HasEditableOptions

Got SongBird? Now that little birdie will sing to WLW.

2006-10-30T21:25:58Z

So keeping with the theme that I'm a horrible coder, I created a SongBird extension that will put all of your track information in the same place that iTunes and Windows Media Player do. So needless to say, this is pretty much a Windows only extension. Now all of you that are converting over to SongBird can still get the Currently Listening love in your Windows Live Writer.

You can snag the xpi here: http://jtsquared.net/songbird/media_blog.xpi

Since there really isn't an UI for this and knowing that some people still want screenies, here is one of the Extensions dialog showing the extension (Media Blogger) is actually installed.

As with all my little coding tidbits you can send me any issues at soulposition at msn dizzot com or leave a comment here.

Also, I'd be remiss if I didn't give a huge shout out to the guys that came up with the Audioscrobbler plugin. With out that as an example I would have never completed this plugin. Huge thanks!

I'm currently listening to Admit It!!! by Say Anything from the album ...Is A Real Boy (With Bonus Disc)

Insert a video from the video insert plugin

2006-10-24T14:29:17Z

<\/embed><\/div>";">

Scott's new plugin is hella cool. Copy the URL of the video (YouTube, Google Video, Yahoo!, MySpace or MSN SoapBox) you want to embed and paste it into Live Writer and it will auto create a thumbnail for you and the appropriate HTML Object stuff.

Nicely done.

Currently Listening Plugin.. now Vista-licio-us.

2006-10-23T12:38:31Z

Austrailia representin' with this fix. I've gotten tons of questions about how to get the Windows Media Plugin to work on Windows Vista.

You see, in the install there is a bit of code that checks to see if you are running Windows XP and if you are not (even if it is the next version) it will not install the plugin. I have been working on fix that required me creating me own WMP plugin to basically do what the already created plugin does but only it would install on Vista.

Well, Frank Arrigo has provided a fix for this issue here. The Reader's Digest version is to install the Winter Fun Pack for Windows XP. A different plugin is included that provides the same functionality only this one will install on Vista.

Plugin

2006-10-02T15:43:56Z

So, I got around to testing my plug-in for Windows Live Writer with the latest version and I’ve found no bugs. So yeah, really sweet. Maybe I’ll get around to actually uploading my little baby up to the Gallery.

Now playing: OutKast/S.C.A.R./Sleepy Brown - Morris Brown

iTunes Album Art .Net Component

2006-09-26T21:08:41Z

I'm releasing my .Net iTunes Album component. It works just like this one for perl, only you can use it from your .Net Applications. I'm actually going to be building a WLW Plugin that will allow you to embed your Currently Listening Tracks Album art into your blog post.

Download here

I'm rocking out to Sleater-Kinney's song Jumpers.

Calling all Live Spaces fans.

2006-09-03T15:13:48Z

Scott released his plugin to the wild today. Check out his post about it in all it's glory here.

Why post this here? I think Scott is a standup guy. Oh, and I helped him with it. ; )

Firefox 2 Beta 2 and Microsummaries.

2006-09-01T15:23:02Z

So I took a break from doing some WLWP work to check out the latest beta of Firefox 2. While the new UI is nice in some places and well not so nice in other places, it seems very stable.

The one thing that caught my eye with the first Beta release was the announcement of Microsummaries in FFX2. Basically, if the site has a microsummary file (an XML doc), this summary file can be used in your bookmark area to show a snippet of the site. Or a kind person can generate one for your site if there isn't one already. Check out the ones that have already been created here.

So if you bookmark w00t and select the Live Title version of the bookmark, your book mark will display the current item and the price for it. Clicking on this will, of course, take you to w00t.com.

You can read all about on the Mozlla site.

I'm still not exactly sold on the idea. I mean really what can this functionality give me that RSS doesn't already? Even so I decided to create my own. I decided to create one for last.fm to pull the last track that a person listened to.

Click here to install the last.fm microsummary.

Here is what the summary should look like if you were to bookmark my last.fm page:

I'm not sure the duration between updates is. So far I have to manually refresh the title by right clicking on the bookmark and clicking 'Refresh Live Title'. There also is no setting for changing the iterval of updating the title text.

