Introduction
We use Movable Type blogging software to enable motorcycle travellers around the world to enter their stories easily and without our intervention. For an example of a blog produced with this software, see Ken and Carol Duval's story.
- You can enter your story from any Internet cafe using only the browser.
- Scan pictures using the available scanner and software in the cafe, then upload them to the story.
- You can allow readers to sign up for notifications when you post a new entry, so your friends and family don't have to go to the site to check if there is an update.
- You can also allow readers to add comments to your entries, or not, depending on how thick-skinned you are ;-) You can even delete their comments if you don't like them. (NOTE: Comments are currently turned off due to heavy spamming. Sorry, blame the scum spammers.)
Request your free personal blog here. The form will give us the information we need to set up the blog. After that, the following should be everything you need to know.
As always, thanks for your patience and continuing support.
Grant and Susan
Movable Type User Manual
- About Movable Type
- Getting Started
- Categories
- Entries
- Uploading Files / Working with Images
- Comments
- Notifications
- Archiving
- Syndicate this site
- Rebuilding Files
- Backing Up Your Files
- Troubleshooting
- Feedback
- Copyright & Usage
About Movable Type
Movable Type (http://www.movabletype.org/) is a web-based personal publishing system. It is designed to ease maintenance of regularly-updated news or journal sites, like weblogs, commonly known as 'blogs'. It includes support for the following features:
- Support for multiple weblogs/journals.
- Support for multiple authors.
- Entry categorization -- group your entries into categories for your own reference, for archiving purposes, and for display in your blog.
- Multiple archiving options -- creates monthly archives of your content; individual pages for each entry; and archives by category.
- Built-in comment system -- at your option, allows your visitors to post comments on your entries and engage in conversations. Movable Type supports comments either inline in your blog, or in popup windows; it also allows you to selectively exclude commenting on certain posts.
- Email notification system -- maintain lists of users to whom notification messages can be sent when you post a new entry.
- Integration of file and image uploads -- upload files and images, and seamlessly integrate them into new posts.
- Pre-date or post-date your entries -- Movable Type allows you to override an entry's date stamp.
- Delete entries -- Movable Type allows for true entry deletion, allowing you to clean out old or unwanted entries.
- Hold/Release status -- allow for content editorial and approval by setting entries to Hold, then let an editor approve by marking Release, at which point the entries will be published on your site.
Getting Started
Logging In
Login at: http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/cgi-bin/mt/mt.cgi
- Use your user name and password from the HUBB. If you don't have one, let us know and we can set it up for you. HOWEVER: note that past this initial entry, the two are not linked, any changes you make to one does NOT affect the other, so you could end up with two different logins if you change one.
- Passwords and user names are CasE sEnsiTiVE!!!
- IF the computer you are using is shared, e.g. an Internet cafe, DO NOT tick the 'Remember me:' box. This feature puts a cookie on the computer and would allow others to log in to your account. Also, if Windows offers to remember this password for you, just say NO.
- Once Logged in, you should see the Main Menu screen:
- IMMEDIATELY: Edit your profile - be sure to add your birthplace so the password recovery feature will work. Remember, if you change your password on this screen, it will no longer be the same as your HUBB password.
- Nickname is not currently used.
- Don't set up Bookmarklets if you are NOT on your OWN computer, or you will be allowing anyone who comes after full access to your blog.
- The users manual (this document) is available from the HELP menu at the top of the screen.
- NOTE: ALWAYS "LOGOUT" when finished, don't just close the browser window. If sharing a computer, this can open your blog to the next user.
- After editing your profile, click on 'Manage Blog'. This will bring up the Editing Menu:
- Read the next brief section on Navigation in Movable Type.
- Then click on 'Edit Categories' to create Categories - see below.
