Windows Live Writer Plugin - Insert Yahoo and MSN Smileys (Emoticons)

I enjoy coding and working with Graphics. So, when I learnt that creating the Windows Live Writer plugin was easy, I was really very excited about it! The best part for me was that I could create something which would make my blogging easy and probably a little more expressive.

The smily like this... :-) was okay for me,  but  is much much better! And best of all is the fact that I have it on my fingertips right now... as a plugin for Windows Live Writer. You can now insert smileys from MSN, Yahoo, Yahoo Hidden Smileys as well as Custom Smileys (which you can add/create yourself, more on this in a moment)...

Update: Smiley Plugin 2.0 for Windows Live Writer (WLW) is now ready for download.

Download the MSI file now and restart your Windows Live Writer to load the Plugin. 

You will notice a new Plugin in your WLW (Insert a Smiley) ...

 

Click on it, and you will see different tabs for MSN Icons, Yahoo Icons, Yahoo Hidden Icons and Custom Smileys. The zip file that you downloaded contains two files, one is the dll and other one is the IconsAndTags.txt. This text file contains all the URLs, so in case you find that the Icon is not visible in your GUI, you need to find the actual web URL and replace it in the Text file. The file is in a very simple Format...

MSN=URL from where Icons are loaded
TOOLTIP=Tooltip which you want to show when anyone hovers over the smiley

In the end of this text file, you will notice the following two lines...

CUSTOM=https://www.cybergifs.com/faces/smileykiss2.gif
TOOLTIP=Smiley Kiss

If you find more smileys which you want to show in the Custom Smileys, you can add the URL and TOOLTIP (both are mandatory) and when you restart your WLW, you should be able to see all your smileys!

The four tabs look as follows...

MSN Smileys, courtesy MSN

Yahoo Smileys, courtesy Yahoo

Yahoo Hidden Smileys, courtesy Yahoo Hidden Smileys

Custom Smileys, courtesy CyberGifs

I guess I forgot to tell you... you can add as many smileys as you like at one shot (even if they are from different tabs!)          

I find it pretty cool, and I hope that you will like it as well! I would love to hear from you if you have any feedback for me or if you find any bugs .

Until next time...
Rahul

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SmilyWLW.msi

Comments

• Anonymous
  April 24, 2007
  Cool, it's like the next iteration of my original plugin for Live Writer http://gallery.live.com/liveItemDetail.aspx?li=2ff4054c-45d1-42ba-8c86-cee1728d2460&l=8

• Anonymous
  April 24, 2007
  So where is it? A big "Download" button would be nice cos I can't find the link to the zip. Not even under the "all you have to do ..." bit.

• Anonymous
  April 24, 2007
  I am sorry guys! Seems like the file was not uploaded correctly. I have edited the article and you can download the attachment now.

• Anonymous
  April 26, 2007
  Hey Rahul, Which language is this plug-in written in? Just for my information!

• Anonymous
  April 26, 2007
  Hello Jigar, I wrote this in VB.NET. You can learn more about creating a WLW plugin in VB.NET from http://blogs.msdn.com/rahulso/archive/2007/04/16/create-windows-live-writer-plugin-in-visual-basic-net.aspx. HTH, Rahul

• Anonymous
  May 05, 2007
  At home, I just have Visual Studio Express editions and one downside to it is that it doesn't have an

• Anonymous
  May 07, 2007
  By the way, have you put this on Windows Live Gallery (gallery.live.com)?

• Anonymous
  May 07, 2007
  Hi Scott, Yeah, I tried doing it once, but it got rejected (probably because, I uploaded a zip file instead of MSI). I have created an MSI and uploaded it a couple of days ago, but it is still showing in Pending Approval state. Can you tell me how long it takes for approval?? And is there anything I need to take care of? I have just created an MSI and uploaded with the upload form, nothing much. Please let me know if I am missing anything! Thanks again for being in touch [:)] I have a couple of other ideas on which a plugin could be nice, let me know if you are interested and we can create them together if you like! Thanks and regards, Rahul

• Anonymous
  May 08, 2007
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  May 08, 2007
  Cool, I will check 'em out. Thanks!

