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potofsoup[DW for tumblrites masterpost]
Is there a way to make drafts on DW?
Yes, but not well.
Let's start with the simple stuff:
If you leave some text in the "Post" box, it is auto-saved.
This means that you can start something on mobile and finish it up on the computer, or start something at home and finish up at work.
But there's no official way to save posts as drafts.
So here is my solution:
Create private posts with forward-dating. Then copy-paste into a new post when ready to post.
There's a lot to unpack there, so let's go step by step.
I've already talked about post privacy here. But if you make a post as private, you're the only one to see it.
Editing the date:
You can edit the date of every post, by clicking edit date in the top area above the posting box:
You can set the date to any day, past or future, and you can choose whether it shows up in your reading page. There's also a checkbox of whether you want it to show up in your followers' Reading Page / Dash or not.
AND: you can view all of the posts for a specific day by going to the page for that date, either by going to your calendar or going directly: https://potofsoup.dreamwidth.org/2018/12/11/ is for Dec 11 2018.
THIS IS SUPER HELPFUL for hiding and finding private posts. You can create a stash of notes or post drafts to yourself on Jan 1, 2000, and find them by going to yourusername.dreamwidth.org/2000/01/01 (you can try it for me). You can even do a thing like hiding your to-do list on one day, your secret angst on another day, and your post drafts on a third day. :D
small aside about calendar:
btw: if you go to your username.dreamwidth.org/archive, it's your calendar, which lists the # of posts you made each day:
If you click on the number on each day, that takes you to that day. If you click on "View Subjects", it lists all the titles of your posts.
Anyway, all this forward- and back-dating of things works because for the DW system, there is a difference between your Entry Date and your Posting Date.
The calendar and your own blog displays things by Entry Date, which is why forward-dating something puts it at the top, and back-dating puts it at the bottom. BUT, the Reading Page displays things by Posting Date. So even if you forward-date an entry, it still shows up on the reading page at the time that you posted it. And if you posted something a long time ago as a "private post" to save it as a draft, the posting date is still in the past.
This means 2 things:
1) When you are porting a lot of stuff over from tumblr and stuffing it into the archives via backdating, you need to decide whether you want it to show up on your followers' Reading Page or not.
2) When you are reading to post something from your Secret Drafts Area, you need to copy-paste the text of that draft and post it as a new post, so that it has the right posting date.
So, like most things on DW: doable, but not elegant.
Is there a way to make drafts on DW?
Yes, but not well.
Let's start with the simple stuff:
If you leave some text in the "Post" box, it is auto-saved.
This means that you can start something on mobile and finish it up on the computer, or start something at home and finish up at work.
But there's no official way to save posts as drafts.
So here is my solution:
Create private posts with forward-dating. Then copy-paste into a new post when ready to post.
There's a lot to unpack there, so let's go step by step.
I've already talked about post privacy here. But if you make a post as private, you're the only one to see it.
Editing the date:
You can edit the date of every post, by clicking edit date in the top area above the posting box:
You can set the date to any day, past or future, and you can choose whether it shows up in your reading page. There's also a checkbox of whether you want it to show up in your followers' Reading Page / Dash or not.
AND: you can view all of the posts for a specific day by going to the page for that date, either by going to your calendar or going directly: https://potofsoup.dreamwidth.org/2018/12/11/ is for Dec 11 2018.
THIS IS SUPER HELPFUL for hiding and finding private posts. You can create a stash of notes or post drafts to yourself on Jan 1, 2000, and find them by going to yourusername.dreamwidth.org/2000/01/01 (you can try it for me). You can even do a thing like hiding your to-do list on one day, your secret angst on another day, and your post drafts on a third day. :D
small aside about calendar:
btw: if you go to your username.dreamwidth.org/archive, it's your calendar, which lists the # of posts you made each day:
If you click on the number on each day, that takes you to that day. If you click on "View Subjects", it lists all the titles of your posts.
Anyway, all this forward- and back-dating of things works because for the DW system, there is a difference between your Entry Date and your Posting Date.
The calendar and your own blog displays things by Entry Date, which is why forward-dating something puts it at the top, and back-dating puts it at the bottom. BUT, the Reading Page displays things by Posting Date. So even if you forward-date an entry, it still shows up on the reading page at the time that you posted it. And if you posted something a long time ago as a "private post" to save it as a draft, the posting date is still in the past.
This means 2 things:
1) When you are porting a lot of stuff over from tumblr and stuffing it into the archives via backdating, you need to decide whether you want it to show up on your followers' Reading Page or not.
2) When you are reading to post something from your Secret Drafts Area, you need to copy-paste the text of that draft and post it as a new post, so that it has the right posting date.
So, like most things on DW: doable, but not elegant.
no subject
Date: 2018-12-23 02:16 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-12-23 02:46 am (UTC)::nodnod:: Yeah, I generally use the autosaved draft. But I also know that some folks like having 3 or 4 different drafts of different posts. :)
no subject
Date: 2018-12-23 04:22 am (UTC)Unfortunately, it's not really useful for scheduling. Drafts apparently has a publish feature for certain sites? I see Mailchimp and Buffer on the list so maybe you can do automate scheduling but with a lot of initial fiddling?? I leave this to greater minds than I to figure out.
no subject
Date: 2018-12-23 04:36 am (UTC)Interesting!! I'll poke at it some more to see what happens. Apparently there's a Chrome extension? Thanks for the awesome tip! <3 <3 <3
no subject
Date: 2018-12-23 05:23 am (UTC)But there's no add-on for my Firefox browser so that's a moot point. It seems really useful though since it works on any textbox.
I also read...somewhere that people use the Post through Email function to schedule posts, so maybe that would be the simplest workaround to a queue?
no subject
Date: 2018-12-23 05:38 am (UTC)Oooo! Post through Email is definitely a good way to schedule posts, especially since a lot of email has scheduling now. I'll look into it some more! (I'm on FF, too, so yeah -- chrome extensions are not that helpful)
no subject
Date: 2018-12-24 01:38 pm (UTC)Damn, I should have kept up with the features updates. Thanks for the heads up!!
no subject
Date: 2018-12-24 02:46 pm (UTC)Interesting! Does it work for multiple different drafts?
no subject
Date: 2018-12-24 03:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2018-12-24 08:43 pm (UTC)What I mean is like.... Can I draft 1 post about birds and another post about Steve and another post about cookies, and be able to choose which to post
no subject
Date: 2018-12-25 06:55 am (UTC)Which is why I think it could be useful for those who want to crosspost their content on other sites too because all it needs is a textbox.
no subject
Date: 2018-12-26 03:45 am (UTC)That does sound really handy!! Thanks for poking around! <3 <3 <3
no subject
Date: 2019-01-07 04:59 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2019-01-07 05:51 am (UTC)!!! What a great tip! Thanks so much! I'll definitely put it in the post when I update it! <3