If past experience holds true then Apple will approve Medusa (Blogsy 4.0) within the next 24 hours. And as soon as they approve it we will release it in all the App Stores.
So this will be the last blog post detailing new features brought to Blogsy in Medusa.
Search Dock Feature – In previous versions of Blogsy we had the dock item for Google Image searches. But if you wanted to search YouTube, Flickr, Picasa or Vimeo you had to have an account set up to do that. Users said they wanted to be able to search these services even though they don't have an account on them. So we created a new Search dock item.
Just write what you want to search for in the the field then tap on the service you want to search. And just like all the other dock panels, you can drag any of these items over to add to your blog post.
Bug fixes – We are very happy about a couple of the bug fixes in Medusa. If you are not aware, if Blogsy crashes a crash report is automatically sent to a service called Crittercism. This helps us track crashing problems. We have been having trouble with two different crashes – according to Critercism they happen less than 1% of the time Blogsy is launched but they are our two most common crashes. These crashes have been going on for several versions of Blogsy now but we were unable to figure them out. We could not reproduce the crashing and the crash reports weren't showing where in the code the crash was happening. Well, quite by accident, we came across the crashes and once we were able to reproduce them we could fix them. So we are really happy that those two bug fixes are part of this update.
Link drag in on images/videos crashing fixed.
Double tap and hold crashing fixed.
Flickr – Fixed new photo set creation in account is set to private.
IBM Connections – Fixed showing error report message after every correct posting.
Just a small update to fix a few rare case problems. Plus one feature we are very excited about.
Bugs
Resolved Flickr uploading “failed” message when a users has a large number of photo sets. For those having this problem you will need to use a different app to upload your images until this update is in the App Store. Sorry for the inconvenience.
Resolved the Blogger post fetching formatting loss problem. If a post was created with another app or on the Blogger site then loaded into Blogsy and saved locally, then the user tried to fetch the same post again from the site the post in Blogsy would lose formatting. Until this update is out you will need to first delete the local draft before fetching the online post again.
Resolved WordPress media library crash when there are unidentifiable files in the library. We found that one user had migrated their site from Blogger to WordPress and in this process unidentifiable files were created in the WordPress media library. If you delete the unidentifiable files from your WordPress media library this problem will be solved for you and you don’t need to wait for this update to come out.
Feature
If a blog sends back an error code Blogsy will display an error message. Now there will be an option in the error message to send us an email with the error code the blog is sending back. This will help us help users identify the problem with their blog quicker.
I came across a great article on Technorati about the blogosphere. The title is State of the Blogosphere 2011and it is filled with a wealth of information. If you are a blogger in any shape or form it is definitely worth the read. It was for 2011 but it was done toward the end of 2011 so I think the information is still fresh and relevant.
One thing that they said in the article is that bloggers updated their blogs more frequently and spent more time blogging in 2011. That is great news because I remember reading not so long ago that with the advent of social sites like Facebook and Twitter blogging was dying. As mentioned in this article those have impacted the content of blogs but they have not killed or maimed blogging. I like to hear that because I think blogging plays a very important role on the web in sharing lengthy and detailed information.
Being the graph and data junkie that I am this article is probably the best I have read on the state of the blogosphere. There are just too many great graphs and charts to go into all of them so these are the ones that got me thinking. They made me wonder how Blogsy fits into the blogosphere.
From this graph it looks like Blogsy has most bloggers covered. The only ones on the list that Blogsy does not support is LiveJournal and SquareSpace.
I was hoping that they had a chart which asked if tablets or smartphones have impacted the frequency of publishing posts. But I guess they are more focused on whether or not they have changed the content of blog posts.
It’s great to see that people are using more images and videos due to the advent of tablets and smartphones. In our humble opinion, Blogsy makes it incredibly easy to use photos and videos in a blog post. And as several of our users have said on Twitter, it’s even easier to create a blog post with pictures and videos using Blogsy than on the blog’s admin panel using a PC/Mac.
We are looking forward to seeing Technorati’s blog post about the blogosphere next year.
This is just a small bug fix update to address a few bugs users have reported. We also added a few minor feature in this update.
Bugs
Resolved crashing when trying to access the WordPress media library if an image in the library does not have the title set correctly. We are not sure why an image does not have an image title set correctly but we have found one other app that uploads images without setting the title correctly.
Resolved crashing when trying to access the WordPress media library if an image does not have the meta data. Blogsy needs the meta data to fetch the dimensions of the image.
Resolved the “failed” problem of first image when trying to upload multiple images to Flickr.
