14 August 2006

Windows Live Writer - Half Open?

Microsoft's Windows Live Writer, which allows you to post to blogs directly from a WYSIWYG desktop app, is hardly open in the traditional sense, although it is free. However, it's half-open in the sense that it supports non-Microsoft blogs like Blogger, LiveJournal, TypePad and WordPress.

I've not been able to try it, because it requires the .Net framework which I prefer not to have on my Windows boxes since it's huge and really just adds to the software spaghetti. But credit where credit is due: Microsoft is slowly getting the hang of this openness lark. (Via Ars Technica.)

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Glyn, is this the start of your (annual? once a decade?) "be nice to Microsoft" week? Or are we still in "be nice to Ozzie, he has to report to Ballmer now" honeymoon mode?
Something that requires a download of proprietary code, which then requires a proprietary framework, is half-open? I'd go with "slightly ajar" myself...

Glyn Moody said...

Sorry, Andrew, you're quite right: I don't know what came over me. I'll go and take a cold shower and hope that it doesn't happen again.