FSP 1.1

Preview and edit on same page

MT needs to show both the preview and the edit screen at once.

When I'm re-editing because I didn't like what I saw in the
preview, I have to leave the preview, go into the edit, and
then I can't remember what I'm supposed to change in the
edit window.

I need to see what's wrong in the entry (the preview) when I'm
fixing it (the edit).

Here's a sample preview:

I see several things I'd like to correct:

I leave preview, go into edit:

Now, did I want to make five changes or six ?
Are there any changes needed in the second paragraph,
or can I keep scrolling down ?

Am I done yet ?

Some forum software does better:

Discuss

set date = now

MT's edit entries tools need a 'set date = now' button.

How to use it:

On January 01, compose but do not publish an entry, Pay Taxes;
MT assigns a date of Jan 01 to this entry.

Wait, then compose and post more entries in February and in March.

Return to entry Pay Taxes, edit and publish it on April. 15

A problem is that by default, Pay Taxes will never
get its day of fame as the most recent entry. It will be published
listed at its original creation date, January 01, and will be listed in
the archives, but never on top of the blog as most recent entry.

A solution is to add a simple way to adjust the entry date to
date of publishing. In this example, when publishing Pay Taxes
in April, the author clicks on Set data=Now, and the
date of this entry is once and for all locked to be April.

Adding an MT category index in 22 steps

Here's how I put the MT link on the left.

1. In the master menu, choose FSP (name of my blog).
   
2. In the FSP menu, choose categories
   
3. In Categories, create and save an MT entry.
   
4. return to the FSP menu.
   
5. select blog config.
   
6. select archiving.
   
7. turn on category archiving.
   
8. go CoreSetup tab.
   
9. note the directory location specified for archives.
   
10. SSH into the web host.
    
11. cd to the archive directory.
    
12. ls cat*.
    
13. copy the output of ls to an editing buffer ( a vi session, teachtext, Word2003, etc).
    
14. edit the ls output to linkify: change cat_MT.html to
    < a href="archives/cat_MT.html" > MT < /a > .
    
15. back to the MT FSP Editing Menu.
    
16. select templates.
    
17. select Main index.
    
18. between Recent Entries and Links, add
    in the linkified text.
    
19. to get the Categories, copy the div
class=sidetitle and div class=side
    from another section and edit accordingly.
    
20. save.
    
21. rebuild (you may lose your work if you rebuild before saving).
    
22. Enjoy.
    

MovableType is great, but could benefit from some task oriented walk through
the process documentation.

Read categories and ask yourself,
How would a reader find the categories ?
How would a blog author tell the reader what categories there are ?

Movable Type User Manual: CATEGORIES
Table of Contents
CATEGORIES
Edit Category Screen
CATEGORIES

Movable Type allows you to enter a list of categories, then assign one or more
categories to each of your entries. This allows you to keep track of your entries
from a maintenance standpoint--for example, when listing your entries you can
choose to list entries only from a particular category--and it can also be used to
provide a categorization structure to your archives.

Each entry can be assigned one primary category and any number of
secondary categories. The primary category is used when you wish to display
information about only one of the categories to which an entry is assigned--for
example, when using the <$MTEntryCategory$> tag. When you wish to display
a list of all of the categories to which a post has been assigned, you can use the
< MTEntryCategories > container.

The difference between primary and secondary categories is not one of ranking
but rather of usage--your secondary categories are not necessarily ``lesser'' or
``lacking in importance'' when compared to your primary category. Rather, the
difference is one of usage: the primary category is the category which will be
displayed when using the <$MTEntryCategory$> tag, or when linking to the
Category archive for an entry using <$MTEntryLink
archive_type="Category"$>.

You can manage your list of categories in Movable Type by logging in, selecting
a weblog, then clicking Categories. Add new categories by typing their labels
into the empty text entry boxes; the system always shows five empty boxes, so
if you fill up the first five, just press SAVE and you'll get five more.

Edit Category Screen

By clicking the Edit category attributes link, you can edit some additional
metadata regarding the category. You can associate a description with each of
your categories. This description can then be used on your archive pages, for
example, as introductory text describing that particular category and the entries
within it.

You can also manage TrackBack-related information for the category:

TrackBack URLs to ping
Use this field to associate a list of TrackBack URLs with a category. When you
post a new entry into this category on your own site, each of the URLs you have
listed will be pinged with information about this new entry.

Accept incoming TrackBack pings
When you turn on a category's ability to accept TrackBack pings, the system
sets up a TrackBack item for this category so that remote sites will be able to
send pings to your site, notifying you of new entries that fit within the category.
These pings can then be displayed on your site, allowing you to build a
repository of links relating to a particular subject.