Resolved adding extra <p> tags if user swipes back and forth between the HTML and Rich Sides then publishes then opens the post again in Blogsy to edit then publishes it again.
Resolved the Google Image search failure if a foreign language user had changed the Safe search settings. (only foreign language problem)
Corrected the attachment area not disappearing issue on Tumblr Photo type posts when using the dock button to switch to the HTML Side. This does not happen if you use the three finger swipe method to get to the HTML Side.
Corrected the circle to the left of the date to show that a post has already been published when a user chooses the “Post & Keep Local Draft” option.
Corrected the attachment area thumbnail image size issue (Retina display only)
Features
Added edit button to blog listing menu for users that don’t know the standard swipe to delete UI.
Added “Delete All” option to blog listing so it’s easy to delete all blogs set up for that platform.
Blogsy will now remember the page you were on if you do a Google search in the built-in browser then leave the browser and return.
One cool thing about us developing Blogsy is that we get to communicate with all these amazing bloggers. When we set out to develop Blogsy that never even crossed our minds. It’s kind of like our own little special Stumble Upon but even better because we get to communicate with the people behind the blogs. I’d be pretty selfish of us to keep these cool blogs a secret so I thought I’d share some of them. Yes, I have asked the bloggers if I could write about their blogs. And we’d love to hear about your blog too so leave a comment or send us an email and tell us all about your blog.
Nancy reached out to me with some questions about how Blogsy works. In our emails back and forth she said she was preparing for a 1000 mile walk. Yep, you read that right, her blog covers the Camino de Santiago walk from Le Puy, France to Muxia, Spain she and her husband are enjoying. They are now around 12 days into their walk and their blog covers all the cool things they see, people they meet and events that happen along the way. I think this is amazing and I have added it to my bucket list.
Very Important – now double-tap (tap two times quickly) to access the image, video and link menus.
Due to user feedback and also a conflict in Blogsy we are changing from a single tap to a double-tap to get the Image, Video, and Link menus to pop up.
In this update we have fixed all the bugs we are aware of. So, if you find a bug please email us right away so we can get it figured out and fixed.
Here are the bug fixes in this update and some reasons behind the bugs.
1) In Blogsy 3.4 we improved the parser for Blogger. In prior versions we just had to use the standard <p> tag when publishing instead of the <br> tag which is the unique way Blogger works. This caused several problems for users. If you opened a blog post created in Blogsy in the Blogger dashboard to edit then all the <p> tag were converted to <br> tags and you’d lose your paragraph spacing. Also, if you opened a blog post in Blogsy which had been created in the Blogger dashboard you couldn’t drag images or videos between paragraphs. Our parser upgrade solved these problems but some other issues appeared due to this change, which we didn’t catch in our testing. These problems are related to using the formatting toolbar options in Blogsy and fetching a post from Blogger which does not have a paragraph wrapped in an HTML tag. We have fixed these problems and they are in this update.
2) In Blogsy 3.4 we added the ability for WordPress users to directly access their media library and to also add featured images. These features are only supported by newer versions of WordPress. So Blogsy requests the version number from the blog to determine if you can use this feature. Thanks to user feedback we have found that in rare cases the blog does not send back the version number and in that case Blogsy will fail or crash. This has been fixed and is in this update.
3) Flickr problem – We didn’t make any changes to the Flickr integration so we are unsure why these bugs appeared. 1) If you have multiple Flickr accounts set up and upload images the images will always go to the first Flickr account. 2) If your Flickr account is set to private then Blogsy will show that the upload has failed even though it has successfully uploaded. These issues have been fixed and are in this update.
4) Other minor bugs – WordPress MU issue, Post Info. menu setting issue, Image to envelope issue (Retina only), WP empty line breaks, Vimeo apostrophe in video title, Tumblr more tag.
Not bugs or not related to the Dragon update of Blogsy (Blogsy 3.4)
1) I am putting this in red because it is a very important change users need to be aware of. Double-tap – Due to user feedback and also a conflict in Blogsy we are changing from a single tap to a double tap to get the Image, Video, and Link menus to pop up.
2) Photo Library Crash – In very rare cases Blogsy will crash if you tap on the Photo Library dock icon. This is caused by a bug in iOS5 and Apple is aware of it and they have told developers that they have engineers working on it. We have added an exception case to try to work around this bug. Because we cannot reproduce this bug we cannot test to see if this will fix it or not. After updating to 3.4.1, if you get this crash please email us.