Navigation
Movable Type uses the same 7 icons throughout to allow you to move between screens. The icons are explained briefly below in the order you will see them, with links to the detailed explanations in the remainder of this manual.
 |
Create New Entry |
Allows you to create a new entry, see Entries |
 |
Upload File |
Allows you to upload an image file from your local computer, then provides the code you need to put the image in your entry. See Uploading Files |
 |
Rebuild Files |
Necessary if you have added categories or changed the category assigned to an entry so that Movable Type can correct the site pages. See Rebuilding Files. If you don't see a change you have made, reuild files. |
 |
List & Edit Entries |
Brings you to a list of your entries. Allows you to view all entries or a subset of them, delete entries, and Search and Replace text in all entries. See Search and Replace |
 |
Edit Categories |
Allows you to add or rename categories. Also indicates how many entries are in each category, which may be useful to know before you make any changes. See Categories |
 |
Edit Notification List |
Allows you to add or delete e-mail addresses of users who wish to be notified when you post to your site. See Notifications |
 |
View Site |
Opens your site in a new browser window so you can see how your entries will look. This is also how you Backup your files. See Backing up your Files |
Categories
Movable Type allows you to create a list of categories, then assign one category 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. If you wish to use categories, we suggest either countries or perhaps continents?
- Note: Each entry will actually be on 3 pages - its own page, its category page, AND a monthly archive page.
- 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. Categories cannot be deleted, but they can be renamed.
- Think carefully about which categories you want to use and enter them in the correct order. The current version of Movable Type displays categories in your blog in REVERSE order of their creation. In other words, the most recently added category will always be at the TOP. This is NOT apparent in the editing menu, where it sorts alphabetically. (We have requested this be corrected in the next release of the software).
- Any categories which don't have entries will not display, so you can create categories in advance of having actual entries for them.
After you have created your categories and saved them, return to the 'Editing
Menu' by clicking on the link. Click on 'Create new entry'.
See Entries below.
Entries
Create New Entry
Entries form the basis of your blog. You can create a new entry by logging
in to Movable Type, selecting a blog, then clicking 'Create New Entry'
.
This will take you to the Create New Entry screen.
When creating a new entry, you will have the chance to enter information as follows:
- Title
The title of your entry does not necessarily have to appear on your blog; it is required, however, for sorting and display purposes in Movable Type itself. - Category
You can choose a category for your post for categorization or archiving purposes. A drop down menu of the categories which you previously created will be displayed for you to select from. You can only have one category per entry. See Categories above.
- Excerpt
You can enter an excerpt from your entry, or use this field to provide a summary of the content therein. If you do not provide an excerpt, it will be automatically generated by selecting the first forty (40) words from your entry, followed by an ellipsis. (...) - Blog Entry
This field is what will show in the index pages. Keep it reasonably short - approx. 1 paragraph. Both the Blog Entry and the More (Extended) Text will be displayed in full when someone clicks on the entry from the index page. In either the Blog Entry or the More Text you may use Bold, Italic, or Underline to highlight text by selecting the text and clicking on the B, I or u respectively. - More (Extended) Text
Collectively this field and the Blog Entry field above make up the body of your entry. You can use the two fields however you like: you could split up your entry over the two fields, or you could completely ignore the More text and enter only the Blog Entry text. Movable Type allows you to split up your entry for more flexibility in the display of that entry; for example, if you write very long entries, you may not want your entire entry on your index pages. You can use the two fields to control what gets displayed, and where. - Status
Default is 'Release'. Entries with Status set to 'Hold' will not be published to your blog. So you could create a draft entry, continue to edit or add to it, then when you are ready to publich, change its status to Release. - Allow Comments
Specifies whether you would like users to be able to post comments on this entry. See Comments below.
You can use the PREVIEW button to preview your entry before posting; CANCEL will return you to the List Entries page WITHOUT saving it.
Edit Existing Entries
After you have saved a new entry, you will be transferred directly into editing
mode for that entry. You can also edit your existing entries by clicking 'List
& Edit Entries' ,
then clicking on an entry from that list.
When editing an existing entry, you will have two new options:
- Authored On
Movable Type allows you to pre-date or post-date your entries by modifying the Authored on date and time for an entry. If you change this value, you must use the format YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS (HH:MM:SS are optional, and will default to 00:00:00); otherwise you will get an error. - Delete
You can delete an existing entry by pressing DELETE ENTRY; you will then be asked to confirm that you really wish to delete the entry. Agree, and your entry will be deleted.
