Six Apart Launches Motion, New Free Social Application for Movable Type
Just got the news from Six Apart’s Twitter status:
Motion, a new free social application for Movable Type (think FriendFeed meets Tumblr & Pownce) is now in beta! http://icanhaz.com/MTMotion
After acquiring Pownce, Six Apart launched a new social application called Motion. Go to Motion application page at http://movabletype.com/motion/ for more details. This works together with Movable Type Pro. On its product page, Six Apart explains:
We looked at the most compelling social sites across the web, from Twitter to Tumblr, Pownce to FriendFeed, and more. And then we built an application around open standards to offer you the best features of each of these services, on your own site. (source)
I haven’t learned further about this new application, but this might be a solution for those who want to run a community-based website/blogs, or even a personal blogger. And, what makes it even better is that it also works — can be integrated — with other publishing platform. Read the FAQ page.
If you’re interested about Motion, here are some resources/pages to get started.
TypePad AntiSpam is here
Right, I have enabled TypePad AntiSpam plugin in this blog. It’s another antispam plugin created by Six Apart — a company behind blogging applications like Movable Type, TypePad, and VOX. I heard about this plugin few days ago, and it seemed promising, at least TechCrunch found it useful. :) Actually, I’m happy with my antispam plugin installed in my blog. Currently only have Akismet and WP-SpamFree (read my post about this). It works great, and I’m happy. WP-SpamFree has caught more than 2,100+ spams, and it seems Akismet does not need to do its job at all. Okey, it does but only a little — I only had less than 5 comments in moderation because WP-SpamFree thought that they’re not spam.
I’m curious about this new spam plugin. This plugin works for WordPress 2.3.x, 2.5.x, Movable Type, and Typepad (of course!); and it’s built based on WordPress Akismet plugin by Matt Mullenweg. The installation process is very straight forward. After having the API Key. Using WordPress, we can have API Key for our Akismet plugin by creating an account at WordPress.com. For TypePad AntiSpam plugin, we can get an API key by registering at TypeKey. The registration is free. Since I already had a Typekey account, it tooks few seconds to get my API key.
Movable Type 4.15 Dashboard Design
WordPress 2.5 did a major redesign on its user interface — also known as Dashboard. And, it looks great. But, this time, I will not talk about WordPress. It’s Movable Type. Right now, Movable Type is on its latest stable release (Movable Type 4.1 — it’s free). For the coming release (Movable Type 4.15) there will be some changes on its dashboard interface too. Also, there are some other new — and improved — features. Here are some highlights:
- Single template listing. If we’re using the latest stable version, managing templates is easy, but we might feel not comfortable and easy in finding the template-related elements. For example, we want to know the URI structures for archive templates. We will go to “Design” tab, choose “Templates”, “Archive Templates” and click on the desired template structure options. The coming design will be more effective. On the “Design” page, we will be presented with a list of templates avaible in the system. All there.
- Related to the first point, there will be changes on the navigation menu. We can work faster now.
- Discussion should be better as Simply Threaded comment plugin — developed by Arvind Satyanarayan — will be included in the distribution.
Look at these screenshots (based on Movable Type 4.15 Beta 3):
For complete details about the coming release, please refer to Movable Type What’s New page.
Movable Type Open Source is Available!
Six Apart just announced the release of Movable Type Open Source — MTOS for short.
Movable Type Open Source (MTOS) is licensed under the GNU General Public License (GPL) version 2. So, if you’re a fan of open source application, it is a good news. Previously, when Six Apart whispered this open source package, many people wondered how this open source version will be different from the other MT packages. Six Apart said that all features in MT 4.0 can be found in MTOS edition — it has the same functionality. Anyway, what it’s all about? Here are some points you should know:
- MTOS is our abbreviation for the open source version of Movable Type. It’s a full-featured version of Movable Type which you can download, use, modify, share, and explore completely free of charge.
- Movable Type has always had all of its source code freely available for review, from its first release.
- There’s no change for any of the commercial versions of Movable Type or any of the products built on top of MT.
- MTOS will be community-supported, while paying users will always have exclusive access to our professional support team.
- MTOS is complemented by the paid software products we sell on top of the MT platform, such as our Enterprise Solution, Community Solution and personal and commercial licenses which include support.
- The nightly builds are always available.
- The package also available from SVN repository:
http://code.sixapart.com/svn/movabletype/branches/boomer
More info about MTOS can be found at http://www.movabletype.org/opensource/. Great!
Movable Type 4 Article Series (Upgrading)
I have been using Movable Type as my primary blogging software for few years. And this September, I have upgraded to the latest version of Movable Type: Movable Type 4. So far, I like it alot! It works for me, that’s the most important point. I do not want to bring other blogging applications into debate here. But, it’s more about my personal experience with a blogging applicaton called Movable Type.
Movable Type 4 (again) comes with many great improvements and it’s very feature-rich. I already listed some features I like. If you want to read the completed and detailed features just head to Movable Type 4 features list.
Comment Authentication in Movable Type 4
Movable Type 4 has a built-in comment authentication. Other blogging platforms have it too. Most of them using their internal authentication system (site registration) or using other service like OpenID. The most common reason is probably to deal with spams — (probably) bloggers’ biggest enemy.
Let’s see what comment authentication Movable Type 4 has. By default, MT 4 has five types of authentication: built-in registration (visitors need to signup to a blog he/she wants to post comment to), OpenID, LiveJournal, Typekey and Vox.
To give more freedom for users to authenticate themselves before posting a comment, there are another options that can be obtained using OpenID-based plugins:
- WordPress OpenID. This plugin was created by Byrne Reese (Movable Type Product Manager). In short, you can authenticate yourself using your WordPress.com account. (only if this method/setting enabled by blog owner)
- OpenID connector for AIM and AOL logins by Minh Nguyen