Insert Code into Windows Live Writer with Code Snippet

Written by: Justin Germino

August 27th, 2010 7:00 am - 9 Comments

I have been using Windows Live Writer almost exclusively for creating all of my WordPress blog content for almost a month now. Over the month I have found some missing functionality in the core Live Writer product but plugins you can download and install that add this missing functionality.

One such plugin is the Live Writer Code Snippet plugin which allows you to cut/paste various source code and have it display really neat with line numbers inside your WordPress blog post.

With the Live Writer Code Snippet, you would just click on the "Code Snippet" link on your right hand sidebar or click on Insert –> Code Snippet from top of the Live Writer menu:

Just paste the code into the top portion of the Code Snippet plugin and select the scripting language that you are pasting:

Click on the Insert button and you will have a nifty little code box showing your source code that looks like below:

#content {
    padding: 0 0px 0 2px;
}
  
#content .post .post-title .post-date {
    margin: 15px 10px 0 8px;
}
  
#content .post .post-entry {
    margin: 0 9px 0 4px;
}

You can even configure to have a solid color background instead of alternating line colors, no line numbers, and other minor style customizations. The best thing about using Code Snippet for Windows Live Writer is you don’t need to install a WordPress source code plug-in to make your code show up in this format. So this means you avoid the overhead of installing and configuring one more PHP plugin on all your blogs you want to write on.

In Summary

If you use Windows Live Writer for WordPress then you should add Live Writer Code Snippet plugin to your arsenal of plugins to help showcase your source code in a clean manner that is easy for users to cut/paste from.

-Dragon Blogger

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Article Written by Justin Germino (1579 Articles Published)

Working in the IT Industry for over 10 years and specializing in web based technologies. Dragon Blogger has unique insights and opinions to how the internet and web technology works. An Avid movie fan, video game fan and fan of trying anything and everything new.

Follow Justin Germino on Twitter @dragonblogger

T.S.Eliot

hi there, tried this yesterday. Tried it thrice actually. It did not work the first two times and I did the exact same thing the third time and it worked well. I don't understand what really happened. Well as long as it works no complains. Nice post lol.

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Udegbunam Chukwudi@Blog Setup Services

Tried it 3 weeks ago and it only worked once before it went crazy on me and stopped working! Uninstalling and Reinstalling it didn't help matters @ all :-(
.

Dennis Edell @ Direct Sales Marketing

Is WLW the only one of it's kind you've used, or just the best you've used?

Paul@ Entertainment tonight

I am not much into coding so I don't think that this would help but thanks for sharing.

Greg Ellison

This looks like a very nice plugin for Windows Live Writer. I have used Windows Live Writer once and it worked out nicely.

This application is good for people with mulitple blogs or who is not confortable with the backend of WordPress.

Thanks Greg Ellison

Laura@Banking Rates

I have to admit I'm not a coding genius, so this probably wouldn't be too much help for me, but thanks for letting us all know about it anyway! :)

dragonblogger

This plugin is for bloggers who use Windows Live Writer and put a lot of code examples like HTML or PHP snippets into their blog to show others how to modify theme files or whatnot. This is definitely a techies plugin.

Trevor B. Reed@Charleston South Carolina

Great article! Using the screen shots really helped explain your points.

Windows Live Writer Lacks Wordpress Featured Image Support says:

September 25, 2010 at 7:02 am

[...] are also some really useful live writer extensions like Code Snippet which allow you to insert html, JavaScript, php or other script code in your posts for those who [...]