Note that, upon saving an entry that is marked for Release, your archives for that entry, along with all of your indexes, are automatically rebuilt. Thus you do not need to manually rebuild your files (see Rebuilding Files , below) after posting a new entry, or after editing an existing entry. You do need to Rebuild Files after creating new Categories or changing the Category assigned to an entry.
Entry-Editing Shortcuts
If you are using Movable Type on Internet Explorer for Windows, you can make use of a couple of keyboard shortcuts while editing your entries, to automatically insert HTML formatting tags. To use these shortcuts, select the text you wish to format in your entry, then press the appropriate keyboard shortcut combination:
For those who prefer mouse to keyboard, remember you can also click on the icons as indicated below.
Search and Replace
From the List and Edit Entries screen,
you can use Movable Type's Search and Replace functionality either to
search through all of your entries for a particular string, or to replace all
instances of a string with another string.
You have the following options when using search and replace:
- Case Sensitive
If you would like the search string to be treated in a case-sensitive manner, check the Case Sensitive box. This means that the string foo will match foo, Foo, fOo, etc. - Regular Expression Match
If you would like the search string to be treated as a Perl regular expression, check the Regular Expression Match. If you are unsure what this means, you would do best to leave this box unchecked. - Search fields
By default, search and replace operates on the Title, Entry Body, and Extended Entry Body fields of each entry in your blog. You can tune the search and replace to operate on only a subset of these fields by checking and unchecking the Search fields boxes.
IMPORTANT: You cannot Search and Replace in just one entry, and there is no undo feature, so be careful when you use the replace functionality.
We recommend you make a copy of your Movable Type entries to your local hard drive before using replace, for backup purposes. See Backing up your files. Note: The Export feature in the screen above DOES NOT work at this time, and you will get an error message.
Hyperlinks
Putting in a hyperlink to anything is straightforward.
To get:
This webpage
as a clickable link, you just put the following in the code:
<a href=http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/tstories/mt/docs/mtmanual.shtml">This webpage</a>
It will look like this:
Uploading Files / Working with Images
Movable Type offers an interface for uploading files--either .jpg images or .HTML files--onto the webserver for use on your site. MS Word or Word Perfect documents, Powerpoint files, movie and sound files, etc won't work.
Uploading Images to your blog
Before you start, you should have Sized the image (using your image editing program) appropriately:
- 500 pixels (screen size) max. for an Embedded image (shows in line with the text)
- 800 pixels (screen size) max. for the Popup image (shows when a link is clicked on)
Export the image as a .jpg file at a reasonable compression ratio - usually between 30-40%. When looked at in your file manager, the image file should be no larger than 80 kb. Larger images may not display properly on the screen, take too long to download and annoy users on less than super fast systems.
NOTE: When naming the image file, DO NOT USE spaces or accented characters. Some browsers cannot read files with spaces in the names, which means some of your friends and family may not be able to see the pics!
Bad: my picture of Iquazu falls.JPG
Good: my-picture-of_Iquazu_falls.jpg
To upload a file, log in to Movable Type, select your blog, then click
Upload File .
The following screen will appear:
- Choose a File - Browse your hard drive to choose the file you wish to upload.
- Choose a Destination - Then choose where you would like to upload the file to. After choosing a destination for the uploaded file, click UPLOAD.
- When uploading images, ALWAYS leave the default as "images" - without the quotes, as in the above picture.
- If you are uploading other files, such as .html files, you should upload the file into the root directory of your Local Site Path, by deleting the world 'images' in the text box on the right. (See Introductory Page - Intro.htm below for more details).
- If a file with the same name already exists in the destination directory, you will have the option of overwriting the existing file; if you choose NOT to overwrite the existing file, you should rename the file locally and upload it.
After you have uploaded a file, you will see the following screen.
- You have the choice of either creating a new entry using that uploaded file, or just displaying the HTML used to link to the file. If you have uploaded an image, and would like to create a new entry with a link to that image so it can be seen in line with the text, select Create a new entry using this uploaded file, and click EMBEDDED IMAGE.
