June 05, 2003
Adding a "Sideblog" in MT

Following in many other people's footsteps, and answering a need/wish I've had for a while to "bookmark"/post links to interesting/random stuff without neccessarily writing any further comments, I've added a "sideblog".

For the technically minded who want to do similar using Movable Type, my reciepe is:

  1. Create a new blog in MT
  2. Create an index template containing only the HTML you want to include on your normal blog frontpage:
    <MTEntries lastn="15"> <MTDateHeader> <br /> <$MTEntryDate format="%Y-%m-%d"$>: <br /> </MTDateHeader> <$MTEntryBody$><br /> </MTEntries>
  3. Edit the main index template of your main blog to add something like this (assuming you are already using SHTML, if not; instructions follow below):
    <div class="sidetitle"> Further random reading </div> <div class="side"> <!--#include virtual="sideblog/index.html" --> </div>
  4. Test; if the SHTML include is not parsed and you use Apache webserver, make sure SHTML enabled by editing your .htaccess file to include the XBitHack (some webservers will automatically parse SHTML if you rename your index file to index.shtml instead of .html, but in this case you might want to set up an additional redirect in case people have linked to the index.html file directly). If switching on the XBitHack for the first time, you should also remember to update your umasks in the MT config file
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Comments

I'm sorry if my questions sounds ridiculous but I'm creating my first MT blog and wanted to implement a sideblog that you mentioned above.

If I installed movabletype as it is (I don't think I use mysql or any database), will your solution work? I didn't install MT myself so I'm not sure. I don't even know how to find out from the documentation/help.

Does the "<!--#include virtual="sideblog/index.html" -->" work for me with just MT installed as it is?

Thanks for your help!

Posted by: Gilbert on February 4, 2004 03:02 PM

Gilbert, the include statement needs to point to wherever you choose to locate your sideblog index page (see the archive settings / config of the new MT blog you need to set up (step 1)). If you didn't set up your first blog yourself, I advise you get a little bit of guidance on this one, as you want to make sure the files are stored in the correct locations/etc

Happy blogging!

Posted by: Anders on February 4, 2004 03:16 PM

Hello.
I'm trying to get the sideblog to work.
I've created a sideblog @ http://www.cubiclewars.com/mt/sideblog/
I have tried the below code in my main blog's html, but still it doesn't work:

<div class="sidetitle"> Daily Links</div>
<div class="side">
<!--#include virtual="/sideblog/index.html" -->
</div>

any ideas?
Thanks very much!

Posted by: Charles on May 1, 2004 04:30 PM

Charles - try
<!--#include virtual="/mt/sideblog/index.html" -->
instead (note the /mt :-) )

Posted by: Anders on May 2, 2004 03:27 PM

Thanks for the quide, but two questions:

I did what you said, but the problem seems to be that my server is not keen on reading .shtml at all, thus when I go to the blog www.vishistorica.com/brain/ what is showing is the index.html. I would actually have to type in /index.shtml. What should I do.

Then, even when I do that, this is the error I get: [an error occurred while processing this directive]

Posted by: Khodadad on November 4, 2004 05:24 AM
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