How to Add Author Pages to Movable Type
Isn't it nice to be able to learn something about the author of a blog post you found particularly brilliant or idiotic? We think so, so that's what we've done on Technology Evangelist. To find out a few things about any of the other authors on this site, just click on our hyperlinked names in the by-lines of our posts. Or, visit our About Us page where you can find links to all of our profile pages.
What do you think?
- Do you visit About Us and author profile pages? When, and why?
- What information do you expect (or would like) to find on an author's profile page?
- How does personalizing a blog change your perspective of the content?
- Are authors with photos and bios just full of themselves?
We would like to see more sites offer easy access like this to author bios, so we're publishing how we did it below.
How to Create About Us and Author Pages If you blog using Movable Type, you may find this interesting. If not, you probably won't:
- Copy the Main Index Template and strip out the body code. (everything from [and including] <mtentries> to </mtentries>)
- Make note of the style tags in the code so you can keep your formatting consistent.
- Create new page called aboutus.html Index Template. Add copy to that page.
- Create additional pages for each author using the same blank template.
- Link About Us page to author pages.
- Now that you've created the author pages, the next step is to link to those pages from individual posts. Set each author's Author URL (under System Overview > Authors) to their profile page.
- Now add the links to the author names by replacing this tag <$MTEntryAuthorDisplayName$> on the following pages: Main Index, Category Archive, Date Based Archive, and Individual Archive, with this:
<a href="<$MTEntryAuthorURL$>"><$MTEntryAuthorDisplayName$></a>
- Save and rebuild each template.
- Done