- If you are already editing an entry, then you won't want to create another new entry (and perhaps lose the one that you are working on); so in that case, click the Show me the HTML button and click EMBEDDED IMAGE. This will display the HTML code for opening the image in a popup window. You can then copy and paste this code into the entry you are editing to display the image in line with the text on the entry.
- Note: Embedded Images should be no larger than 500 pixels wide. This allows for the viewer to see the image without scrolling horizontally on the page if they are not viewing the page on a large monitor.
- To Center an image on the page, just put <center> above the image code shown in the figure above, and </center> below it. Note the spelling must be exactly as shown.
- Popup Image - You can also use either of the above options to create a Popup Image, if the image you are uploading is larger than 330 pixels wide. In this case, the HTML code creates a link in the text, which the viewer can click on to see the entire image. Note: Popup Images should be no larger than 640 pixels wide.
Putting images into your blog from Yahoo, Hotmail or any other remote picture storing/album website.
Photo editing: You can edit photos online with any one of a number of good free services - for reviews of the majors, see:
http://labnol.blogspot.com/2006/06/online-photo-editors-compared-gifworks.html
http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,2108968,00.asp
If those links are broken, things have changed! Try googling for:
or any combination of those and see what you find. If you find one you really like, let me know and I'll list it here.
There are lots of sites now that make it really easy to store hundreds of images, create photo albums etc. You can post a link on your blog to these albums (See Hyperlinks for details on linking to files.)
Or you can just put a link in your blog so that the picture shows up inline in your blog, and just looks like it's a part of the webpage.
Here's how to do that:
- In your blog, paste the following into the Edit field where you want the picture to show up.
<img src="http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/tstories/images/mypicture.jpg" width="400" height="300">
- Next, to link to an image, you need to find the full path and filename, or url, (Universal Resourse Locator) of the image you want to display. Open a new browser window and navigate to your online photo album.
Depending on the site, you may be able to see the image only, in which case the url will be something like:
http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/tstories/images/mypicture.jpg
Note the .jpg extension at the end. If it's not .jpg, or .png, .gif (unlikely) it's not what you want. In that case, right-click on the image and select Properties at the bottom of the menu.
In Internet Explorer, select and copy the contents of the Address: (URL) field. Note the Dimensions: e.g. 400 x 200 pixels. You'll need that.
In Firefox, select and copy the contents of the Location: field. Note the Width and Height: dimensions e.g. 400 x 200 pixels. You'll need that.
(It doesn't look like you can select the contents of those fields, but you actually can - just click and drag your mouse, and seclect ctrl-c to copy.)
- Then back in your blog Edit field, all you need to do is paste that URL into the line you inserted in step 1 above, replacing the placeholder url (the bold text below) with yours:
<img src="http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/tstories/images/mypicture.jpg" width="400" height="300">
Substitute dimensions, and you're done. It'll take about 10 seconds once you've done it.
- As below, you can add then alt text and centering.
Combining Embedded and Popup Images (advanced users only):
Before you start, you should have:
- Sized the two images (using your image editing program) appropriately (330 pixels max. for the Embedded image and max. 640 pixels for the Popup image).
- Uploaded them in Movable Type, so they are in the correct directory. You should also copy the code which Movable Type provides into a text document, then use it to combine the images, following the guidelines below.
We will use an example from Ken and Carol Duval's blog to show the code. See 'Playing with Trucks in Pakistan' to see how it looks, then follow the steps below to use it for your own images.
1. Example - the following HTML code will produce a centred 330 pixels wide image, with an option to Click on a link for a larger 640 pixels wide image.
<center>
<img alt="Iranian petrol sells on the black market in Pakistan."
src="http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/tstories/duval/images/BlackMarketPetrolPakistan-330.jpg"
width="330" height="215" border="0" />
<a href="#" onclick="window.open('http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/tstories/duval/images/BlackMarketPetrolPakistan-640.html', 'popup',
'width=640,height=417,scrollbars=no,resizable=no,toolbar=no,directories=no,location=no,menubar=no,status=no,left=0,top=0'); return false">
<font size="1">click for larger image</font></a>
<p class="caption">Iranian petrol sells on the black market in Pakistan</p>
</center>
2. Customizing the code for your own images. The only changes needed to this code are: the Alt text and Caption; the paths to the Embedded and Popup images which contain your directory and the image names; and the image size. I have indicated in Bold Red the only parts that you should change to customize it for your own image.
