Following up my recommendation post on Windows Live Writer, I promised to deliver with some of the best extensions (or plugins) that are available for WLW. Hence, I’ve spent the last week or so, researching the depths of the WLW Plugin archives (7 pages); in search of the most useful add-ons and I found couple of absolute gems!

After reading the comments, from the initial WLW post – it was clear that many people hadn’t either heard of it or have heard of it but can’t (or won’t) use it. That came a bit of a surprise to me because I thought more people would have known about Windows Live products and they had software versions for other Operating Systems (i.e. Macs).

However, that was not the case to be. Since then, I hope more of us have started using the program (or at least given it a shot). For those of us that do use the tool, I would like to share some useful plugins available for Windows Live Writer. (Maybe, you might be convinced to use the program after seeing some of these tools!) Without much further ado, let’s get straight into the plugins itself;

8 WLW Extensions

Blog This for Firefox

> Download Blog This for Firefox allows you to directly import a page’s content on to your WLW Editor. I know of many bloggers that take ideas of other people and rewrite them in their perspective, and for those; this plugin is brilliant. Just make sure that you express your opinion in your own words and avoid any copyright infringement.

Insert Code for WLW

> Download Insert Code for WLW will allow you to add code from a range of widely used languages such as; C#, HTML, MSH, JavaScript, Visual Basic and TSQL. Using the normal source editor will work most times, but when working with more complex codes; it sometimes do some really weird things… Hence the usefulness of this plugin!

Twitter Notify

> Download Just like the countless number of “automatically tweetin’ tools” out there; this plugin will add that functionality to your WLW. It will automatically send a tweet, using the account of your choice – announcing your published post. I haven’t used it yet, but seems pretty straight-forward and handy.

Word Count

> Download Quite surprisingly, WLW doesn’t have a running total on the number of words per article. That was pretty annoying but luckily this plugin fills in on that mistake. Similar to the “word count” feature found on Microsoft Word and other alternatives; Word Count calculates the number of words, characters and even spaces!

Bullets Plugin for WLW

> Download Windows Live Writer automatically synchronizes its editor with the theme of your blog, including your bullets. This is a really useful feature to maintain that flow within your blog, but more importantly within your posts. However, we all need to spice things up every now and then – this plugin adds heaps more variety to your bulletin-options.

DiggThis

> Download DiggThis for Windows Live Writer adds a very small, but well-design “Digg Button” onto all of your posts. This one is optional, especially if you already have WP-Plugins such as Sociable or other alternative Digg buttons.

However, for those of us that want a quick solution to adding a Digg button – this is the way to go.

Adsense Code Drop In

> Download I’ve always found it hard to add Google Adsense codes into my WP-Blogs. Not particularly for Blogussion (because we don’t implement any advertising) but with my previous blogs; it just don’t work sometimes. Hopefully, this plugin will make it easier for bloggers to insert Adsense codes without too much hassle!

Sharper Photo

> Download Sometimes, you just want to quick edit a photo and there’s no point opening an application such as Photoshop or something similar. Perhaps a quick crop, or a resize – Sharper Photo will allow you to do that. WLW does have a pretty decent image-editor on-board; but extra features are always welcomed!

Don’t Worry, There’s More!

These are just 8 plugins from about a pool of at least 150 WLW-supported extensions. You can find more that suit your personal needs over at the WLW Plugin Archives. If you do find one that is useful, but haven’t been mentioned in this thread – please let us know in the comments below!

Related posts:

1. Windows Live Writer: The Next Step In Blogging

2. Firefox Makes Blogging Easier

3. Is Your Blog Convincingly Secure?