Knot My Line

During the last year or so, I started blogging a half dozen or more times on a variety of free sites.  But each time I found that I was unhappy with something.  It probably was a combination of frustration with what I was attempting and the limits of that software.   My approach to all this was to then ignore that site and then a month or so later when I got the urge again I would find a different free site and start all over.

This may have been a good thing because each site had a different way or style of blogging.   So along the way I found some approaches and techniques that appealed to me.    Also, I was gaining knowledge.   To learn more, I began following “Next Blog” tags and began to see hundreds of different blogs each with different templates and each with different content presentations.   I was learning and beginning to understand more about blogging.

A free blog site I tried was WordPress.com.   I had been reading a lot about it and used Google to search for comparisons of WordPress to other blogging software.  Since it was one of those with positive reviews, I decided to try it before several others and got stuck there.  I got stuck because I was mostly satisfied with what I was able to do.  Here I began writing somewhat more in earnest than before.

I also had found Blogger.   Here was another free tool I could use.   Because it was a Google acquisition, I felt that Blogger was going to be around for a long time and would become better and better over time.   Also, I think that it is probably a good thing for me to use two free tools.  I can learn more this way.

However, For a variety of personal reasons, I did want my own domain.  I figured that initially I could blog on it.   And, I hope I can continue to learn and eventually would use a domain for more than a blog.   At the same time what I was reading at various web sites and WordPress forums was much different than I was doing at WordPress.com.   Was I missing something?   Yes I was, I discovered that WordPress.com and WordPress.org were not the same thing.   Cool, I could use the WordPress blogging tool on my own domain.

I have friends that have blogs or web sites of their own and over the years they have encouraged me to learn this or that software.  Each time I devoted weeks to reading and exploring the software they recommended.   However, I could never get motivated enough to actually learn and begin using it.

Now, quite by accident, I had found something I felt comfortable using.  An   important point to me was that it was one of the tools that was well used and well liked.  This meant I could get some help if I dug myself a hole.  I looked around for hosting sites that offered WordPress and had positive reviews. I found many so I flipped a coin and selected BlueHost.

I signed up at BlueHost and got the domain I wanted and began doing some minor things.  But somehow, about a week later, when my IP address got assigned things got screwed up and I could not access my own domain.   It took a while to get to the right support staff.  When I did, they finally fixed the problem.   I got a whole new IP address.  I have not had a problem since.  Well, the truth is I did, but those were of my own creation or because I was making all the mistakes common to new users.  Not just one or two mistakes, but all of them.   I am now a month down the blogging road and am enjoying myself.

Recently, the Windows Live Writer Beta was announced and I began using it and haven’t stopped.   This is a great tool and I now use it for 90% of my posting.   If you have a blog, I encourage you to grab WLW and use it.   While it is still a beta product and I am looking forward to lots of improvements in the next release, it serves my needs very well.