<center>
<img alt="Iranian petrol sells on the black market in Pakistan."
src="http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/tstories/duval/images/BlackMarketPetrolPakistan-330.jpg"
width="330" height="215" border="0" />
<a href="#" onclick="window.open('http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/tstories/duval/images/BlackMarketPetrolPakistan-640.html', 'popup',
'width=640,height=417,scrollbars=no,resizable=no,toolbar=no,directories=no,location=no,menubar=no,status=no,left=0,top=0'); return false">
<font size="1">click for larger image</font></a>
<p class="caption">Iranian petrol sells on the black market in Pakistan</p>
</center>
3. After you have customized the code, copy the amended code into the blog text in the appropriate location, and Save the page. Look at the page in your browser and see if the results are what you expected. If not, go to Section 4 and see the explanations for what each part of the code does.
4. Step by step - if you encounter any problems, you should read the following to see what might need correcting.
<center>
(aligns the image in the center of the page. Note that </center> must be used at the end of the block of code to close the code, or else subsequent text will also be centered.
<img alt="Iranian petrol sells on the black market in Pakistan."
This is the text that will show if the person holds a mouse over the image, or if they can't display the image. By default, Movable Type will display the file name of the image here, unless you give it the text to display. We suggest you use the same text as for your caption (image description) below.
src="http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/tstories/duval/images/BlackMarketPetrolPakistan-330.jpg"
This tells the browser exactly where to find the image. The format should always be http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/tstories/yourname/images/imagename.jpg.
width="330" height="215" border="0" />
This tells the browser what the size of the image is. When you upload an image in Movable Type, it will show you this code so you can copy it into the blog. Note the /> at the end closes the code which began with <img alt="... HTML code is very precise, and as a rule, if you have a < you must have a /> to close the code. Otherwise, you will get unexpected results.
<a href="#" onclick="window.open('http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/tstories/duval/images/BlackMarketPetrolPakistan-640.html', 'popup',
This command tells the browser what to do when the person clicks on the link, and exactly where to find the larger image. Note that Movable Type creates an .html page to display the popup image when you upload a Popup image, so the link is to the .html page, not to a .jpg file. This is why you must have uploaded the images correctly before starting to do this process.
'width=640,height=417,scrollbars=no,resizable=no,toolbar=no,directories=no,location=no,menubar=no,status=no,left=0,top=0'); return false">
This tells the browser what the size of the larger image is. When you upload an image in Movable Type, it will show you this code so you can copy it into the blog.
<font size="1">click for larger image</font></a>
This command displays the link under the image to click for a larger image. Note the /> at the end closes the code which began with <a href="#".
<p class="caption">Iranian petrol sells on the black market in Pakistan</p></center>
This command displays the caption (image description) under the picture, in small text. Note the </P> to close the caption code, and the </center> to close the centering for the image(s) and captions. (The case matters for "caption". "Caption" won't work.)
This whole process seems painful, but once you've done it the first time, it's really not difficult to repeat it for other images, and it does make for a very professional looking page.
Introductory Page - Intro.htm
At the top of the index page of your blog you will probably want to have an introduction to you and your trip.
We recommend that you keep it short, only a paragraph or two, with a single picture. You can have links on it to other files, which you can of course upload as well. These files are ordinary html files, with .htm or .html extensions. (Do NOT call them index.anything!)
In these additional files you can put information such as equipment lists, route planning information with maps, bike preparation information and photos, and anything else you like.
In order to have the inroduction always at the top of the index page, the introduction section requires a special file, intro.htm. All you have to do is put the text you want in the file and upload THE FILE intro.htm using the blog file upload software.
