Since I first started blogging, I’ve written my blog posts in Notepad. Notepad is a text editor that comes with Windows. You’ll find it in Accessories. (If you use it regularly, you can “Pin” it to your Start Menu for quick access.)
At first, I used to write my posts in Notepad because I could save them to my computer easily and it was much quicker to open up Notepad than it was a heavy word processor like MS Word. At the time, my computer was a POS.
Now, I use Notepad because it is a text editor, not a word processor. When copying it into the Wordpress editor, it doesn’t bring a bunch of messed up code along with it like word processors do.
I’ve had many clients who use different word processors to write their blog posts only to find that after they paste it into Wordpress and publish it, their blog looks all kinds of messed up.
When I go into the Edit Post page, it’s a nightmare. Open tags everywhere! One client of mine had over 50 posts like that. It’s extremely time consuming to clean it all up so it’s best to avoid that problem right from the beginning.
Here’s what it looks like in the Visual tab:
And here’s what that nasty piece of work looks like in the HTML tab:
See all that weird code in there? We don’t want that.
If you are using Microsoft Word (not to be confused with Works) and you would like to continue using it to write your blog posts in it, please use the “Paste from Word” button in your Wordpress editor.
Just click on the “Kitchen Sink” button:
And hit the “Paste from Word” button:
I would still recommend using Notepad however because I’m one of those untrusting types of people and I think that Word will still sneak in a few open tags.
What is an open tag?
Any time you format text you’re using tags. Let’s take the bold tag for example. To bold the following sentence, the HTML code would look like this:
<strong>I’m a bold sentence.</strong>
The <strong> tag is the open tag, and the </strong> tag is the closing tag.
If you don’t close a word or sentence with the </strong> tag, the rest of your text will end up bold. This won’t look very cool on your blog.
So there you have it. That’s my opinion about writing blog posts in word processors and why I cringe just thinking about it.
Chris
Anna
John Hoff - WP Bl...
Josh
Keith Davis
Luis Aveiga
Marie
8 comments ↓
I’m a Word processor user. I don’t know maybe because I’m just used to it. I used to write my article in word then paste it in notepad and past to wordpress from notepad until I upgraded my wordpress and now I paste with the “paste from word” button.
You are right about not trusting the word processor even with the ” paste from word” button. It was yesterday that I had open tags again and I used the button to paste. I always double check.
Anna´s last blog ..Making a wizard hat for my little magician
Good for you Anna! Always double check!
And smart thinking about copying to Notepad before copying to Wordpress. I used to do that as well but now I just write directly in Notepad and hand code where I want lists, bold/italics and subheaders.
Writing in notepad is a good idea, if you want to save copies to you hard drive, if you want text editors with a few extra features notepad2 and notepad++ are worth checking out. For back up purposes its good to just save a copy of your database, there are wordpress plugins to help with this if you don’t know how.
I’ve personally gotten into the habit of starting drafts directly within wordpress, I find it very convenient and I also like the auto save feature in wordpress
Wardell´s last blog ..MySpace Mail Allows One Time Name Change
I LOVE Notepad++. I use that to design websites. I also use it to clean up code for my clients. I just copy and paste each Wordpress post/page into it, then find and replace all the embedded code. Their Find/Replace feature lets you replace for every open document which kicks a lot of butt and saves a ton of time.
I really thought I was the only one who wrote in plain old reliable notepad. Word is just to big and bulky for blogging. One thing Notepad is lacking though is a word count feature.
Cindy Bidar´s last blog ..Marketing for Freelancers
Hi Cindy!
I agree, Notepad is lacking in a word count feature. BUT, if you download Notepad++ (which I am going to marry), you can write your blog posts in that instead because it does have a word count feature. Just select all the text (CTRL+A), then go to TextFX in the menu, then select TextFX Tools, then Word Count.
Very very cool program. I code websites in it but it’s also lightweight enough to write blog posts in. Just like Notepad but with some very cool extra features.
Hey, thanks for pointing out the word count feature in Notepad++. I looked (nearly) everywhere and couldn’t find it! I might never go back to Notepad now!
Cindy Bidar´s last blog ..Marketing for Freelancers
Yep, I wasn’t joking when I said I was going to marry Notepad++
I’m still geeking out over the feature that lets you Find/Replace in all open documents. What a gigantic time saver!
I’m smacking myself for not using this program sooner. I downloaded it a long time ago, thought it sucked, and promptly uninstalled it. Then a few weeks ago I figured I’d give it another shot since I was tired of having a bunch of different Notepad windows open for different stylesheets and index files, etc. Now I’m in love!
Leave a Comment