3) \n for WordPress – If you publish to WordPress then Blogsy removes the \n code because it causes formatting issues. Now, if you choose to publish from the HTML Side we will not remove the \n. This allows people that want to use Markdown to type and publish from the HTML Side. This takes a plugin on your blog to do – I will do a blog post about how to do it once this update comes out.
4) Korean app name changed from 블록지 to Blogsy and other minor language translation fixes.
We are really excited announce our latest update. We added a new platform, a new service and a whole lot of new features. It takes Apple about a week to approve updates so you should be able to find it on the App Store next week.
So what is in Dragon?
Features
1. Retina Display Support – Blogsy now has the high resolution graphics to look clear and crisp on the New iPad.
2. Tumblr support – Blogsy supports all post types for Tumblr. So if you want to post a quote post, audio post, video post, text post,…etc, you can do it with Blogsy. Check out our platforms page to see all the Tumblr features Blogsy supports.
3. Vimeo support – This means you can now easily drag and drop your Vimeo videos into your post. No need to copy and paste embed codes.
4. Featured Image Support – Now you can set or edit the featured image for your self-hosted WordPress blog. You will be able to choose an image from your iPad to use as a featured image or choose an image from your WordPress Media Library. This is not part of the WordPress API so you need to change some files on your server in order to use this feature. If you want to do it now so you are prepared for when Blogsy will be on the App Store the instructions are here.
5. Custom Field Support – Set and edit custom fields for WordPress blog posts.
6. WordPress Media Library Access – If you have a WordPress.com blog or a self-hosted WordPress blog which is running version 3.1 or later then you will have direct access to your media library.
7. PDF / Document / Audio WordPress Drag and Drop – You can drag and drop PDF, document or audio files from the WordPress media library into your post.
7. Post Format Support – Set and edit the post format for WordPress blog posts.
8. Sticky Support – Choose to make a WordPress blog post “Sticky” .
9. Keep Local Draft – We have added an option to keep a local draft when publishing a post to your blog.
10. Local Draft UI Change – Now even if you have a post open it will appear in the “local” draft list. There is a check mark next to the post in the list showing which post you currently have open.
11. Edit Button – Added an edit button at the top of the “local” draft lists to make it more clear how to delete a draft if a user is unaware of the swipe to delete UI.
12. IBM Connections Encoding – IBM Connections uses non-standard HTML entities for foreign languages. iOS can not read these special HTML entities. So we have built a parser for these so IBM Connections users can load and edit posts from their blog written in a foreign language.
13. TypePad Source Image – Blogsy now dynamically changes the source image used for displaying your image in a blog post based on the display size you choose. This makes your blog load faster without any loss in image clarity.
14. Blogger Parser Enhancement – Blogsy’s Blogger Parser will now convert between the standard <p> tag and the Blogger <br> tag method. This means you can edit a post in your Blogger Dashboard created with Blogsy now and Blogger will not change the formatting. This also means that if you load a post created or edited in your Blogger admin into Blogsy you can now drag images between paragraphs.
15. Blogger Media Library – Many people are unaware that Google owns both Blogger and Picasa so they choose to use Picasa as a Blogger blog’s media library. Therefore Blogsy now prompts people to set up their Picasa account right after they set up their Blogger blog.
16. Default Video Format – The default video format is now set to iFrame. (Only for new users.)
17. Flickr Private Images – Users are now able to see their Flickr images set to private when they do a Flickr search.
18. Language Support – Thanks to our great translators Blogsy is now in Portuguese, Japanese, Swedish, Czech and Korean.
19. Flickr Image Sizes – Flickr added two new sizes to their list of automatically generated image sizes. We have added these new sizes in Blogsy.
Bug Fixes
1. IBM Connection Publishing Issue – Blogsy would crash after the post was published.
2. IBM Connections Set Up Problem – Blogsy would add extra community blogs when setting up an IBM Connections account.
3. Page delete – Blogsy would crash if you tried to delete a page from the online page list.
4. Account editing – Blogsy would crash if you tapped on “Save” two times in a row in the WordPress account editing menu.
5. Renamed xmlrpc.php problem – If a users had a renamed xmlrpc file but their blog was not sending back the correct xmlrpc URL then Blogsy would not set up their account.
6. Blogger Page Issue – If a user had started a Page in Blogsy then saved it as a local draft, when they opened it again it would be changed to a post instead of remembering that it was a page.
7. WordPress Space Issue – If you opened a WordPress post which had lists in it then the space between list items would increase.
8. Block Quote Formatting – If you tried to eliminate bolding or italicizing of the block quote the bold or italic would come back.