Intro.htm formatting
The intro.htm file has to be formatted in a special way, as it is "included" automatically inline in the main page. IMPORTANT NOTE: It is NOT an entry - do not paste the code into an entry.
You can download the default intro.htm file by going to your website address and adding intro.htm to the end of the url, e.g. "http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/tstories/yourname/intro.htm" and then View source, and save that.
Or you can create one: the intro.htm file must be formatted as follows: (and if it's greek to you, just send us the text and photos you want in your intro and we'll take care of it for you. Also the names and descriptions of any files you want to put up as well, so we can insert the links.)
<!-- Start of the file - nothing goes above this line, don't change the following at all -->
<div class="content">
<!-- Your text, and html links and tags goes in the blank space below this line. -->Your stuff here in RED! Straight simple html.
example:
<p>This is all about us!</p>
<p>This is a new paragraph.</p>
<a href="bike.htm"> This is a link to a page about our bike</a>
<!-- This is the end of your text, don't change the following at all -->
</div>
<!-- end of the file - nothing goes below this line -->
NOTE that there are no HEAD or BODY tags, or anything else above or below these lines. Anything else will break the page.
If you are lost and befuddled at this point, just send us the text and photos you want and we'll take care of it for you.
If you have uploaded intro.htm, and the index page is broken, and you're not sure what to do, let us know, and send us the file so we can fix it for you. In the meantime, upload a BLANK (absolutely nothing in it) intro.htm file. This should recover your page for you.
Comments (Optional)
Comments are currently turned OFF due to heavy comment spamming by spam scum. Sorry. A new system we are working on should help sort this.
Notifications
After posting a new entry, you may wish to send email to your readers, to inform them of the new entry. Movable Type makes this easy with its notification system. Your viewers can 'sign up' for a notification when updates to your entry are posted to the site.
Managing the Notification List
- You can manage this notification list--either add a new address, or delete
addresses from that list--in the Edit Notifications
section of Movable Type.
Sending Notifications
Notifications are never sent automatically when you post a new entry, as you may not wish to notify your readers immediately, and also you may wish to send a message with the notification.
- To send a notification to your readers on a particular entry, first go to
List and Edit Entries .
Select the entry for editing and click on it. In the Send a notification
section, enter the text of the message you would like to send. You can also
include the excerpt from your entry, or the entire body of your entry, by checking
either of the checkboxes to the right. The message sent to your readers will
include a link to the entry, followed by the message that you enter.
Archiving
Your site will be automatically archived by individual entry, monthly, and by category.
- Full (Archive) Index - Lists all entries and excerpts the first 40 words of the actual entry, if there is no excerpt. If you prefer to summarize the entry for indexing purposes, you can create your own excerpt when creating or editing the Entry.
- Monthly Index - Displays all entries for that month in their entirety, including pictures, with the most recent entry at the top. The reader can navigate to the previous month or the next month's entries, return to the home page or click on the right-hand menu to go directly to other entries for that month.
- Category Index - Displays all entries for that category, in their entirety, including pictures, with the most recent entry at the top. The reader can return to the Home page or click on the right-hand menu to go directly to other entries in the category.
Syndicate this site
This allows users to access an RSS feed (which your blog automatically generates) using a tool like BlogExpress in order to easily keep up-to-date on a number of sites. Read the BlogExpress page for details on this new technology.
Important Note: If you don't want people using BlogExpress or any other RSS feed program to have trouble:
- In the Title and Excerpt fields you must stick to simple ASCII characters when
doing data entry:
- Never copy text from a Word document for these fields - always type it in manually to prevent problems.
- Do NOT use "true" apostrophes or double quotes (probably pasted from Word etc., often called "Smart Quotes") - use ' or " only. Those are the characters on the keyboard beside the enter key on most keyboards.
- Do NOT use any accented characters used in foreign languages.
- Everywhere else you can use whatever characters you want.
- An easy way to strip the problem characters is to paste the text into Notepad, then copy from there and paste into the Excerpt field. It may not get all accented characters, so check carefully.
