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Blogs & Your Subscriptions

When you first launch Desktop Dean, you will be presented a list of popular Dean oriented Weblogs ("blogs") that you can subscribe to. Some are official blogs of the Dean campaign, such as Blog for America or Iowa for Dean. Others, like Dean Nation, are run by pro-Dean supporters and offer valuable independent analysis. As more special interest groups create their own communities and blogs, such as Latinos for Dean, they will be available as well. Tens of unofficial regional blogs are covered, from Alaska for Dean to Seattle for Dean. You can even keep tabs on other candidates, including Bush-Cheney and Wes Clark.

A sample subscription list follows. It has been compressed to reduce space:

indicates I am subscribed while means I have not subscribed. You can change your subscriptions at any time, of course, and as new feeds are added to the master list Desktop Dean will automatically inform you of new or deleted feeds. The up-to-date master feed list is available here. Please contact us if you have any suggestions or additions or corrections.

A Quick Tour of the User Interface

By default Desktop Dean will pop-up it's tiny window when a new message is received. Here's a screen shot:

Here is a close-up of the Desktop Dean window, with major features highlighted:

As new messages are received they are appended to the end of your message list. Desktop Dean will normally jump to the first new message it has received unless you recently viewed an message, in which case you can click the "New Messages!" link to jump to new message(s).

By default, clicking any link within the a message will launch Desktop Dean's compact, built-in browser:

In the screen shot above New York Times article link was clicked in the Desktop Dean window. You can also configure Desktop Dean to launch your default Internet Browser instead, such as Internet Explorer, Mozilla, Opera, or AOL.

When you are finished reviewing messages, simply click the button. Desktop Dean will close the compact browser and it's popup window and hibernate in the "tray icon" area near the system clock:

Click the icon to show or hide Desktop Dean.

Navigation

Click the and buttons to navigate through your messages. You can also use the ← and → cursor keys on your keyboard.

All of the above support auto-repeat. For example, you can press and hold the button or → key to quickly navigate through your messages.

If you want to jump to the first alert, right-click the button or press your HOME key. Likewise, to jump to the last message right-click the button or press the END key.

To Delete or Not Delete, That is the Question

• You don't have to delete messages! Desktop Dean will keep up to 99 or 999 of your most recent messages (which to use is configurable through the program options). If you go beyond 99/999, the oldest messages you have will be automatically deleted. That's first-in, first-out for you fellow geeks.
• If you would prefer to delete messages as you read them, keep in mind that you are moved to the next message when you press the button. So you could use this instead of the button. You can also delete the current message using the DELETE key on your keyboard (see below for other keyboard shortcuts).
• You can delete all messages through the program menu. Click button and select "Delete All Messages ..."

Feed Tips

Some blog feeds provide the full text of their blog messages for download, and thus Desktop Dean can present the full message. For example, Blog for America normally provides the complete blog entry, links and all, in their feed. When this is the case you can read the entire message within Desktop Dean.

Some blogs, however, only provide the first few sentences from a blog entry in their feed. If this is the case the message inside of Desktop Dean will be truncated and you will normally see a "more" link you can click to read the entire message. For example:

You can always click the message's title to bring up the full message or the feed name to go to the blog's homepage.

When you first subscribe to a feed, Desktop Dean will show only the 5 most recent messages for the feed. After the initial download of a feed, Desktop Dean will present as many messages as it can from each feed. Most feeds will only send their 15 most recent blog entries. So if you have been away from your PC for a few days and a feed is very active, it is possible you will have missed some messages.

If you subscribe to a very large number of feeds and have been away from your PC for an extended period of time, it is possible that your new messages exceed your 99/999 limit. In this case Desktop Dean will prune the new messages, ignoring the older messages in each feed.

You can review the feeds you have subscribed to by selecting "Display Your Feeds and Archives" from the menu. Desktop Dean will display a scrollable list of your subscriptions in it's window:

Clicking a feed name will display the feed's home page, usually a blog, in the compact browser or your external browser. You can edit your subscriptions by clicking the "Edit Subscriptions" link at the bottom. You can also edit your subscriptions by choosing "Options ..." from the main menu.

Click "Done" when finished.

Built-In Browser

By default when you click a link in a blog message Desktop Dean's compact browser is used. This browser has a built-in popup blocker: when a page tries to open a window that you did not request, you will hear a beep (this can be disabled) and a message will appear on the browser's status bar:

You can mouse over the area if you want to see what was filtered. You can click the warning to launch the filtered Webpage in a new window.

Normally Desktop Dean will know whether you requested a popup window by clicking a link vs. a Webpage launching a popup window on it's own. But if you ever click a link and nothing happens, check for the message.

By default, when you minimize Desktop Dean by clicking the button the "primary" built-in browser that may be open is automatically closed. If the browser had opened a new window -- for example, to view a video -- this window will not be automatically closed. The reverse is not the case: closing a built-in browser has no affect on the Desktop Dean message window.

