This is my contribution for @blind-spot's new project: #blindtest

The idea is for users to review the several DApps available for the STEEM Network, focusing on a different DApp every week. This is the first week and we're reviewing eSteem.

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Intro

I've been using eSteem for 4 months now. Even though most of my publications are done through other DApps, I often return to eSteem to publish and article because the editor is so damn cool and simple to use.

I hardly use it to browse so I will focus this Review on what I've used the most: The Editor.

There are several versions of eSteem: Android, iOS mobile apps and Desktop programs for Windows, Macintosh and Linux.

I use the eSteem Surfer 1.1.12 in Linux Mint.

This is a stable but early release of eSteem, which means I get all the good stuff developed by @good-karma, the Founder of eSteem but none of the cool graphics created by @dunsky for the 2.0 series of eSteem, like this cute whale:

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The Editor Review

A) Writing an Article

The first thing you notice when you start composing an article, is this toolbar, at the left of the writing box.

Toolbar
	This toolbar allows the user, with a click of a mouse to format the text in a simple manner. From top to bottom, the buttons are: 1. Bold 2. Italic 3. Header 4. Code 5. Quote 6. Ordered List 7. Unordered List 8. Horizontal Rule (or Line Break) 9. Image 10. Link 11. Table

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Most of these tools are self explanatory, such as:

1 & 2) Bold & Italic

Select your text with a mouse and then click the Bold and Italic buttons to format your text. In alternative, you can also use the Keyboard Shortcuts (Ctrl+B & Ctrl+I) instead of clicking the buttons.

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3) Header

When in doubt, the user just needs to hover the mouse over it (without clicking) to see a quick help and, when available, a menu of sub-options.

For example, placing the mouse over the Header icon will show you this:

Click on the h1, h2, h3, h4 buttons to use the various types of Headers:

Header 1

Header 2

Header 3

Header 4

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4) Code

The Code icon is useful when you write an article oriented to programming, for example, and want to show a piece of code to your readers:
function helloSteem()
{
if (!Facebook && !Twitter & !GooglePlus)
then runSteem();
}

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5) Quote

Most of you will probably run into a quote from someone else which you like to share with others. That's what the next icon is for. Click on Quote and add your quote after the ">" symbol that appears, like so:

There is a theory which states that if ever anyone discovers exactly what the Universe is for and why it is here, it will instantly disappear and be replaced by something even more bizarre and inexplicable. There is another theory which states that this has already happened. ~ Douglas Adams

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6 & 7) Ordered & Unordered Lists

The next couple of icons are used to create simple lists, ordered or unordered:

List of Crypto Coins:

1. STEEM
2. BTC
3. Who Cares?

Who won't be investing in Crypto?

• Cats
• Dogs
• Llamas
• The guy waiting to buy only at the very bottom

You get the point, right?

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8) Horizontal Rule

The next icon allows you to quickly place a line separator, like the one I've been using before and each section of this article.

Here goes another one...

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9) Image

Now the fun part begins. One can't have an article without photos, right?

This icon has three options.

1. Click it once to get a code like this ![title](url). Add your external url of an image to make it visible, the title is optional...
2. Use the Upload option to insert an image from your disk...
3. Click Gallery to reuse an image you've used in the past, in an eSteem post. (Every image you upload is stored in a Gallery and you can reuse them later or delete them.)
4. Another method to add images is to drag and drop them from your disk to the editor area.

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10) Link

The next icon (Link) is to add an url to your article.

Just like in the Image feature, clicking it will give you the blank code to insert an url: [title](url).

Again, the title is optional, but if you leave it without the title, the full url will be shown to your readers. It's always nicer to use a title.

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11) Table

I believe most of us spend months in here, until we realise we can make tables!!! And it's so damn easy to do them with eSteem. Press a button and you'll see this text being added to your article:

The above text will be shown as this, when published:

You can play around with it to add or remove more lines or columns, it's all up to you.

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B) Using the Side by Side Preview

To check out how the article will look like, after being published, you have a very neat and useful preview area, side by side with your text. This is by far, the most useful part of the editor for me. Check it out:

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C) Getting Ready to Publish an Article

When you're happy with your article, from the Title to the Body and the Tags, you have some more decisions to make... and all of them are available on the tools at the bottom of the editor:

From Left to Right:

1. A combobox to select how the post Rewards should be. 50/50 STEEM, 100% STEEM POWER or Decline Payout;

2. A checkbox to tell eSteem to Upvote your own post, immediately after publishing;

3. A button to Clear All the text and start from scratch. Don't worry, there's a confirmation question, in case you press it by mistake;

1. A Schedule button, in case you want to go away and leave a post to be automatically published at a certain time. Very useful, when you go on vacations. Or when you want to write an article at night, to be published while you're working. You can Schedule several articles and set up eSteem so it releases one per day, for example.

^{Just for the fun of it... and show you that this really works, I'll program this post to be published at 22:22, today.}

1. There's also a Save Draft option, very useful so you don't lose your text in case of an electric outage or something like that... You can also be working on a bigger article and not write it all at once. Save Draft and make a pause...

2. Finally there's the Post button. Click it as soon as you're ready to publish your article.

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Conclusion

There's more to eSteem than just the Editor, I know, but I haven't been using it as it seems to me that part of eSteem Surfer 1.1.12 for Linux has still a long way to go...

There's also a feature missing from this Editor which will be included in the following version: the Spell Checker.

So, as you see, the program is good and only keeps on improving.

I have no doubts the 2.0 release which is currently on beta testing will make it a lot better. So, my review will not talk about the other parts of eSteem. Maybe later on I can review those other features, when the version 2.0 comes out of the beta testing phase.

eSteem is one of the most cool looking apps for the Steem Network and I'm glad that there are people like @good-karma and @dunsky working on it. Both of them are very active users of Steem and sticked with us through the best as well as through the worst times.

I'd also like to mention there's a good incentive, in the form of upvotes, for some of the posts published through eSteem.

Make sure you use the tag #esteem when you publish through this program/app, in order to raise awareness to those who don't know about eSteem yet.

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I hope you have enjoyed this review... and I hope I can see you entering your own review of eSteem for the #blindtest project until the end of the day.

Here's the link to the #blindtest project, by @blind-spot:

• #BLINDTEST . Let's talk about your project. -Coming to life

And here's the link for the eSteem website, where you can download it:

• eSteem Official Site

You have the various versions available, so you can try version 1.1, which is pretty stable or the version 2.0, which looks a lot of better but it's still in a beta testing phase, which means not everything will be perfectly tuned and you might encounter some glitches.

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@trincowski signing out...