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What is Pocket Blog?

Pocket Blog extends your weblog to any Pocket PC device. Weblog entries are maintained offline. When Internet connectivity becomes available, such as when your Pocket PC is placed in it's docking cradle or a WiFi card is inserted, changes are automatically posted to your weblog. Pocket Blog also downloads recent weblog entries, enabling you to edit entries that were originally posted from your desktop.

Pocket Blog works with your existing weblog software rather than replacing it. The initial Pocket Blog release implements the Blogger API, which is supported by many popular weblog packages including Blogger, Movable Type, and Radio Userland. A future release of Pocket Blog will also implement the MetaWeblog API, which is presently supported by Radio Userland. The MetaWeblog API adds support for categorization of weblog entries, and should be supported by other weblog software in the future.

Pocket Blog's codename was Mobile Offline Blogger.

Table of Contents:

Legalese
Installation Guide
User's Guide
Release Notes

Legal Notes

Pocket Blog is Copyright © 2002 T. Bryce Yehl, all rights reserved.

Portions of the XML-RPC routines were adapted from XMLRPCCOM and are Copyright © 1999-2001 Jan G.P. Sijm. These routines are used with permission, source code will be released under a BSD-style license at a future date. Such release is not required by Jan.

This software is a Beta release, use at your own risk. All warrantees, expressed or implied, are hereby disclaimed. I am not responsible, ask anyone. If you have any problems, don't bother suing me, I have neither money nor assets.

Pocket Blog Beta 1 (v0.1.4) may be freely redistributed provided that it is not modified in any way. Future releases may require payment.

Feedback is appreciated.

In addition to Jan, thanks go out to Evan Williams of Blogger fame for making the Blogger API an open spec, Dave Winer of Userland for Radio Userland and XML-RPC, Frank McPherson for his many links to my weblog, and my roommate for being a pain in the ass who constantly stood over my shoulder while bugging me to finish. My roommate is also providing my hosting, please don't Slashdot me.

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Installing Pocket Blog

System Requirements:

• PDA running Pocket PC 2002, such as the Audiovox Maestro, Compaq iPaq, or HP Journada. Pocket PC 2000 devices may work but have not been tested and will not be supported.
• Visual Basic Runtime (included with installer).
• Approximately 100KB of available storage memory, which will vary based on the cache settings (more if the VB Runtime is not already installed).
• Approximately 3MB (peak) of available program memory, which will vary based on the cache settings. Continuous usage is roughly 2MB.

Step -1: Download and extract the latest release from the Pocket Blog Download page.

Step 0: Run setup.exe and follow the on-screen instructions. On your Pocket PC you may be prompted to replace various .DLL files that are already contained in ROM. Click on the No button.

Step 1: Run Pocket Blog on your Pocket PC. An icon will have been created under Start -> Programs.

Step 2: Configure Pocket Blog. Click on the menu Configure -> Server Settings. Your Pocket PC must have Internet connectivity during this process.

Server: Defaults to plant.blogger.com for Blogger users. Radio Userland users should specify the name of their desktop computer, Movable Type users should specify their web server.

Port: Defaults to 80 for Blogger users. Movable Type users are likely to be on port 80. Radio users may need to use port 5335, check your Radio prefs.

Path: Defaults to /api/RPC2 for Blogger users. Radio users should change to /RPC2. The location may vary for Movable Type users, my roommate uses /mt/mt-xmlrpc.cgi

Protocol & API: Not configurable in this release

User ID / Password: For Blogger and Movable Type users, enter the same information used to log in via the web interface. Radio users may need to check their prefs.

Cache: This is the total number of weblog entries that Pocket Blog will cache. The smaller the number, the faster Pocket Blog will operate.

Blog: This is the weblog that Pocket Blog will use. Click on the Refresh Blogs button to retrieve a listing of available weblogs. Note: Errors may occur if the weblog selected contains no entries.

Click the "ok" circle at the top of the window to save your configuration changes.

Step 3: If everything is configured correctly, Pocket Blog should now be displaying a list of your recent weblog entries.

Step 4: There is no Step 4.

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Using Pocket Blog

The Main Screen

Pocket Blog's opening screen displays a list of cached weblog entries. The list may be navigated using the directional pad or by tapping the screen. When an entry is highlighted, it's cache status and timestamp will be displayed at the bottom of the screen. The cache status may be "Cached Entry", "New Entry (Not Posted)", or "Changed Entry (Not Posted)."

