Running a blog on a personal website can be a little tricky as there is a database to look after.

Thingamablog is a solution to this problem as it holds the information on a local computer and then publishes updates as and when they are needed.

It is written in Java so it should work on any operating system that has the Java Runtime Environment installed. You will need the FTP details for the website.

This download is the Windows installer. Installers are also available for Linux, or there is a zip file with the Java files needed to run the software. Some people have even got the software to run on a USB key for use on different computers.

There are 16 templates included with a fair range of styles. A built in news reader makes it easy to find and quote other stories.

Creating posts is simple and the toolbar includes all the formatting options that might be needed so there is no need to learn HTML.

It is not possible for readers to leave comments because the pages are generated locally. According to the FAQ, there are third party addons for Thingamablog for this purpose.

There is also a list of blogs using this software from the Thingamablog website.