When you move Desktop Dean around the screen the built-in browser is automatically moved as well. You can disable this and tweak other features in the Browser tab of the program options.

The built-in browser is not supported on Windows NT 4.0. Your external browser will always be launched on NT4.

E-Mail Features

Desktop Dean has powerful built-in e-mail capabilities. It can create new e-mail messages using your default e-mail client (Outlook, Outlook Express, AOL, Eudora, Netscape, and others) as well as two popular Webmail systems: Hotmail and Yahoo! Mail. By default Desktop Dean uses whatever mail client is configured in your Internet Options control panel. If you want to use Hotmail or Yahoo! Mail instead, select "Options ..." from Desktop Dean's menu, click the E-Mail tab, and then click the appropriate radio button.

You can send create two types of e-mail: send a blog entry or send a Webpage.

E-Mail the Current Blog Entry

From Desktop Dean's message window, bring up the menu and select "E-Mail This Message to a Friend". For example:

Depending on your e-mail client, either the blog message (as downloaded by Desktop Dean) or the URL of the blog entry will be sent. AOL does not support a standard called MAPI which allows full messages to be sent. So for AOL e-mail a brief summary of the message is sent instead with a link to the full message. AOL's new "AOL Communicator" does not have this limitation. It is much more feature rich e-mail program that you might want to try and is developed and supported by AOL.

Desktop Dean does not really send the message: it launches your default e-mail client and fills in the subject and body. You can then address the e-mail to whomever you chose and add your own comments. For example, if you are using Outlook 2000/XP you would see something like the following:

Remember, not all e-mail programs can accept the full blog message. For some a truncated version will be sent along with the URL to the full entry. For others only a URL to the full entry will be sent.

E-Mail a Webpage from the Built-In Browser

You can also send any page that is being viewed in the compact browser. Just click the button that looks like a mail envelope. Here's an example:

Depending on the page and the capabilities of your e-mail program you will have one of three options:

• Send URL - just send the URL
• Send Page as Text - this is all some e-mail programs can handle or all their APIs allow
• Send Page as HTML - sends the same thing you see on screen; some pages won't e-mail well because of embedded multimedia or complex Web markup: always look for a "print this page" or similar link and mail this version of a Webpage instead

Send URL is always available; Send Text and HTML may be unavailable for certain pages or if your mail program does not support MAPI fully.

DeanSpace Event Support

Many regional Dean groups use DeanSpace, an open-source content management system, to manage their online activities. DeanSpace provides a simple global event calendar which users can view and create events in. If these events are included in the site's front page "feed," Desktop Dean will notify you when new events are schedule.

1. The date and time of the event will be displayed at the bottom of the message.
2. You can click the " event detail" link to view any additional event information in the browser. This might include RSVP instructions.
3. You can click the " export event" link to create an appointment for this event in your calendaring program. Your calendaring program must support import of vCalendar .vcs files. Microsoft Outlook and Palm Desktop version 4.0 support this.

Keyboard Shortcuts

You can use your keyboard instead of the mouse for most operations:

Menu

Menu Summary:

Look for New Messages Now!		Forces Desktop Dean to look for new Blog entries. Normally the message server is contacted in the background every 15, 30, or 60 minutes depending on your preferences.
Delete All Messages ...		You will be asked to confirm that you really want to purge all messages.
Reset Message History ...		More a debugging and experimentation tool than anything else, selecting this will reset Desktop Dean' internal database so that it: deletes all messages, "forgets" all the messages it has already seen, and connects to the server to download messages.
E-Mail this Message to a Friend ...		Launches your favorite mail program and inserts the latest message in it. You can then use your program's address book and distribution lists to e-mail the message to others.
Copy Message to Clipboard		Copies a text version of the current message to the clipboard, including the URL to the article. Both plain text and HTML versions are copied.
Copy Message URL to Clipboard		Copies only the URL to the full message to the clipboard. For example, http://blog.deanforamerica.com/archives/001582.html.
Display Your Feeds and Archives		Displays a list of the feeds you have subscribed to in the program window. Clicking on a feed will bring up the feed's homepage. Click the "Done" link when you are finished to restore any message that was previously being displayed.
Always on Top		If checked (), Desktop Dean will always be in front of other applications when it is open. This is the default.
Options ...		This lets you configure all program options, including those available in the setup wizard.
Look for New Feeds ...		Normally Desktop Dean will look for new, modified, or deleted feeds once a day in the background. This forces an update in real-time. You might use this if you contacted us about a new feed and we added it. No more waiting for your feed to popup!
Look for Application Update ...		Forces Desktop Dean to see if there are any program updates available. Normally the program checks for updates once or twice a day.
Feature Tour & Help		Note you can keep this window open while you use the program.
Technical Support		Launches the tech support homepage.
Websites		This sub-menu contains links to various Dean-oriented Websites as well as a link to the Desktop Dean homepage.
About ...		View program version information, copyright, software license agreement, and credits.
Exit ...		Quit the program completely.