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10 of the Best Mac Apps for Bloggers
November 28, 2008 - 11:31 am PDT - by Paul Glazowski 35 Comments
Most bloggers today are familiar only with services designed for use with their choice of web browser. If you edit a WordPress.com account or WordPress.org installation, chances are you login and publish your material through the cloudware provided.The same goes for Blogger and TypePad users, and as well as options like MySpace and Vox. But if you’ve grown tired of those standard frontends, and would prefer to utilize software to blog for work or for personal enjoyment, there are alternatives that you should know about. For Mac users in particular, there are several that prove as useful, powerful, and visually worthwhile as any comparative webware.
Here we present our best discoveries. Share your suggestions in the comments, too!
Flock
People conditioned to regard their Web browser as their de facto “blogware” will likely warm to Flock fairly quickly. You might say that’s because Flock is a browser as well. Its foundation is the Mozilla platform. The joy in using Flock and all that it grants easy access to is that it’s built for the social web. You can network and share photos and cool web pages with little effort. And, yes, you can blog, all while navigating the web just as you ordinarily would.
MarsEdit
One of the most celebrated of publishing utilities for Mac OS X users, MarsEdit, now in version 2.2.2, is not a free package. Its cost is $29.95 after a free 30-day trial. But a common refrain heard by users is that the more often it is employed the more the price is so clearly justified.
Apart from dead simple uploads and a quickly-learned interface, MarsEdit sports features like compatibility with Blogger, Drupal, LiveJournal, Movable Type, Vox, and more, a Flickr connection, and integration with more hardcore Mac-specific text editors like BBEdit and TextMate. In short, it’s a power tool.
ecto
Another multi-service editor of MarsEdit-like design, ecto puts considerable emphasis on getting you from A to B to Z as quickly as possible. It certainly holds its own by comparison with others on the market. Its list of supported blog services is extensive, to say the least. Presently in Version 3 form, ecto has been around for over 5 years, and costs $17.95 to own.
Blogo
Launched by Brainjuice, Blogo seems simply drawn and puts your typical blogware to shame. As with the other editors above, its support list for blogging services is long, allows you to quickly publish media, and can even manage to publish Twitter and Ping.fm messages in association with your blog feed - call it streamlined PR, if you will.
Finally, Blogo gives users the option to produce content distraction-free with an on-board full screen mode. That’s a nice little dollop of GTD whipped cream, for sure.
Tumblr Dashboard Widget
Here’s a super small and super lightweight Dashboard application tossed midstream into the mix. We think Tumblr Dashboard Widget is worth mentioning simply for the fact that Tumblr itself is a bare boned and ultra-minimalist invention. A widget of this size is a fine complement. Enough said.
Mac Journal
An appreciable application both for its adherence to the traditional idea of journaling as well as its implementation of color to make the editing environment that much more colorful, Mac Journal is something that, while quite costly at $34.95 for a license, runs with the best in the business. It may not carry the same fanboy cache as that held by MarsEdit and others, but it’s a strong delivery nonetheless.
Blog.Mac
Intended to be a generally fool-proof development, Blog.Mac is more or less the closest thing to something that would come out of Apple’s own software assembly room. It’s not heavy on the details. It’s personal blogging made simple.
The current release, Version 1.3 Beta 4, talks to Apple’s MobileMe web hosting service and offers better Mac OS X Leopard integration. It will set users back $29.99. The creators at Largemouth Software also offer a Blog.Mac template editor free of charge.
iWeb plus MobileMe
You could go with something independently-made like Blog.Mac, but if you prefer something actually from the halls of Infinite Loop, Apple presents its own website and webpage editor in the form of iWeb. It’s a very controlled setup, and comes with all Mac computers sold today (standalone iLife suite runs $79), and to make use of it in ways that takes advantage of the “Apple experience,” you’ll need to pony up $99 per year for MobileMe hosting (formerly “.Mac”) and photo gallery access and so forth.
RapidWeaver
Some people just want to blog in their own unique way, requiring a departure from many popular web services today. RapidWeaver lets users wield an editor’s stick in ways that no other application here is able. Of course, that can mean a concerted effort to continue a blog for a significant period of time within the environment provided by RapidWeaver and the folks at RealMac Software, but hey, if you want choices, you’ve got choices with this one. Nearly limitless options, really.
Fluid
Okay, so you’ve parsed the choices listed above, and you’re not quite sold on any of them. Perhaps you recognize more than ever your liking for the way your blog service of choice operates, but you’d rather have it resemble an application within your Dock or menu bar. Fluid lets you do just that. It behaves as a kind of super powerful webclip creator that allows you to access web applications without having to visit the URL in Firefox or Camino or whathaveyou. There’s a bit of a wow factor that goes with this download.
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November 28th, 2008 at 11:34 am
are these all mac only
November 28th, 2008 at 12:14 pm
Some nice interfaces (i like what tumblr does) but tough to beat wordpress on any level for features and plugins.