I'm still scratching my head about how useful this feature is. I'm still going to get the most up to date information from a sites RSS feed.

Or maybe I'm missing the point? Maybe it's really there for users to get updated information from sites that don't expose RSS. If only you could cache each update somewhere. Or maybe that's the next evolution for microsummaries, could the possibility for updating the RSS integration in FFX2 to use the microsummary generator functionality for sites that don't have RSS.

Live Writer System Tray gets some love

2006-08-30T18:00:02Z

The fine people over at WLWP have seen fit to post about the LW System Tray app. Wait until they see what's coming in the next version ; )

I'm currently listening to The Curse Of Curves by Cute Is What We Aim For from the album The Same Old Blood Rush With A New Touch.

Great Ceaser's Ghost! Another update?

2006-08-28T20:17:58Z

Yep, updating again today. I just felt like adding Winamp support, so it's been added. There are some caveats to this though. I basically use the same technique that everyone (I'm assuming) else uses to try and get the Winamp information. Unfortunately that means no Album name data. I know it sucks but really you should upgrade your media player anyway, Winamp is so 1990's.

Download the fresh basket of goodness.

Currently Listening ver 1.5 out now.

2006-08-28T15:25:59Z

It's passed both of my testers so I'm releasing to the wild. This is step one towards getting everything cleaned up for going into Windows Live Gallery.

Download Here.

Changes for this go around:

Totally redesigned template editor. I mean, totally redesigned. Maybe even revolutionary. Or not.
Still no Winamp integration.
About page for shameless promotion of my peeps.

** UPDATE **

If you have the unfortunate issue of the plugin not displaying any information, redownload the plugin and try again. There was a very GLARING error on my part when I compiled it, mainly it was a debug release.

I'm currently listening to Final Broadcast by Statistics from the album Often Lie

A look at the newest version of Currently Listening.

2006-08-27T16:16:38Z

Here is a quick sneak peek at the forth coming version of the Currently Listening plugin, version 1.5.

The new side bar entry complete with new logo thanks to Tim Heuer.

This is the new template designer. It now includes a very lightweight HTML editor for creating your templates. The first three buttons are, in order; Insert Artist, Insert Track Name, Insert Album Name.

They are then followed by Bold, Italic, Underline, New Link and Unlink.

You can also edit the HTML directly if need be.

A new about screen that will list the current version and have links to this site as well as some links to people that have helped me during the development of this plugin.

That's all for right now, keep a look at here in the coming days when I set to release this beast upon the world.

Currently rocking out to: Snow Patrol, Set The Fire To The Third Bar

Latest Version of Currently Listening Plugin

2006-08-23T19:31:59Z

You can now download a minor update to the Currently Listening Plugin. The following changes were made:

Some minor formating issues. You should be able to embed any HTML into the template field.
Updated icon from Tim Heuer.

As always you can download the latest version here: http://jtsquared.net/currently/currentlylistening.zip

Introducing Currently Listening Windows Live Writer Plugin

2006-08-18T16:28:44Z

Now that you've installed Windows Live Writer, you want let everyone know what your listening to when your posting your thoughts to a blog. Now you can using the Currently Listening plugin.

You will need to download and install the Windows Media Blogging plugin for Windows Media Player itegration. You can download it here. If you are running Windows Vista you will have to follow the instructions here.
For iTunes integration will also need to install a plugin from here (via Adam Meltzer).
Winamp is on the todo list, but since I'm not a fan, it's not a high priority.
You will also need to download and install the .Net 2.0 Redistributable, you can get that from here.

Once you have installed all the pre-reqs, download and extract the zip file into your Live Writer plugin directory (e.g. C:\Program Files\Windows Live Writer\plugins\) and then launch Live Writer. For now you can configure the template that will display the track information into the post.

You should now see the Currently Hearing plugin listed in the plugin directory.

If you click on the Options button you will get the music formatting window.
Here is where you can edit the template string for how your track information will be displayed.

The sidebar will now contain a link to add your current track information to your blog post.

In the future you will also be able to configure the link types for searching in iTunes, MSN or Amazon. As a bonus, you'll be able to put in your Amazon Associates Id to score some cash.

Feel free to email me at soulposition [at_sign] msn dizzot com if you have any questions, comments or bug reports.