I am sure that by now most of you out there who are in the know of popular offline weblogging tools would probably know that there is a new beta release, v. b5, of Qumana ready for download. In case you haven’t seen it just yet, Jon Husband also created a great weblog post over at the Qumana Blog titled Qumana – A New Release where you would be able to read what some of the different new features are ranging from a couple of bug fixes, like the freezing of the screen while moving a picture around in the editor, or the (in)famous issue with the blockquote, to some really nifty and lovely features like the availability of fonts (Something I was missing very much given that other offline weblogging tools provided such functionality already) and a new Insert HTML… button that will certainly help along the lines when sharing HTML snippets for video clips (Like YouTube‘s, for instance) or whatever other web-based objects, whatever those may well be. Yes, indeed, a really worth while upgrade, to say the least. I am impressed.
In the past you would remember how I have been weblogging several times about my adoption of Qumana as one of my preferred default offline weblog tools (The other main one would be w.bloggar, which, by the way, I am not sure what happened to it but the official web site is currently down at the moment. It has been for the last few days…) and I must say that with this new release it is actually going to continue being the case. Even now more so, if w.bloggar is bound to disappear?!? (Let’s hope not). Either way, a couple of folks have actually been contacting me to ask me a question similar to what Jon also weblogged about over at Qumana – A New Release. What were my thoughts about the availability of Windows Live Writer?
Well, of course, before I could share my thoughts about it I had to download it and give it a try, which I did, and it took me exactly about 10 minutes to uninstall it again ! Ouch! Yes, I know, you would probably think that was way too fast, right? Yes, indeed, it surely was. After configuring it for the first time and having a look into the user interface and the ease of use when posting a weblog post I decided it was not meant for me. Too bulky, too clunky, too slow (Qumana sets up your weblog in a matter of seconds, Windows Live Writer just doesn’t), not very user friendly and still way back in its making. Basic features like working with tags, or working your way through pictures from other systems, or just something so simple as to connect with Roller is just not happening. At least, from my end, which I find a bit disappointing thinking that one of my weblogs is hosted in a Roller weblogging engine server. Sigh.
It may well be a good first attempt for its first beta version but having used Qumana (Or even w.bloggar for that matter) for a few months now switching over to Windows Live Writer is like going several steps backwards, something that I am not sure I would want to go through at this point in time. Qumana just fits in my needs perfectly all right and for as long as it does no matter what else would come up out there it would still be a winner. Right now and perhaps over the next few months, specially if they keep up the pace of releasing new upgrades packed with new features like they are doing lately. A big thumbs up for the Qumana developers!
Keep up the good work in delivering an impressive ease of use for offline weblogging tools because I very doubt there is anything much better than that for Windows than Qumana at this point in time, at least, for me. Kudos to Qumana!
Tags: Qumana, w.bloggar, Windows Live Writer, Roller, Blogging Tools, Offline Blogging Tools, Metablogging
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