Hi there.
This is my very first post from a stunning tiny – okay, not so tiny – tool named Zoundry Raven.
System Tray
One cool feature of this program is that it lets you minimize it to your system tray, and post to your blog directly from there.
Media Storage
Right now, I am trying its different features. It’s really cool and even allows you upload your post attachments to a multitude of different upload repositories – like Flickr. It also allows you to define your very own FTP server.
Spell Checking
Also, it has a native spell checker. You only have to select your desired language – if available – and allow it to download the dictionary.
Offline Content
It can manage your posts very well, and also builds a tag cloud based on your posts. While still in beta, it shows a promise of becoming a force to be reckoned with.
Rich Toolset
It also has a toolbar which makes it very much suitable for writing to WordPress weblogs.
Image Editing
It also allows you to seamlessly create thumbnails for any image you insert. A lightbox can be set to be automatically inserted into your posts for these images – however as I already have a lightbox plug-in installed for my blog, I have not put this feature into test.
Here is a preview of its automatic thumbnails:
XHTML Editor
In the XHTML tab at bottom of the screen, you find yourself face-to-face with a neat editor, which in addition to source code highlighting, features an HTML code completion toolbox.
What it lacks …
What it lacks right now is the possibility of writing an excerpt for your post. Also, sometimes it stills shows you that it is still in beta. For example, if your connection goes jerky while it is uploading a picture, it will not complaint, it only adds a messy URL to your images source attribute.
Also, when you send a task to the background, you won’t have it in sight any more, and to make sure it has finished without problems, you have to use the application’s main menu. In this regard, I would prefer something like what Eclipse does with it’s background tasks.
What’s more, as a tool designed for hardcore writers, it should put more use into the keyboard. I really don’t know why these UI engineers are so afraid of giving out a lot of shortcut keys.
Conclusion
Otherwise, I can say I am pretty excited to be posting to my blog like this. However, one thing I’m a little concerned about is the subtle way in which the homepage states the possibility of this utility becoming a shareware. On the "Software" section on Zoundry’s website you can read:
Raven (new and still free!)
It might be a misunderstanding on my part, but hey, I’m kind of paranoid about this stuff!
PS: After restarting the computer, something rather strange happened. Raven wouldn’t start and I had to reinstall it. Right now I’m not inclined to reboot again just to check if this is a real bug or not, but if I find it to happen again, I’ll report the incident here.
