I explained in this post that I was forced to switch from Windows Live Writer to Open Live Writer to be able to connect to my OpenLiteSpeed web server. I wanted to post a couple notes on Open Live Writer setup.
Connecting to the server was easy with Open Live Writer, but plugin setup is a challenge. The basics, which work for the Rich Hewlett Source Code Highlighter plugin, are described in his blog here. Note, however, that Open Live Writer, now a Windows Store app (why?), has moved the installation folder from %LocalAppData%\OpenLiveWriter to %ProgramData%\%UserName%\OpenLiveWriter. So the basic steps are:
1. Put the plugin here: %ProgramData%\%UserName%\OpenLiveWriter\Plugins
2. Add a string for the plugin to this registry key: Computer\HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\OpenLiveWriter\PluginAssemblies
3. Edit this file to enable loadFromRemoteSources: %ProgramData%\%UserName%\OpenLiveWriter\app-0.6.2\OpenLiveWriter.exe.config.
<configuration> <runtime> <loadFromRemoteSources enabled="true"/> </runtime> </configuration>
(Interesting: Open Live Writer cannot leave a simple <pre> block alone. It flows five lines into three. I’ll have to reformat that directly in WordPress after publishing.)
The log is still in %LocalAppData%. Check %LocalAppData%\OpenLiveWriter\Open Live Writer.log if the plugin is not loading correctly.
Another plugin I used frequently was the Code Tag Plugin for Windows Live Writer by Alex Meyer-Gleaves. Unfortunately, this fails to load in Open Live Writer, giving the error, “Unable to load one or more of the requested types.”
My third plugin, Attach File Plugin for Windows Live Writer, came with its own installer. I tried manually registering its DLL with Open Live Writer, but got the same error about requested types.
Kudos to Rich Hewlett for updating his plugin for Open Live Writer. Living without the other plugins will be a challenge.