- You can test that your blog is okay (valid) by viewing your page in Internet Explorer and clicking on the
icon
halfway down the right hand menu of your page. If there is an error, it will show you the text just before the error. The next
character is the problem character. Edit it in your blog entry, and test again. If the problem doesn't go away, go back to the
main page and force a refresh, by clicking on the Refresh button while holding down the shift key. You may even
need to close ALL Internet Explorer windows and then open a new one and try again. (IE's caching is a little stupid here).
Rebuilding Files
When you make changes to your category names, you will need to rebuild your files to see those changes reflected on your public site. Note, however, that when editing an entry, or creating a new entry, you will not need to rebuild your files: editing and creating entries automatically rebuilds the archives for that entry, and updates all of your indexes.
- When you do need to rebuild your files, log in to Movable Type, click on
Manage Blog, then click Rebuild Files .
Rebuild all Files is selected by default, and should not be changed.
Click REBUILD to start the process.
- Note that rebuilding all of your files can take a good amount of time, particularly if you are using several different types of archiving; please be patient, and do not abort the rebuilding process.
Backing up your files
Before doing a Search and Replace on an entry or multiple entries, you should make a backup of your files. Currently the procedure is clumsy, we hope to improve it in the next version.
- To make a backup, Click on View Site.
The home page of your site will appear. Click on the entry you wish to save.
- In Internet Explorer, go to File, then Save As. You can use the defaults or change the File name to whatever you wish.
- If you save as 'Web Page, complete', all images will also be saved again, so the page will look exactly like it looks on the website.
- If you save as 'Web Page, HTML Only', images will not be saved. When
viewed on your local machine, the image will be replaced by a small red X in
a box (as below) where the picture would normally be. Note the image still is
on the server, so will display properly on the site.
- If you save as 'Text File', any HTML code (such as that which calls the images) will be gone, as will formatting such as Bold or Italic, but all text will be intact.
- Note: Netscape has fewer options for Save As, choosing its defaults will save the text and images.
- We do make an automatic backup of all blogs on a daily basis - but we make no guarantees that the backup will be complete or up-to-date. If we are away on a trip, the backup may not happen at all.
Troubleshooting
I keep getting the Movable Type login screen
The problem: you log in to the system and get the Main Menu; but every link you click on that screen brings you back to the login screen.
- The reason for this is likely that you have cookies disabled in your browser. Movable Type uses a cookie to store your authentication credentials; in this cookie, your password is one-way encrypted, so this is not a security risk. If you do not allow this cookie, however, Movable Type has no way of knowing that you have already successfully logged in, so it will present you with a login prompt when you try to do anything.
- To fix this problem, you will need to enable cookies in your browser.
I can't logout!
The problem: you are logged in to Movable Type; then you logout, and try to login as another user (for example). But you are still logged in as yourself.
- This is probably due to your browser having several versions of the Movable Type login cookie. The reason this might happen is that the cookie is dependent on the domain name; so if you have two different domain names that access the same Movable Type installation, and you use both to get there, you will get two versions of the Movable Type cookie. If one domain name is a substring of the other domain name--for example, if one domain is www.foo.com, and the other is foo.com--then you will need to log out of both sessions in order to truly logout. To do this, load Movable Type on both domains, and log out of both sessions.
- This can happen if for instance you access the site via http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/cgi-bin/mt/mt.cgi and http://horizonsunlimited.com/cgi-bin/mt/mt.cgi - both of which will get you there, but are considered to be different domains to the cookie.
- Because of this, it makes sense to always access Movable Type through one single domain name - use http://www.horizonsunlimited.com/cgi-bin/mt/mt.cgi only.
Feedback
We have adapted this manual from the original one supplied by the program's authors. We have tried to simplify it, and also provide screen shots so you can compare what you are seeing on the screen to the instructions. Please let us (Grant and Susan) know via the feedback form how you find it to use, so we can improve it for future users.
Copyright & Usage
Movable Type is Copyright 2001, 2002 Mena G. Trott and Benjamin Trott. All rights reserved.
All content you enter into YOUR blog is YOUR copyright. We reserve the right to reproduce it in the Newsletter or other HU location with full credit to you.