Recovering Windows Live Writer Files

Ever lose a stash of old blog posts to a defunct app and wondered if they were gone for good? That’s exactly what happened to Ben Overmyer — years of drafts and published posts trapped in Windows Live Writer’s proprietary .wpost format after the blogging platforms and the app itself faded away. Small files, big memories; a digital attic full of content that, until recently, he couldn't open.

The rescue

Reverse engineering isn’t his wheelhouse, so he turned to an AI helper. It has been reported that he asked Cursor to write a Python script to extract the .wpost contents — and on the first pass, it produced Markdown files. Not stopping there, he had Cursor go back for a deeper sweep to hunt embedded images. The AI apparently found them too, pulling pictures that hadn’t been online in years.

The code and what’s back

Overmyer made the extractor — wlw-extractor — available on Codeberg so others with old Windows Live Writer files can do the same. He also published a list of recovered posts and rebuilt the content on a Zola-powered site; all material is released under CC BY-SA. In short: posts and images thought lost to the Internet’s dustbin are now back where they belong.

There’s a beat of triumph here — digital archaeology that’s equal parts curiosity, luck, and tooling. Want to be sentimental? Call it rescuing younger versions of yourself. Practical? It’s a reminder to keep your formats open or your backups tidy. Either way: mission accomplished.

Sources: benovermyer.com, Hacker News