CustomFields, the aptly named plugin, brings custom fields to Movable Type's entries, authors and categories offering the ability to create text fields, multi-line textareas, drop down menus, radio buttons, url and date/time fields (complete with a pop up calendar). These fields, as demonstrated by the screenshots below, are easily accessible as they're displayed inline (directly on the respective editing screens). When CustomFields are enabled on the editing screens, all fields displayed on the screen are completely sortable - through a simple drag and drop interface, you can reorder your entry, author and category screens.
The data in the custom fields can be published in a number of ways including custom template tags - each of your custom fields could have its own custom template tag, for example if I had a custom entry field called Current Mood, I could create a custom tag MTEntryCurrentMood.
Finally, CustomFields also adds full fledged author archiving to Movable Type. Through one archive template, you can create pages for each of your authors displaying not only their entries but their custom fields data.
CustomFields 2.0 is the recommended version to install but is currently a release candidate which means that some bugs may still exist. You are recommended to take a backup before installing this plugin
CustomFields is free for personal users, however, a donation of $ is greatly appreciated. Commercial users are encouraged to support this plugin by donating at least $
You must have:
To download CustomFields, select the download format you would like, .zip files are good for Windows servers while .tar.gz files are good for Unix/Mac servers.
An updated user manual for CustomFields 2.0 is currently being written. This version details CustomFields 1.0. Although the plugin has changed considerably, major sections of this manual still applies and hence can be used as a reference.
Extract the distribution and preserve the directories. The directories that have been extracted correspond to the directories in your Movable Type installation. Upload these directories to your Movable Type installation such that file structure looks like so (where mt-static is your StaticWebPath):
MT_DIR/
|__ plugins/
| \__ CustomFields/
| |__ author_archive.cgi
| |__ author_archive.pl
| |__ author.cgi
| |__ author.pl
| |__ categories.cgi
| |__ categories.pl
| |__ entries.cgi
| |__ entries.pl
| |
| \__ lib/
| | \__ CustomFields/
| | |__ AuthorArchive.pm
| | |__ Authors.pm
| | |__ Categories.pm
| | |__ CustomFields.pm
| | |__ Entries.pm
| | |
| | \__ Template/
| | |__ ContextHandlers.pm
| |
| \__ tmpl/
| |__ archives.tmpl
| |__ edit-extended-authors.tmpl
| |__ list-custom-fields.tmpl
| |__ list-edit-custom-fields.tmpl
| |__ rebuild.tmpl
|
|__ php/
| \__ plugins/
| |__ (20 .php files)
|
|__ mt-static/
| \__ plugins/
| \__ CustomFields/
| |__ (12 files)
Set the permissions of the four .cgi files (author_archive.cgi, author.cgi, categories.cgi, entries.cgi) to 755 and if the plugin was successfully installed, you should see something similar to this on the Plugins listing under System Overview.
You can create a custom entry field on two different levels:
To create a custom entry field on the system level, go to the Plugins listing screen under System Overview and click the Custom Entry Fields link (under the CustomFields Pluginset):
To create a custom entry field on the blog level, go to your blog's main menu and in the middle column under Plugin Actions click Edit Custom Entry Fields
Both these links take you to the CustomFields Creation Page where you can create custom entry fields.
By default, these custom entry fields will not appear on the new/edit entry screens. Follow these steps to have them show up:
Customize the display of this page link at the bottom of the page.Custom layout and check the CustomFields box.Save the entry screen will refresh and the custom entry fields will now appear.
The order that these fields appear can easily be changed. Simply grab the field's name and then move it to where you'd like it to appear from now on. The other fields will shuffle down to make room.
Like custom entry fields, custom category fields can be created on two different levels:
To create a custom category field on the system level, go to the Plugins listing screen under System Overview and click the Custom Category Fields link (under the CustomFields Pluginset):
To create a custom category field on the blog level, go to your blog's main menu and in the middle column under Plugin Actions click Edit Custom Category Fields
Both these links take you to the CustomFields Creation Page where you can create custom category fields.
These fields appear by default on the category editing page.
The order that these fields appear can easily be changed. Simply grab the field's name and then move it to where you'd like it to appear from now on. The other fields will shuffle down to make room.
To create a custom author field, go to the Plugins listing screen under System Overview and click the Custom Author Fields link (under the CustomFields Pluginset):
which will take you to the CustomFields Creation Page where you can create custom author fields.
