I think a WordPress Firefox extension (add-on) would be pretty cool, I have a ton of ideas for it but I’m curious what you guys would like to see in it. What would make blogging easier for you? Any talented FF extenders who would like to take on the project and get paid?
Well, let me say that firstly I don’t think it’s necessary to make a blogging tool for Firefox; there are already several extensions like that out there, and even Flock if you want to go that route, so that’d just be overkill.
One thing I do think could use some extension love is the links manager. I think it’d be cool to be able to add links to your manager like you do on the del.icio.us extension, i.e., where you right click on a link and have the option to tag/save it.
As an extension developer myself (and FF contributor), I’d personally like to see a more generic blogging client. I considered writing one a few years ago back when I used wordpress (even made the UI), but nothing behind it.
IMHO a few ugly things:
1. Interfaces aren’t 100% equal across the board… it’s kinda messy supporting various blogging platforms.
2. Firefox is designed as a web browser, not an OS. Why another thing integrated into your browser?
Ideally, it should be xul/js based, but use XULRunner so it runs as it’s own application, but be cross platform thanks to the nature of Mozilla based applications.
Would you be thinking of something like the Performancing extension for Firefox?
First thing: decent XHTML output. I know it’s obvious, but I am so annoyed at all the other extensions that claim to provide decent markup.
Also, perhaps the ability for server-side plugins to interface with it?
I’d be interested in working on this. So far I’ve only made one extension (Squidoo’s official extension), so I may not be talented enough to make something like the Performancing extension by myself (if that’s the kind of blogging extension that you’re thinking of). If you’re thinking of something simpler than that, or you’re looking for a collaborative effort, I would be very interested in lending my programming skills.
The only thing that’s been stopping me from using editors outside the dashboard has been the lack of a way to work with plugins that add functionality. For example, I use Ultimate Tag Warrior for tagging on my blog, so if I were to write the actual entry in a third-party editor, I would still have to go back into the dashboard to apply tags and such via its post editor.
Also, although a lot of editors seem to do their own HTML generation, so that’s a bit of a problem with me using Textile for formatting posts. If the extension didn’t force its own HTML generation on me and just let Textile do its thing, that’d be great.
Yeah that would be pretty cool 🙂
If you’re talking about a blogging client extension, then the one thing that I absolutely must have is support for additional post fields that plugins add… there’s no point in me blogging from a local client if I don’t have support to add my UTW tags, or be able to check that RunPHP checkbox, etc.
I would love to see an extension that after I have highlighted some text on a page I could right-click and select “Save as draft post…” This would grab the text/links/images selected and paste it into a post with a cite link back to the webpage I got the text from. Then save that post as a draft, this way next time I log into WordPress I have the saved post waiting for me.
Check out a Firefox plugin called Performancing. It works with several blog programs, including WordPress.
I used it for a while, but ultimately I work my blog from different computers, and this stores too much locally. Other than that it might be exactly what you’re looking for.
http://performancing.com/firefox
Funny, when I have a PressIt bookmark in my Firefox Bookmark Toolbar. I don’t remember where I found it, but I’ve had it since I first started using WP and all I have to do is click it from a website and I can blog it in a jiffy from a popup window. Is this what you’re thinking of?
What would it do? There’s already extensions like Performancing for composing stuff. I guess you could build in some administrative stuff, but the WP admin is so clean as it is – what would the extension get you? I guess it might be neat to have a status bar widget that had some vital stats updated every hour or so (page views, comments, links, etc.)
Maybe I’m old school, but I really like wp-admin. Not sure having some subset of it spliced into an extension sidebar/pane would gain me much over using the real deal.
Um… Wasn’t that the point of the failed (flailing?) Flock browser?
http://flock.com/tour/blogging/
Get a branded version of Performancing? Done.
Hey, great idea Matt ;>
I don’t think it would really be necessary because of Performancing. Dashboard speed improvements would be great though. I find myself going to http://m.wordpress.com sometimes just to get off a really quick post.
I wish a FF extension which permit me to do what I am doing with Contribute 4.0.
Contribute 4.0 give me a really powerful wordpress editor which often help me in some situations.