After clicking the ``On'' checkbox, save the changes, and the system will give
you the TrackBack URL that other users can use to ping your category.

Passphrase Protection
If you only wish to allow a certain set of users to send TrackBack pings to your
category, you can set a passphrase for the category. Users who wish to send
pings to your TrackBack-enabled category will need to know the passphrase in
order to ping you.

This is a good way to enable ``private'' TrackBack items; even if someone can
guess the TrackBack ID, he will not be able to send a ping unless he knows the
passphrase.

This is optional. If you do not set a passphrase, everyone will be able to ping
you without providing a passphrase.

You can set up category archiving in your weblog configuration--select a
weblog, then click Weblog Config. In the Archive Configuration section, under
Archive Frequency check the box next to By Category.

Copyright © 2001-2003 Six Apart. All Rights Reserved.

MT embargo

MovableType [MT] needs better workflow control for articles.
Currently, articles are one of
1. non-existant
2. draft
3. published
4. deleted.

I suggest another publication mode, embargo, which is post-draft, but pre-published.

How to use:
Draft: Compose and revise.
Embargo: save and wait
Publish. make public if date greater than now.

list categories of entry

I'd like an easy way to list all the categories an entry currently has,
and add categories in the context of still seeing already assigned categories.

modular page comosition tool

I'd like for MT a higher level page composition tool which would
enumerate the available widgets:

calendar [ ]
archives [ ]
entries [ ]
links [ ]

etc
then let me choose to include or exclude them.

Secondly, it would allow me to sort and columnize the selected-for-inclusion
widgets.

If you've setup an account at my.myway.com, the advantage of this
method over hand editing template files is obvious.

upload img from URL

MT's UPLOAD FILE needs to allow selecting to upload IMG
from an URL, not just by browsing the local disk.

Currently, I browse and see an image.
1. Right click, save as
2. Open a new browser tab,
3. Open MT
4. Select Upload image

This new feature could skip steps 1-3, and
add step
0. Copy image location.

Staged Pictures

When I upload images in MT, I choose between

* immediately creating a new entry using that image; and

* having MT show me the HTML for the image I just uploaded,
and copying that HTML to the clipboard. Then, I hope I don't
get distracted and copy and paste something else before I
need to retieve the HTML code.

There's no way to re-generate the HTML for an already uploaded
image.

I'd like a third option, to add picture to library where MT would
build an index of all uploaded images (whether uploaded via MT,
or otherwise placed in the image-archive director).

This new feature would display the list of images and beside each would be:

* a link to the HTML to copy and paste into an entry to use that image

* a list of and links to entries using that image (think of this as a categories
feature where each image is automatically its own category).

This feature would also generate a list of images not used
in any entry. Orphan images.

Since MT already has a thumbnail generator, this feature could optionally
include thumbnails in the lists of images it generates.

Note: I've refered to images here because that's how I've been
using MT: upload an image, and let Mt generate a thumbnail and the HTML code
with correct width, etc, for the image. The current MT feature is actually
UPLOAD FILE, but I haven't explored what it does if I upload a sound or
movie file.

MT Primary Category or Keywords

The Main Menu > FSP 1.1 Editing Menu > Create New Entry page
says Primary Category; the Customize the display of this page page
says keywords.

In any case, it only shows one category, and hides the other
categories even if more than one category has been specified.

What are keywords ?

Keywords:
The Keywords field can hold whatever type of data you want to put in it; it is
geared for holding metadata or keywords about your entry, and is not normally
displayed on your public site (though you can display it using the
<$MTEntryKeywords$> tag). It is searched when a user performs a public
search on your site, so you can use it to tag entries with words that may not
normally appear in the entry body.

Movable Type

Moveable Type has added a couple of interesting features.

One of those is Trackback which tracks links to specific posts/pages
from outside sources.

Entry-to-entry communication: for each post you write, you can allow
others to receive ping notices when it's updated. Or, you can track specific
posts on other sites for updates, and recieve notices when they are.

Category-to-category communication: you can set up your categories to
allow ping notices, which means that whenever you post an item in, say, your

"Information Architecture" category, you can automatically announce this to
other people/blogs. Also, you can expose any of your categories to other
blogs so that a post somewhere else is announced to one of your categories.

(Password-protection is available for this system as well)

That means that if I use the category name "Information Architecture" and
you use "IA - Resources and Stuff", that our posts, comments, and categories
can still create permanent links to each other automagically, even if our
category names change.

Some additional examples of use scenarios have been posted.