Initial Reaction to Movable Type 4.0

By Josh Reighley on August 18, 2007 11:00 AM | Permalink | Comments ()

Well, The Movable Type 4.0 upgrade is mostly finished.

The upgrade ran about as would be suspected. Not great.

Getting the back end installed was a breeze. I uploaded the version 4.0 files into a new directory on my server, then gave it my MySql credentials and It converted nicely. I was able to go in and make a new entry without any trouble. The templates all still appeared to work, which has not always been the case in prior upgrades.

Then I tried to leave a comment. The authentication I was using didn't seem to work right. I remember doing some substantial customization to lock people into the typekey authentication a year or two ago. I did a little research in the documentation, and it the 4.0 default templates are using now are way more modular than the ones they used in 3.2 It doesn't look like a quick copy-paste fix is going to happen.

So I reverted back to the default templates. This wasn't too hard to do once I found the document ion. I had to remap the individual entry pages, which seems a bit odd to me. But over time I got it to work.

I installed the Portland-Cityscape theme. Seems nice enough, but I am not from Portland. Downloaded a public photo from flickr and saved it over the Portland Header.. Easy enough. Welcome to Spokane! Didn't get it sized right, but I can work on that, and the font color later.

Then I wanted my menu widgets back. I searched through the documentation, and didn't find any step by step instructions on how to modify these. I hacked it a bit, and figured out how to get my widgets to display. I wound up going into each widget and editing it so that it would match the theme. It seems like the default sidebar template is a massive collection of If/then type switches to display certain content if specified in the index page. I don't really understand the philosophy. I would rather just specify which widgets to show like the widget manager allows. Then I could move things up and down etc..

Now it works fine in Firefox, Camino, and Safari, but it is not working in I.E. correctly. The second column appears at the bottom of the page, over the text of the main body. CSS issues like this are kinda nightmarish, especially when you didn't write the code in the first place. Let me know if you figure it out!

The new interface is nice. It is is much more modern, and is comfortable to use. The autosave is nice, and I discovered that I have 3 drafts from a year or so ago. Some of them are pretty good! Stay tuned, and maybe you will see them. Live preview is cool too.. The editor allows you to add a link without losing your spot in the post. That removes one of the big annoyances of the old system.

If I where to do it again, I probably would have started with a fresh install, then imported all of the entries, comments, and trackbacks. I don't think the upgrading process is that smooth when using customized templates.

I am sure that documentation will get better over time. There isn't quite enough out there yet to be confident in your hacking. I would also wait for a few more weeks to get off the bleeding edge.

Comments

Well, The Movable Type 4.0 upgrade is mostly finished. The upgrade ran about as would be suspected. Not great. Getting the back end installed was a breeze. I uploaded the version 4.0 files into a new directory on my server, then gave it my MySql credentials and It converted nicely. I was able to go in and make a new entry without any trouble. The templates all still appeared to work, which has not always been the case in prior upgrades. Then I tried to leave a comment. The authentication I was using didn't seem to work right. I remember doing some substantial customization to lock people into the typekey authentication a year or two ago. I did a little research in the documentation, and it the 4.0 default templates are using now are way more modular than the ones they used in 3.2 It doesn't look like a quick copy-paste fix is going to happen. So I reverted back to the default templates. This wasn't too hard to do once I found the document ion. I had to remap the individual entry pages, which seems a bit odd to me. But over time I got it to work. I installed the Portland-Cityscape theme. Seems nice enough, but I am not from Portland. Downloaded a public photo from flickr and saved it over the Portland Header.. Easy enough. Welcome to Spokane! Didn't get it sized right, but I can work on that, and the font color later. Then I wanted my menu widgets back. I searched through the documentation, and didn't find any step by step instructions on how to modify these. I hacked it a bit, and figured out how to get my widgets to display. I wound up going into each widget and editing it so that it would match the theme. It seems like the default sidebar template is a massive collection of If/then type switches to display certain content if specified in the index page. I don't really understand the philosophy. I would rather just specify which widgets to show like the widget manager allows. Then I could move things up and down etc.. Now it works fine in Firefox, Camino, and Safari, but it is not working in I.E. correctly. The second column appears at the bottom of the page, over the text of the main body. CSS issues like this are kinda nightmarish, especially when you didn't write the code in the first place. Let me know if you figure it out! The new interface is nice. It is is much more modern, and is comfortable to use. The autosave is nice, and I discovered that I have 3 drafts from a year or so ago. Some of them are pretty good! Stay tuned, and maybe you will see them. Live preview is cool too.. The editor allows you to add a link without losing your spot in the post. That removes one of the big annoyances of the old system. If I where to do it again, I probably would have started with a fresh install, then imported all of the entries, comments, and trackbacks. I don't think the upgrading process is that smooth when using customized templates. I am sure that documentation will get better over time. There isn't quite enough out there yet to be confident in your hacking. I would also wait for a few more weeks to get off the bleeding edge.