November 28th, 2008 at 12:18 pm
if you consider the iPhone a mac you could have add also the Wordpress iPhone application. It’s really cool for short updates on the road.
November 28th, 2008 at 1:26 pm
I still don’t know how can I use Flock without sufferin’ an epyleptic attack.
For me, Fluid + Wordpress fits well with a non-heavy use (1-2 posts per day).
November 28th, 2008 at 1:28 pm
Sorry, not Fluid: I meant Firefox.
November 28th, 2008 at 4:54 pm
I’ve tried most of them, and yet, none come close to the ease of use nor the features Windows Live Writer has… Hell, That’s probably the only reason I have XP running in Fusion: Live Writer
November 29th, 2008 at 12:28 am
Thanx for this roundup!
I just got a Mac Pro and am looking forward to blogging on it — my fave blogging app is Windows Live Writer, so either I’ll have to find something I like even more (which seems unlikely, sigh), I’ll find a workable Mac solution which is roughly equivalent, or I’ll virtualize WLW. (Like how arturogoga feels.)
November 29th, 2008 at 4:33 am
I’ve used every remote blogging app around (and paid for some of them too) and I have no hesitation in declaring ScribeFire the easiest, quickest and least obtrusive (it sits on the bottom of the page - no multiple windows opening all over the shop) editor there is. I’ve posted over 4,000 times with it and I now hardly have to think about it. And it’s free.
November 29th, 2008 at 5:27 am
Time to get a Mac!
… Dear Santa, … :o)
November 29th, 2008 at 10:15 am
RapidWeaver (4.2.1) is awful for blog purposes. It is buggy as hell and support is abysmal.
November 29th, 2008 at 10:25 am
id check out sni.ps too.
November 29th, 2008 at 10:29 am
Read the TITLE - IDIOT
November 29th, 2008 at 10:46 am
I’d second RapidWeaver being an awful blogging platform. It is a step up from iWeb but not much. It is really aimed at low-level users getting their first website up and running.
November 29th, 2008 at 10:50 am
Interesting… Thanks for the tips, Josh and Esquare.
November 29th, 2008 at 10:53 am
@Pascal - Perhaps so
November 29th, 2008 at 10:53 am
@DavyB - Kindness for the holidays, please
November 29th, 2008 at 10:55 am
Yeah, we were kind of sticking to the desktop on this roundup. WordPress for iPhone is nifty indeed, though.
November 29th, 2008 at 11:14 am
The best is indeed MarsEdit. Blogging became so easy with it. As companion for images I use Skitch.
November 29th, 2008 at 11:24 am
@arturogoga and Torley - Two votes for Live Writer!
November 29th, 2008 at 11:54 am
Don’t waste your time with Mac blogging software. I have a Mac Pro and I run VMware with windows for one and only one reason. - Microsoft’s Live Writer. It is quite simply the easiest and best blogging software in the world. Once you use LiveWriter for 10 minutes, you will never go back to anything else.
The day someone comes out with LiveWriter for OS-X, is the day I am 100% Apple. Until then, Windows wins in this category.
November 29th, 2008 at 12:35 pm
Hey — for someone who doesn’t want to do FULL virtualization, has anyone tried CrossOver with Windows Live Writer yet? I may give it a shot later and am googling, but would like to hear personal experiences.
I just made my first post with Blogo: http://torley.com/my-first-post-from-blogo-on-my-new-mac-pro
November 29th, 2008 at 12:50 pm
Good list. Practical. What the “Internet” needs more of. It also needs more “misuse” of quotations.
November 29th, 2008 at 1:23 pm
never really been a mac fan, the only apple thing i own is an alarm clock lol
November 29th, 2008 at 1:25 pm
yeah talking shit on the internet, you’re cool
November 30th, 2008 at 2:23 am
[...] http://mashable.com/2008/11/28/blogger-mac-apps/ « Music matters [...]
November 30th, 2008 at 6:01 am
[...] 10 of the Best Mac Apps for Bloggers (tags: 11 2008 software:mac reviews) [...]
November 30th, 2008 at 7:57 am
Don’t forget about http://www.MediaSignage.com
They allow you to embed links to Free Digital Signage that you can display both at a store as well as on a Blog /Web. A must have for bloggers and business owners alike…
Regards,
Sean.
November 30th, 2008 at 8:19 am
[...] Ten Best Mac Blogging Applications Mashable has an interesting list of the ten best Mac blogging apps: Most bloggers today are familiar only with services designed for use with their choice of web [...]
November 30th, 2008 at 10:15 am
it won’t work with crossover since Live Writer requires the .Net Framework to work… so it’s either full virtualization for a single program (yeah, it sucks), or go for the mac options (which also sucks)
November 30th, 2008 at 10:42 am
Nice roundup. I use Fluid for several sites already but it never occurred to me to set up a Fluid link for my WordPress admin panels. Gotta go do that right now.