I was responding to some frustrating formatting issues being experienced by community member, Mark Hendry of C21 Pro Realty Group in Blue Ridge GA.
He was trying to import a blog article he had drafted on a desktop application, Dreamweaver, and was having problems getting it to upload onto his ActiveRain blog publisher.
During the course of our phone conversation, I asked why he was crafting his articles on Dreamweaver, rather than using the ActiveRain publisher?
He responded that whenever his blog muse would inspire him, he iiked to just go into Dreamweaver, knock out a few sentences, then save it for a later time when he could finish it up.
I asked him, "Why don't you just us the ActiveRain blog publisher and save your articles to 'Draft' mode?"
There was a short pause on the phone.
"The 'Draft' mode? What's that?
I explained that he could easily accomplish the same thing using his ActiveRain blog publisher, and simply scroll down to the 'Draft' mode in the 'Visibility' box before saving.
This 'Draft' mode is a feature that I personally use all the time. Like Mark, my blogging muse strikes at the most inopportune moments, so many times I only have a few minutes to throw something up, and hit the 'Draft' button, saving it until I have more time to complete my post.
There was a line from the Tim Allen movie "Galaxy Quest"....
"It's the simple things in life you treasure!"
I just love that draft feature. I use it all the time. I have some still sitting in there I better get too!
thanks for the helpful tips as usual
I believe the confusion is due to the fact that in AR you 'publish' to draft and not 'save' to draft. The semantics here are incorrect which makes it confusing. They really should make a 'publish' button and a seperate 'save' button. I think there are lots of people who do not know you can click the 'publish' button without having the blog post published?!?!?!?
I loved Galaxy Quest!
Rich, it is certainly one of the most helpful features! Because I have 3 different computers, I am often writing on my laptop but need a picture from my desktop, 3 feet away. I can just save it as a draft, run over there, log in and finish the post!
I love that feature. Use it all the time.
Your quote on it is the simplist things in life that you treasure. Yes it is and I need to remember it as I keep overthinking the Mac apps, I'm so use to a PC.
Rich,
With the recent changes does the Draft Mode now save your work periodically while your composing? It did not use to do that. I often would lose my work when an interuption to my wireless would happen.
Also another thing I noticed ( before ) was that when you saved something to draft for a few days, that when you finished the product it had the date stamp of when it was first entered not when it was completed. Is that different now?
Rich, Call me crazy but after I wrote one of my first blogs I hit draft, then publish just to see what happened. I figured if it actually got published I could just delete it right away, but I didn't have to. It is a great feature to store some great blogging ideas before they are ready to post.
Thanks Rich. Being a newb and all, I did not know we had this feature. I will have to check that out.
Herb: We now have an 'Auto-Save' feature (yipee!) And I totally agree, the time stamp should apply when you actually publish, not when you save it to draft. I will forward that onto our techno dudes.
Robert: I completely agree. The semantics are misleading. I'll share your suggestions to the powers that be. Thanks!
Rich ~ The draft mode is awesomely helpful! Sometimes I start writing and get interrupted by a phone call, and the draft mode saves it for when I have more time. Thanks for the explanation.
Gee, Learn something new everyday! Thanks Rich!!!!
Rich to the rescue again. I am sure that there are a number of member who are not aware of that feature.
Rich, I use draft mode from time to time. Though usually I write an entire blog post in one sitting. However, for those times when you don't have the energy or time, or get interrupted, I find draft to be very helpful
It took me forever to find out about the Draft choice. Kristal Kraft was kind enough to answer my question, and tell me where to find it!
Hi Rich...I always use the Draft function. In fact I even wrote a blog sometime ago mentioning that I would prefer Draft as my default. I always like to see how the post looks, especially if I've added pictures, before publising it. It also gives me a chance to think if I want to add or delete something.
Kate
Rich,
I come from a generation that is a little skittish about the "draft". We had some presidents, back in the 60's, that really liked to use the draft function!
Hey Rich, I've started using the 'draft' to 'save'. It would be so cool and less confusing if they were seperate buttons :~)
Learning something new everyday! I know about the Autodraft feature, but I didn't about the Draft. Now I do.
How does one import an Excel file into Active rain? Having problems figuring that out. Thanks
Rich, it would be great if 'draft' were the default. Even Active Brad accidentally posted one day when he thought he was putting it in draft mode! I agree that it's a wonderful tool to have. I like to write, look at, sometimes sleep on it before posting a blog.
