How To Post To Your Weblog

There are always a few nuances to everything - this is a computer, right?  That said, I will show you the simplest, quickest and most painless way to post an entry to your weblog.

When your local weblog home page has launched in Radio, you will see a text-entry area just below the title of your weblog. You can enter text directly into this area;

Do you notice the 'WYSIWYG' and 'Source checkboxes? Herein lies a tale about Internet Explorer, Netscape and the Internet. It is a tale you can't afford to miss to understand Radio. Consult What Is The Difference Between WYSIWYG and Source Editing for enlightenment?

Let's Post

In the remainder of this topic, I assume that you are running Internet Explorer under Microsoft Windows:

1. Place your mouse inside the Internet Explorer text entry area on your weblog home page and click once. This will give you a blinking cursor within the text window.

2. Write.

3. Keep writing.

4. Write until you are done with your first post.

5. Are you done yet? For fun, let's assume your first post looked this:

You can select text and apply formatting just as you would in any WYSIWYG-style word processing program. See How To Enter Text Into Your Weblog for a bit more information on text editing than is given here.

6. Click the "Post to Weblog" button  underneath the text entry area.

That's it. You now have an official weblog.

Your first post will be displayed just below that text entry window as shown below. The time it was posted will be shown. You will also see an 'edit' label to the right of the post.

If you click on 'Edit' (now or next year, Radio doesn't care), you will see your post redisplayed in the text entry window where you can change it freely - and then republish it.

Under the covers, your copy of Radio automatically broadcasts your post to the Community Server (also termed the "Public Website").  That server publishes your local (or desktop) post to your public weblog there. This process is called 'upstreaming. 

That weblog will mirror the one on your own local computer.

You Now Know All You Need To Know

While this barely scratches the surface of what you can do with Radio, it is vital that I re-emphasize this point:

You cam maintain a weblog day after day, year after year, simply by repeating what you have just done. No additional technical knowledge is required.

True, you will probably find this somewhat limiting (after all, why not do more with Radio?) but you don't have to.

This is why Userland claims - justifiably - that you have just been given the power to publish your thoughts around the world in the simplest manner possible.

Congratulations! You are now a blogger.

(If you are a glutton for punishment, try Talking Terms for a peek at some of the jargon we bloggers have come to know and love.)