• Anonymous
  August 11, 2007
  The comment has been removed

• Anonymous
  August 20, 2007
  Recently, I came to know that a few changes in Windows Live Writer Beta version made my plugin to insert

• Anonymous
  September 06, 2007
  Doesn't work with the latest WLW release, v1.2 pleeeeease!

• Anonymous
  September 07, 2007
  Hi Daniel, Can you please try this and let me know? You can mail me at rahulso at microsoft.com. http://blogs.msdn.com/rahulso/archive/2007/08/21/smileys-plug-in-for-windows-live-writer.aspx Thanks, Rahul

• Anonymous
  November 23, 2007
  Hi Rahul, first thank you for this plug-in. It is the first WLW I have downloaded so far, and it's very cute. Now I have a little question: I can see the emoticons after they've been inserted to the post, but I can't see them in the tabbed table (when I'm selecting them). They appear as "X". I should mention that, I also can't preview gifs on my computer with Windows Picture and Fax Viewer, or Microsoft Office Picture Manager. And I assume those emoticons are all gifs. I would be grateful if you could answer this little question of mine, and wish you a happy holiday.

• Anonymous
  January 04, 2008
  Hi! First, I really like this plug-in, as I prefer the Yahoo Smilies ;) (and I like to have a big choice g) Recently I tried to add some Smilies (the Skype ones...), and although I saved the file several times, the Icons wouldn't show up when I restarted the writer. And when I went back to the .txt-file, my changes were gone. I did this twice, and afterwards I was quite annoyed, as I tried to add about 60... (Was this too much?) Thanks in advance! Elisabeth (fjaeril9-schmetterling [AT] yahoo.de)

• Anonymous
  January 04, 2008
  Hi Elisabeth, I think you just found a bug. In fact, initially it was possible but due to some changes in the beta deployment I had to deprecate this feature. Watch out for this space or mail me at rahulso at microsoft.com and I would inform you when the update is done. Right now, I am a bit pressed for time, but I will do it as soon as the time permits. Sorry for the inconvenience. Rahul

• Anonymous
  July 30, 2008
  Hoy voy a hablar de dos plugins más. El primero se utiliza para subir archivos al servidor, y enlazarlos

• Anonymous
  February 06, 2009
  I tried installing this plugin but it does not work. I get and error when I click on the plugin in Live Writer. It says "Access to the path 'C:Program FilesWindows LiveWriterIconsAndTags.txt' is denied." There is not file of that name in the folder specified.

• Anonymous
  March 29, 2009
  hii yeah i would love this but the thing is i downloaded it but nothing is coming up what are you meant to do after you down load it?? plz help me by replying ?x

• Anonymous
  August 14, 2009
  hey! this is brilliant! thanks mate!

• Anonymous
  February 13, 2010
  When installing with the latest version of LiveWriter, I get this error message on Vista:

---

Send this error message to rahulso@microsoft.com

Access to the path 'C:Program FilesWindows LiveWriterSmileyInfo.txt' is denied.   at System.IO.__Error.WinIOError(Int32 errorCode, String maybeFullPath)   at System.IO.FileStream.Init(String path, FileMode mode, FileAccess access, Int32 rights, Boolean useRights, FileShare share, Int32 bufferSize, FileOptions options, SECURITY_ATTRIBUTES secAttrs, String msgPath, Boolean bFromProxy)   at System.IO.FileStream..ctor(String path, FileMode mode, FileAccess access, FileShare share, Int32 bufferSize, FileOptions options)   at System.IO.StreamWriter.CreateFile(String path, Boolean append)   at System.IO.StreamWriter..ctor(String path, Boolean append, Encoding encoding, Int32 bufferSize)   at System.IO.StreamWriter..ctor(String path)   at SmileyForWLW.InsertSmiley.InsertSmiley_Load(Object sender, EventArgs e)

OK  

Thoughts?

• Anonymous
  February 13, 2010
  Hi Charles, Please get the latest update from this place... http://www.dotnetscraps.com/dotnetscraps/post/Smileys-plugin-for-Windows-Live-Writer-Update.aspx And if you have subscribed, please update your feed to www.dotnetscraps.com :)