opens the Qumana editor.

I add a title, I write some text to flesh out the post. I go back to the quoted page, or surf to another page (leaving the editor open), copy the URL of the links I want to include, go back to Qumana, use the Insert Link function to create the links (it's just pasting the URL into the dialog box).

There' still some back and forth, but it's much easier because the Qumana editor window is open just "over there" on the left.

There's spellchecking, so the final review is much easier (for me).

Tags ? Click on The Insert tags button, type in the Technorati tags you want to include, and click OK. That's it, that's all.

Adding images and video clips is easy .. and will get easier still in the future (it's one of the things we are working on).

If you're a blogger that wants to use advertising on her or his blog, that's easy too .. but just because it's a function available to you in Qumana doesn't mean you HAVE to use that functionality.

I'd never go back to the way I used to compose blog posts ... no way.