To edit these custom author fields, click your username at the top of any Movable Type screen. This takes you to your author profile where you'll notice a set of tabs. Click the Extended Profile tab to edit your custom author fields.
Note: These custom author fields can only be filled in by the authors themselves.
The order that these fields appear can easily be changed. Simply grab the field's name and then move it to where you'd like it to appear from now on. The other fields will shuffle down to make room.
The interface for creating custom author, entry and category fields is identical. To create a new custom field, click the Create New Field link that appears towards the right and a green bar will appear as demonstrated above.
Enter the name of the field in the first text box and an optional short description for it in the field below.
Next you'll notice that a custom template tag has been automatically created for you, if this isn't to your liking, you can change it (be careful that you don't name it after a template tag that already exists!). Remember to leave off the starting MT bit, so if you wanted to create a tag called MTMyCurrentMood, you would enter simply MyCurrentMood into the template tag text field.
Choose the type of field, if you choose Drop Down Menu or Radio Buttons, a further field will appear where you can enter the valid options separated with commas for example
Option 1, Option 2, Option 3
Required box if the field cannot be left blank by authors.To edit an existing custom field, just click its title and an orange bar (similar to the green one shown above) will appear with the details of the custom field filled in. Edit away!
CustomFields allows you to create archives for authors in Movable Type and these author archives closely model the existing archive types in Movable Type (if you don't understand what I mean by author archives, think of the Individual Entry Archive for authors). To create a new author archive:
Create a new archive template. You can use any of the MTAuthor tags (detailed below) in this template. Note: You do not need to first use the MTAuthors container tag, just use MTAuthor tags directly
Once you've create an author archive template, go to your blog's publishing settings (Settings > Publishing) and click Edit Author Archives under Plugin Actions at the bottom of the page
In the screen that follows, you can setup your author archiving mapping. The file maps can use any MTAuthor tag as the screenshot demonstrates:
To rebuild author archives click Rebuild at the bottom of the left hand menu and in the popup window choose Rebuild Author Archives. Note: Choosing Rebuild All Files will not rebuild author archives
The following template tags can be used to display custom fields and their data:
<MTAuthorID> — An author's author_id<MTAuthorName> — An author's username<MTAuthorNickname> — An author's nickname as defined in their profile<MTAuthorLink><MTAuthorURL> — An author's website URL as defined in their profile<MTAuthorEmail><MTAuthorBlogCount> — Returns the number of blogs an author has access to<MTAuthorEntryCount> — Returns the number of entries an author has created<MTAuthorData><MTAuthorDataFieldName> — The name of the custom author field<MTAuthorDataFieldDescription> — The description of the custom author field<MTAuthorDataFieldValue> — Displays the value entered by the author for the custom author field<MTAuthorDataIfFieldValue> — A conditional tag which evaluates as true if the author has entered a value for the custom author fieldCustom Entry Fields (must be used within an entry context)
<MTEntryData><MTEntryDataFieldName> — The name of the custom entry field<MTEntryDataFieldDescription> — The description of the custom entry field<MTEntryDataFieldValue> — Displays the value of the custom entry field<MTEntryDataIfFieldValue> — A conditional tag which evaluates as true if a value has been entered for the custom entry fieldCustom Category Fields (must be used within an category context)
<MTCategoryData><MTCategoryDataFieldName> — The name of the custom category field<MTCategoryDataFieldDescription> — The description of the custom category field<MTCategoryDataFieldValue> — Displays the value entered for the custom category field<MTCategoryDataIfFieldValue> — A conditional tag which evaluates as true if a value for the custom category fieldThe current version of CustomFields is only compatible with Movable Type 3.31 or higher. If you have an older version of Movable Type, check the list below for a compatible version of CustomFIelds:
CustomFields is free for personal users, however, a donation of $ is greatly appreciated. Commercial users are encouraged to support this plugin by donating at least $
For support, visit the forums
CustomFields is free for personal users, however, a donation of at least $ is greatly appreciated.
If you have a problem installing or using CustomFields, visit our forums
You can download, install and try a fully functional version of CustomFields for a 30-day evaluation period. If, after this period, you wish to continue using the plugin, you are expected to purchase a commercial license for $. Purchasing a commerial license entitles you to priority support via The Helpdesk.
You can download, install and try a fully functional version of CustomFields for a 30-day evaluation period. If, after this period, you wish to continue using the plugin, you are expected to purchase an enterprise license for $. Purchasing an enterprise license entitles you to priority support via The Helpdesk.