IMHO, Flock is too simple and it doesn’t permit to export my preferences in html format; Performance is ugly.
Good point, but then FF will be cluttered with all this exetensions e.g. delicio/squidoo…
I’m curious what you’ve got in mind, but the wp-admin + Copy as HTML Link is all I ever really need.
I’m happy with Performancing at the moment. – Although you could make it easier for new bloggers on the wp.com platform
I think that it would be similar to Performancing, but with all the options of WordPress interface.
I wouldn’t even use a WordPress/Firefox extension. I don’t use any of the blogging extensions that are already out there. It’s just as easy for me to always leave tabs open to my various dashboards and have simple full access to everything that way. The Firefox tab system is, for me, already the least common denominator and the simplest technique for managing my blogs.
would you pay me Matt for being both a WordPress anf FF USER? 🙂
One incredibly simple option you might want to consider would be a client-side version of the wp-admin interface fed by XML from the database. I expect it would take some WP upgrades to get everything necessary hooked up, but I’d certainly use it if it was made. All the functionality with none (or at least much less) of the waiting. 🙂
We’ve offered to build you a WordPress only version of Performancing Firefox a couple of times, why not take us up on the offer Matt?
I don’t see any need for anything new alongside Performancing. It’s pretty solid. Sure, Performancing could do with a few bits added in but it’s relatively early days yet.
Performancing is great, with the exception that it doesn’t allow you to edit what you’ve already entered. Too many times in the past, I’ll click the submit button, only to realize that I haven’t set a link, mistyped a word, etc. It’d be nice to have an extension that allows you to actually pull up something you’ve written, make changes, then resubmit it to your site.
I’ve never understood why people can’t go to their admin screen. I see all these “blog from your browser” advertisements yet don’t I blog from my browser in wordpress?
Matt, you’ve got some potential here, but as some folks have mentioned – a few other options exist. No existing option fully meets the needs of the WP community. That is, none is capable of integrating with plugins, eg. UTW, or addressing the unique points in WP’s functionality, eg. each blogging software uploads images differently.
There’s room for such a plugin or standalone publisher, but its got to really excel past Performancing and the standalone crowd to make waves. If you can figure out WP plugin integration (maybe give a plugin a way on install to expand the FF plugin) and get some advanced features in there… then you’ve got something.
Would a public discussion of a feature set be helpful?
I found a real treasure tool if you blog.It’s name is Windows Live Writer. This beta software from Microsoft allows a blogger to post to their blog offline and is basically as easy as using a word processor such as Word. It is a true WYSIWYG editor that handles all the code complexities for you so you don’t have to fuss with them. It also comes with alot of fun image editing toys and a map tool to boot! Here’s a video of it in action. [link] It also comes with an image tool that takes care of all your picture uploading too! Best of all, IT’S FREE! I love free.. as in beer of course.
Windows Live Writer is really cool but it works only with Windows, for this the reason I use Contribute 4.0 .
I believe that a WP-FF extension will have a sense only if improves a lot the TinyMCE editor.
I do not use an extension which the same things of opening a tab with WP Dashboard.
Chris — you can, actually, edit what you’ve already published in Performancing for Firefox. Your articles are found under the “History” tab on the far right. If you edit something, you can “publish as edit” to update.
Matt — the only thing missing from Performancing for Firefox as as I’m concerned? Excerpts.
Matt, you should get in touch with the developers of Deepest Sender, an in-browser weblog editing client.
It began as a LiveJournal-only tool, but now supports Blogger and WordPress.
I’ve tried using the Performancing plugin and it’s decent, but I’m really looking for something that would utilize the UTW functions and special plugins that blogs have.
I think a FF extension is a great idea.
Last time I checked, there is already one for wordpress.com:
http://ruffcode.wordpress.com
I’ve just found Performancing, and it looks liek a good tool, but I’ve not tried it enough for long enough to make a firm opinion on it yet.
