Comments on: Rebuilding a portfolio

By: Johan Sahlen

Johan Sahlen — Wed, 14 Jan 2004 15:48:17 +0000

I've just created my first site using MT, and I wanted to use it for more than just the blog. I took on a different approach though. I found the excellent plugin/hack ExtraFields, which allows you to add any number of fields you want, and you can name them whatever you want. The downside is you need some basic knowledge of MySQL. I use it to post a movie reviews blog. I have a field called 'Rating' where I can enter a number, which I use in the MT template to show n amount of stars. I decided not to use MT for the portfolio though, as I want to be able to upload an image + a thumbnail directly from the browser. MT's upload file function is just inferior as of yet (in terms of not being able to set defaults, like upload folders and such), but I'm keeping my fingers crossed for a batch upload plugin or something to that effect. Until then I'll just use the simple PHP/MySQL setup I wrote, but MT really has a lot of potential to be a quite complete CMS.

By: eric!

eric! — Tue, 22 Jul 2003 07:06:59 +0000

your writeup was a pretty interesting read… i JUST redid my own portfolio about two weeks ago with a similar method. my requirements are slightly different, so i’m using the fields for different things, but the result is pretty similar.

the new porfolio is miles easier to update than my old directory-driven PHP system, and entries have absolute links now. when used with zempt it’s almost too easy to use.

By: Submunition

Submunition — Sun, 20 Jul 2003 20:17:37 +0000

I am glad to see the amount of thought that people have put into the topic of extending MT. I have been experimenting with it for a number of different projects, and the ideas presented here really help.

I am trying to decide if it is worth it to set up a blog for each section of my site, with a sort of master template that they will all conform too.

Its exciting and overwhelming, there are so many ways to do this, and so many applications of the Movable Type tool that it is starting to boggle the mind.

It’s probably high time I finished the MT flash interface…MMMM…

By: Robert Denton

Robert Denton — Fri, 18 Jul 2003 18:38:21 +0000

one way to limit publish/draft is to have a staging site and a production site.

I edit the menu.tmpl and add js logic to write out a URL particular to each blog which calls a cgi shell script (basically rsync and a few other things) to make the changes “live” — currently this is available to any author of the “blog” but it’s not a stretch to think of making another page linked in with authorization which then linked to the publish script.

By: huphtur

huphtur — Fri, 18 Jul 2003 00:44:51 +0000

re #10: alex,
those are not frames.
its simple div tag with overflow:auto;
also used here: http://etnies.com/bmx/team/ruben.alcantara/
(validates correctly)

By: Beto

Beto — Thu, 17 Jul 2003 20:21:50 +0000

You have answered my prayers!!! For years, the portfolio section has been my biggest headache when redesigning my site, because of the sheer number of entries and my lack of knee-deep MySQL knowledge to come up with a better solution. Even ventured into Flash and XML for a while, but never got satisfied with any of these. But I do have and know MT… can’t wait to start implementing this one on my forthcoming design.

By: alexBuda

alexBuda — Thu, 17 Jul 2003 19:30:28 +0000

FRAMES
Doug, I need your help and sugestion (and of who else can give me some light on this).

Today I went to http://exp.hicksdesign.co.uk from a Zeldman note. So far so good. How ever, is the frame effect Standard?

You see I wanted to use that effect for same time now…

Can you give me some light?

Keep up the good work!

By: huphtur

huphtur — Thu, 17 Jul 2003 07:12:23 +0000

doug & jay: my apologies, i did have a faulty firebird build. i installed the latest nightly build and both doug’s and jay’s rollover now work. sorry about the ‘false’ bug reporting.

By: Doug

Doug — Thu, 17 Jul 2003 02:38:55 +0000

Dan: The one thing we will need MT Pro for is author permissions regarding Publish rights -- we'd love to allow multiple authors to edit content, but set only certain users to publish the content to the live site. Unless Jay or someone else knows of a solution, this doesn't seem possible in the current version of MT. There is currently no separation in concept between saving changes to a "Published" entry in the MT database (i.e. a temporary local save), and re-publishing entry edits to the live site. They happen at the same time. If an entry still exists in "Draft" status, then it seems possible, though I haven't figured out the permissions checkbox combination to make it possible. This would also require an entry to already be in (or be set back to) "Draft" status anyway, which isn't really an acceptable solution. Despite the confusion between "look" and "girlie" on definitions, this MT forum topic may help clarify the situation: Problem with editor permissions. Sounds like "look" wants the same thing, and that you're right: we'll have to wait for MT Pro's Author Management feature.

By: Doug

Doug — Thu, 17 Jul 2003 02:10:52 +0000

Huphtur: I saw your note to Jay in a previous comment about the rollovers on his site crashing your browser as well. The rollovers on Jay's site and the ones in my portfolio are implemented using completely different methods. His use JavaScript, mine use CSS. I've tested both sites in Firebird 0.6 on two different systems, and I haven't seen one problem yet. If you continue to have this problem, you must have a very unstable build of Firebird. Simple rollovers should not crash your browser. If you installed a new version of Firebird over an old version without deleting all old files first, the installation instructions warn that you WILL have problems. If I were you, I'd revisit Mozilla's Firebird page, and do exactly as the instructions recommend. Might save you a lot of headaches in the future.

By: huphtur

huphtur — Thu, 17 Jul 2003 01:43:50 +0000

doug: the new rollover crashes my browsers (firebird 0.6)

By: Paul Michael Smith

Paul Michael Smith — Wed, 16 Jul 2003 22:48:57 +0000

Doug, are you ever away from your computer mate ? You seem to get a hell of a lot done. ;-) Makes me jelous.

By: Dan Rubin

Dan Rubin — Wed, 16 Jul 2003 21:31:05 +0000

I love what you’re doing with MT — we’ve been playing around with it for some time, but have been holding back when it comes to using it for clients’ projects, with the hope of MT Pro being released, but I think we’re going to change that policy right now.

If it’s good enough for StopDesign and AdaptivePath, it’s good enough for our clients :-)

The one thing we will need MT Pro for is author permissions regarding Publish rights — we’d love to allow multiple authors to edit content, but set only certain users to publish the content to the live site. Any ideas on how to hack MT directly? Maybe I’ll luck out and Jay Allen will read this and have an idea…

By: Mike

Mike — Wed, 16 Jul 2003 19:22:56 +0000

Very cool Doug.

I’m doing something similar to that, however mine isn’t as intricute.

Instead of making an entirely new blog consisting of my portfolio, I simply have the category “Portfolio” and only reference that on my portfolio pages.

Easier to implement on a small-scale portfolio such as mine ;)

By: Paul Scrivens

Paul Scrivens — Wed, 16 Jul 2003 18:58:31 +0000

It’s nice to see someone extending a product to new boundaries and then providing us the resources to show us how its done. Greatly appreciated.

By: avianto

avianto — Wed, 16 Jul 2003 18:01:22 +0000

Thanks for the insight. Been thinking to redone my own portfolio with MT (after reading Matt Haughey’s entry) and your entry now really help me a lot. Thanks again.