9. Placeholder text – Was missing in the tag and category selecting views for some platforms.
10. Flickr Link URL – If a user’s Flickr ID and username were different then the image link URL would be incorrect.
11. Bookmark Managing – If you deleted the last bookmark Blogsy would crash.
12. Dock Managing – You could drag a dock item below the “Add” item in the list when managing the dock items.
13. Picasa Username – Blogsy would show the number Picasa was sending back as the username instead of the displayed username.
14. Side Switching Button – The button in the dock used to switch between the Rich Side and HTML Side would disappear sometimes.
15. Flickr API Change – Flickr changed their API so this caused Blogsy to pull in images at 240 pixels wide instead of 500 pixels.
16. YouTube and <div> Tag Setting – If you had set your paragraph mode to <div> and dragged in a YouTube video and used the old video embed code then all blog content would get erased and replaced by the term “Undefined”.
17. Google Authorization – Google changed their authorization URL which caused a constant processing message in Blogsy when setting up a Google service.
18. Picasa API Change – Picasa changed their system so the default URL now sends you to the 512 pixel size of your image. We now fetch the original image size and add the appropriate code to the URL so the image links to the full size image.
I keep getting the question, “Will Blogsy support the Retina display?”, or questions very similar to that. And I can give everyone a big gigantic resounding YES! Blogsy will support the Retina display and it will be in our next update. We are in the middle of working on our next update and adding some features that we know are going to make a lot of people happy. Because we were in the middle of adding these new features we were not able to get our update out in time for the release of the New iPad. Our plan is to submit this next update to Apple in a about a week. Once we submit it to Apple I will do a blog post detailing all the things we have added.
Secondly, we have gotten a couple of reports from people that after upgrading to the New iPad and doing the restore, Blogsy is not working. The problem is that because you are changing devices the restore does not reestablish the approvals from the services (WordPress, Blogger, Flickr, Picasa,…..etc.).
There are two ways to solve this.
Delete all the accounts you have set up in Blogsy and set them up again.
Or, I think the easier way, just delete Blogsy from your iPad and download it from the App Store again and set up your accounts again. Just know that you should save any local drafts to the Notes app prior to doing this as all local drafts will get deleted in this process.
We found out today that Flickr changed their API. They have added two new image sizes to their API. To find out more about this you can check out their message about it here.
The ramifications of this change for Blogsy is that when you drag and drop an image from Flickr it gets placed with a dimension of 24o pixels. The display size image used is still 500 pixels but it displays at 240.
We have this fixed and it will be in our next update. Until then you will need to tap on the image and resize it to the width or height you want.
We have also added the two new sizes Flickr added to their API as source size options in Blogsy. This will also be in our next update.
Update 2/23/2012 9:40AM (local time)- Apple expedited the approval of Blogsy (thank you Apple) so now Blogsy 3.3.1 can be found in the App Store.
We have submitted the update to Apple and asked them to expedite its approval. If they agree to speed up the approval then it will be in the App Store in the next few days. If they reject our request then it will be in the App Store in a week.
This is the list of bugs we have fixed in this update.
1) IBM Connections – Support multiple blogs.
Problem fixed – IBM Connections users couldn’t set up their blogs in Blogsy if their account had multiple blogs. This fix will set up all their blogs in Blogsy at once.
2) Blogger update account.
Problem fixed – If the user declined to set up their Blogger blogs again when Blogsy requested, and they only have Blogger blogs set up in Blogsy, then any post they have open will be lost if they close Blogsy.
3) TypePad Post Info.
Problem fixed – TypePad users were seeing the Posterous option when they tapped on the Post Info. menu. So they could not set a post as draft or select categories.
4) Justified and right-aligned text.
Problem fixed – If a user chose to justify or right-align their text Blogsy would strip out the HTML when publishing or flipping to the HTML side and back.
5) Dragging from device library crash
Problem fixed – If a user selected images to upload and the uploading finished then they tapped on another service in the dock and then back to the iPad photo library dock icon the panel would open showing the iPad Photo Library images but the uploading view would not show. In this situation, if the user tried to drag an image, thinking they were dragging it into a post, Blogsy would crash.
6) Blogger and WordPress selection crash
Problem fixed – If a user had both a Blogger blog and WordPress blog set up and tried to select the Blogger blog to post to Blogsy would crash.
Minor feature adjustments
1) WordPress – Now shows a specific error messages instead of a general one when accounts fails to set up. 2) Posterous – now lists all blogs on an account instead of just 30. 3) Translation – German, French and Chinese translation corrections. 4) Uploading error messages – now shows the specific error message the server is sending back to Blogsy.
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