I learned this long ago from a fellow rainer who shared the info by chance - but this is great to share with others - I was really limiting myself when I didn't know about the draft feature and it made me crazy going back and forth with it when trying to link once I had already gone "live" - I think I lost some readers during that time ;-)
As an AR newbie, I have discovered several features, including the draft, by playing around on the site. I clearly remember the "lottery" associated with the draft of the '60s. I also enjoy reading other member's comments and find that additional questions and concerns of mine are often brought up. Thanks for your tips and suggestions.
Great title and YES I do know about the draft feature. I also use it to put in graphs, etc. to see which look clearer when testing out different programs. I wish we could do a little more in HTML then we wouldn't have to use NVu, Dreamweaver etc. I know that you guys will be working on that soon!
Rich, thanks for the tip. Didn't know this, but will use it for my next post.
Rich - I didn't know about Draft mode until blogging for a year. Duhhh me... I would write, then keep re-posting corrected article :)
The draft feature is great. I use it for my website blog and ActiveRain all the time. It lets me jot down a few lines when I have inspiration for an article as you said, or write up an article and save it for posting at an appropriate time.
Well I could have had a v8
HI Rich - I appreciate the auto-draft feature so if I get bumped offline I don't lose everything I've done, but I have noticed that if I take awhile to finish a particularly lengthy post, it shows as having been posted at the time it was first saved as a draft, instead of the time I post it publicly. This means that I will get fewer readers and comments because it doesn't show up on the first page of blogs. It goes immediately to a back page with older posts.
I think some of my posts never get seen by many, and those who find it are ones who come to my blog for the Wordless Wednesday and then stay to look at a few other posts. Maybe it's just me who thinks they're good posts. Consequently, I seem to feel more secure if I draft longer posts on Word and then copy into AR and just format and add photos, etc on AR.
Until your new draft feature, i must have lost over 10 posts. One of the reasons I probably hadn't blogged last year as much as I could have. I love the new feature and thanks for it!
Gracious...
I haven't read the comments so forgive me if someone has already brought up my question.
When I save my posts in draft they are posted on the day I saved them. Let's say I started a post on Jan. 16. I finish writing the post on Jan 20. When I take the post out of draft the post date is Jan 16. Has that been an issue for anyone else?
TLW...ROAR!
Rich,
My biggest complaint and the reason I don't use it is the problem of when it's published that you discussed above. Also, it would be nice if we could change font color and size without having to go to HTML.
I have a terrible time remembering that I have junk in draft... Aside from that, it is a great tool.
I quite often get into a writing mood during the weekends when all the sports are on. The problem that I have with the ActiveRain draft mode is that the drafts keep getting pushed to the bottom as I comment. If I do 30 comments each day, those drafts can be a few billion scrolls away. So I use Word to do all my drafts and then paste it into ActiveRain, at which point I use the draft mode to insert pictures and make sure everything looks good.
Thanks for the information on draft. I do forget about it!
I love this. Everyday I learn something terrific on Active rain.
I haven't tried the draft feature. I just usually work in word and then cut and paste. It has always worked in the past, but I haven't been around recently. Does that still work with the new website?
Kim: You'll find that importing your draft articles from Word will carry with it some added and unwanted coding that may throw off your content, or cause problems. I always recommend drafting your articles here on AR.
I use the draft feature a lot. I had never noticed that the date was when I created the draft not when it was published; probably because I have never kept a post in draft longer than one day.
If you kept a post in draft for several days and then published it, where would it appear in the chronology of your posts? Would it be back in the list of old posts if that was when it was first started?
Rich, Thanks again for the great tip! I'm a newbie here and was wondering how to do that.
LOL. I knew about the draft feature, but I couldn't figure out how to use it. DUH. You might actually be a cool person. A 24 fan and a Galaxy Quest quote. My favorite line "The maching always stops at 1"
I just recently figured out the draft feature when learning to post a you tube video on AR. I've only been blogging here for a few months, but what a relief. Now I use it for a multitude of things.
Wow...was wondering how to get back to the drafts...thanks! Can't believe I didn't realize that.
Ahhhh, I just did a search on how to do this as a Website I intend to add a link back to is currently down and I don't want to publish the blog until I'm sure whatever the problem is is fixed. The Website is our Local Newspaper's and this is rare that it has problems.
So, thanks so much for this "oldie but goodie" blog I am now comfortable for stashing it in "DRAFT" and coming back later.
Sue of Robin and Sue
Yay! I've been trying to figure this out for months! :-) Thanks!!
Thank you - I did a search to find out this information and you had it all laid out for me.