Mars Edit 2.1
I used to use an application called Ecto to post to my blog but since Wordpress update to 2.2 it’s been possible to ‘tag’ your posts, hence the tag cloud on the right. Ecto hasn’t been updated in a while and so it doesn’t include any sort of tag field and so I’d have to publish the post from Ecto, switch to Flock and point that to my blog and add the tags there. Since it was quicker to just write the post in Flock then, I stopped using Ecto but I have always been on the lookout for another desktop application for blogging that will give me the ability to add tags. Enter Mars Edit 2.1.
Mars Edit was one of the apps I looked at when I was looking around for a desktop blogging app in the first place. I played around with it for a while and it was good but Ecto was cheaper so I went with that. Now that I’m not looking around I’ve delved further into Mars Edit and I have to say so far I’m impressed. In only 10 minutes I’ve set up a live preview window that shows me exactly how my post will look when I publish it. Even now as I type, on my other monitor the window continues to add the text and show exactly how it will appear. Sure it took a bit of manual effort but nothing too difficult considering the final result. However I’m wondering how it will hold up when/if I change themes. But I’ll cross that bridge when/if I come to it…
It handles image uploads pretty well too. I use a plugin called Lightbox to overlay images instead of you click and it opens a new window, that really annoys me so I found a way around it. The image isn’t show in the post window, just the HTML. To see how the image looks you need to head over to that handy little preview window and there you can see if it fits or what not. Also cool is that you can add photos from your Flickr account so next time I make a blog post about some photos I’ve taken, I no longer need to upload one of the images again to my blog. Nifty huh?
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