I use Blogdesk, Desktop blog editor. It got inbuilt spellchecker & dictionaries. Autosave posts every minute. Local Images that you use in post are automatically uploaded via ftp, you can easily switch between wysiwyg and source editor …many more cool features…
Wow, lots of people with something to say on this… so here’s my input as well:
1. Generic blogging clients try to do too much most of the time and don’t necessarily fit every blogging platform that well. Semagic, for example, is imo one of the best LJ blogging clients, and it does support WordPress now, but I’d never recommend it for WordPress.
2. I’d personally love to see a WordPress-specific client (I’ve gone over the idea time and time again myself) and I don’t know why anyone would be opposed to it. Tighter integration with the WordPress implementation of xmlrpc would be key as well as some possible changes/workarounds to make functionality with popular plugins (such as UTW) be almost as usefu/accessible as they are from the admin screen.
3. Not that there’s anything wrong with having a FF ext. as that would be great, but why limit it like that? People are forgetting there are programs outside the browser window as it is. Desktop client would be a larger priority I would think and a FF ext could always follow.
4. As lots of people brought up Performancing, others mentioned xhtml output, and I know very well from my meetup group in NYC where the majority of end users would run into trouble… Performancing is well, abysmal, and causes very large problems for people using the wysiwyg mode. Try it out by doing a few simple things, deleting a few, adding a few more… now go into the code view and see the disgusting mess that’s been left behind. Then people don’t understand why their blog is screwed up after using it. I can illustrate the problem in two steps.
Xinha-type solutions are better and are suited more for very specific circumstances… I’m thinking theme writers could easily include styles that would be loaded into your desktop-based wp client on sync and instead of using just the usual inline ugly markup, actual CSS specific to the theme would be used for the wysiwyg code output. Of course then the problem becomes switching themes and being stuck with markup specific to a different one, so there might have to be a semantic class api for such a thing, a workaround, or some other solution my fizzling brain doesn’t want to bother trying to think about at the moment.
The other big thing that goes along with that is image management. A lot of end users find WP’s image mangement features to be severely lacking and there aren’t any real workable solutions (aside from commercial ones) that will get the job done for them. With a wp-specific desktop client, it should be easy to correct that as long as it’s kept in mind.
5. If it does by some miracle happen in the form of a desktop client, ideally it would be a small, portable (no installation/registry stuff necessary), and cross-platform… oh, and open-source of course. 😉
Jason
Why has nobody mentioned an “Add this link to my blogroll” button? I would love to see that in the right-click menu.
One thing Flock got right was integrating the blogging experience into the browser by letting you save multiple Web Clips containing quoted text, links, pictures, etc. If you use the rich text visual editor, then rich text copying (including links) is very easy, too.
Another super-useful one would be some sort of status bar that notified me of new comments or pingbacks in near-real time (instead of email). This can easily be accomplished with one AJAX request. Maybe even let me mark them as spam right there as well? I also think it would be cool to be able to edit multiple posts at once – i.e. add or remove a category (or tag) from all the selected posts. If you are going to make a desktop app, do the things that are difficult in the browser. Maybe make a web clip area for new tag ideas.
Like, I’m reading an article and I see a word that jumps out at me, like “Travel” or “Viral”. Then I think to myself “I have a couple of posts I could tag as Travel”, but I don’t do it right away because I’m reading something.
How about a reminder that a scheduled post is about to go public? Give me a warning so I can give it a once-over before it goes to ping-o-matic and my loyal subscribers?
Lastly, everyone loves graphs. Example: the trademark Automattic blog post calendar timeline thing at the bottom of this page. Think about it.
1. Custom fields. A great number of plugins work with this, but not clients. It must be done.
2. Work with photos and tumbs. Set equal directories for local and server images for fast work (with same images of course).
3. Support draft, private and publish.
4. Support list of custom css styles (user-defined) and user-defined html construcrions (as Firefox BBCODE “additional tags”).
5. Auto excerpts filling as option.
6. Simple localization support.
7. Html highlight.
+1 on private post. I like to make journal notes for my self as well.
Personally…I’d love a yahoo widget for this.
But I’m weird.
As long as it takes up no more screen space. With all the extensions/toolbars I am using, its almost time for a bigger screen.
Support for editing WordPress *Pages* in addition to WordPress *Posts*