To edit an entry, highlight it and select the menu Edit -> Edit Entry. You may also double-tap the entry or use the action button on the directional pad (typically pressing the center).

To create a new entry, select the menu Edit -> New Entry.

Entries may also be deleted from the cache. Highlight the desired entry and select the menu Edit -> Delete Entry. Note that Pocket Blog will not (and can not) delete entries that have already been posted to your weblog, however, this facility may be used to remove new or changed entries before they are posted.

To configure Pocket Blog, select the menu Configure -> Server Settings. See the Installation Guide for more information.

The Configure menu has two items related to Internet connections. Configure -> Connection Status will display information about the Internet connection that Pocket Blog has (or has not) detected. Configure -> Down Connection will force Pocket Blog to re-discover the Internet connection. This is useful to force a re-synchronization.

Synchronization

Pocket Blog only synchronizes with your weblog when an Internet connection is first detected. To force Pocket Blog to re-synchronize, select the menu Configure -> Down Connection. This will make Pocket Blog think that it is currently offline, causing it to re-synchronize when the present Internet connection is re-detected a few seconds later.

To view Pocket Blog's connection status, select the menu Configure -> Connection Status.

The Editor Screen

When creating a new weblog entry, or editing a cached entry, the Editor screen is displayed. While this screen is displayed, the Pocket Blog cache is locked and will not be synchronized. Changes are saved to the cache when the "ok" circle is clicked.

The Editor Toolbar

The Editor supports all of the input options supported by the Pocket PC it is running on. The standard SIP (Soft Input Panel) menu appears on the right side of the menu bar at the bottom of the screen.

The Cancel button aborts any changes to the current weblog entry and returns to the main screen.

The remaining buttons will edit the selected text. From left to right:

: Inserts Paragraph tags <P></P> around the selected text.

: Inserts Bold tags <B></B> around the selected text.

: Inserts Italics tags <I></I> around the selected text.

: Inserts Underline tags <U></U> around the selected text.

: Inserts a carriage-return, replacing the selected text.

: Inserts a hyperlink around the selected text. (Implemented in v0.1.3)

: Pastes text from the clipboard, replacing the selected text.

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Release Notes

Beta 1, v0.1.5, 8/12/2002

Fix for Blogger users. Pyra has broken spec with the Blogger API, which exposed a bug in Pocket Blog's XML-RPC handling.

Beta 1, v0.1.4, 5/1/2002

"Update" button forces Pocket Blog to post updates and refresh it's cache immediately.

Several minor display bugs fixed. Thanks to Josh Puetz for reporting one of them.

Some types of errors are handled better, still much room for improvement.

Beta 1, v0.1.3, 4/14/2002

Note: Incorrectly identifies itself as v0.1.2, use the "Hyperlink" button as confirmation.

The "Soft Input Panel" is now automatically opened and closed, as appropriate.

The "Hyperlink" button on the Editor's toolbar is now functional.

Pasting support is improved.

Beta 1, v0.1.2, 4/13/2002

Major speed improvements. Caching 50+ weblog entries is now workable, although the synchronization time would be long.

Peak memory usage is reduced by several hundred kilobytes. Continuous memory usage is unchanged.

Cache file size has been cut in half.

Beta 1, v0.1.1, 4/12/2002

Initial public release. This release was tested in the Emulator and on the developer's Audiovox Maestro Pocket PC after a hard-reset. Radio Userland and Blogger have been confirmed to work with Pocket Blog.

Pocket Blog will react poorly if configured to use a weblog that contains no entries. "Don't do that."

The "hyperlink" button in the editor is not implemented. This will be fixed in the next release.

For certain actions there is a "lag" before Pocket Blog appears to be doing anything. In particular this occurs when saving a weblog entry and deleting an entry from the cache. Pocket Blog is in fact working, it just has not yet displayed the "Busy" cursor. This will be fixed in the next release.

Sometimes Pocket Blog cannot detect an active Internet connection, even after restarting Pocket Blog or re-establishing the connection. This appears to be a problem with the Winsock control in Embedded Visual Basic. Presently the solution is to soft-reset (reboot) the PDA. This will be fixed as soon as a work-around is found.

Pocket Blog will only refresh the cache when it initially detects an Internet connection. This is by design, as it is expected that the PDA will only have Internet connectivity for brief periods of time. Select the menu Configure -> Down Connection to cause a refresh.

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