This is the blog of Adam Kalsey. Unusual depth and complexity. Rich, full body with a hint of nutty earthiness.
Freshness Warning
This blog post is over 20 years old. It's possible that the information you read below isn't current and the links no longer work.
2 Feb 2003
TrackBacks are comments. They are comments left on someone else’s site rather than your own, but they are comments nonetheless. Movable Type makes a distinction between entry comments and TrackBacks that seems artificial, and it made more sense to me to have TrackBack ping data appear within the comments portion of a Movable Type site.
SimpleComments is a new plugin that will let you do just this. Comments and Trackbacks are merged into a single list. Comment counts include the number of TrackBack pings, and best of all, you don’t need to learn new MT tags in order to do this.
Simplecomments 1.34 (updated Jul 24, 2006)
Unzip the SimpleComments zip file to a directory on your computer.
Copy the plugins
and php
directories to the MT directory on your server.
Simplecomments gives you a couple of new tags that complement the existing set of Movable Type comment and ping tags.
<MTSimpleComments>
sort_order
attribute as the built-in MTComments tag. You can also use lastn=”N”
to limit the total number of comments and pings displayed. Under MT3+ only approved comments are displayed. If you want to show unapproved comments as well, add an attribute of moderate=”0”
. You use standard MTComment… and MTPing… tags inside this container to output your comment and ping data.<MTSimpleCommentCount>
<span class="caps">MTS</span>impleCommentCount
will display 5.<MTSimpleCommentNumber>
<MTSimpleCommentOdd>
class=”commentbg<MTSimpleCommentOdd>“
and create classes for commentbg0
and commentbg1
.<MTSimpleCommentIfTrackback>
<span class="caps">MTS</span>impleComments
tag is going to give you a list that has both comments and TrackBack pings. Since comments and pings use a different set of MT tags, you can use this conditional container to output data for trackbacks. The contents of this tag will only be displayed if the current item in the comment list is a TrackBack.<MTSimpleCommentIfComment>
<span class="caps">MTS</span>impleCommentIfTrackback
, the contents of this tag will only be displayed if the current item in the comment list is a Comment. See the example below to help you understand how this works.<MTSimpleCommentEntry>
<MTSimpleComments lastn="5"> <MTSimpleCommentEntry> This comment was made on the entry <MTEntryTitle>. </MTSimpleCommentEntry> </MTSimpleComments>
<p><MTSimpleCommentCount> Comments</p> <MTSimpleComments> <MTSimpleCommentIfTrackback> <a name="trackback-<MTPingID>"></a> <p><b><a href="<MTPingURL>"><MTPingBlogName></a></b> <$MTPingDate format="%b %e, %Y %l:%M %p"$><br /> <MTPingExcerpt><br /> Read more in <a href="<$MTPingURL$>"><$MTPingTitle$> »</a></p> </MTSimpleCommentIfTrackback> <MTSimpleCommentIfComment> <a name="comment-<MTCommentID>"></a> <p><b><$MTCommentAuthorLink$></b> <$MTCommentDate format="%b %e, %Y %l:%M %p"$><br /> <$MTCommentBody$></p> </MTSimpleCommentIfComment> </MTSimpleComments>
Like my other freeware, this plugin is released under the open-source MIT License. In plain English, that means you can do whatever you want with the software, including modifying it, selling it, or eating it, but I’m not responsible for anything that goes wrong.
The PHP port was created by Brad Choate and is also released under the MIT license.
1.34 - Jul 24, 2006
1.33 - Jul 12, 2006
1.32 - Oct 24, 2004
1.31 - Oct 18, 2004
1.3 - Oct 12, 2004
moderate
attribute controls the display of unmoderated comments under MT3+. The default is to show approved comments only.1.2 - July 27, 2004
1.11 - Apr 24, 2003
1.1 - Apr 23, 2003
1.0 - Feb, 2003
Moderation question: It seems like if I have your plugin designed to list the last 10 comments, and my last 9 comments have been blocked pending moderation, the plugin only shows one comment. Is there a way to have the plugin only display the last X *non-moderated* comments? Thanks!
Just wondering if the: Undefined subroutine MTPlugins::simplecomments::SimpleCommentCount at lib/MT/Builder.pm line 139 bug was fixed. I'm currently setting up a photoblog with posts set as future as far as one month from now and my indexes aren't being rebuilt, which really makes me using scheduled posting useless. Thanks!
I've also just started getting the bug... Undefined subroutine MTPlugins::simplecomments::SimpleCommentCount at lib/MT/Builder.pm line 139 ...since the upgrade to 3.16. But there's a post on the MT Support Forum reporting it happening in 3.14... http://www.movabletype.org/support/index.php?act=ST&f=28&t=48607
I am pretty new to this stuff, but this blog has answered questions that had me run up the wall! Thanks a bunch.
Just tried this with MT3.2 as it was one of my fav plugins up until now.. unfortunately, when listing all X recent comments/trackbacks, it includes all the junk comments and trackbacks as well, which is utterly useless. I hope you'll have time to look at a new release in the near future, I'm sure a lot of people would appreciate it. Cheers.
Awesome! I just implemented it on my site, so I can mix all the comments and trackbacks together into one listing. One request that, with MT 3.2 now out, is semi-important: is there a way to make SimpleComments adhere to the new junk scoring system used in MT 3.2? Right now, it only includes approved comments, but TrackBacks are a problem -- any TrackBacks that are deemed junk by MT 3.2 (and thus not displayed) are still included in the SimpleComments container. I think it'd be as simple as checking the tbping_visible column in the mt_tbping table.
Hi Adam! Just a couple notes: 1) SimpleComments 1.32 with MT 3.2 seems to be publishing trackbacks in the new "junk" folder. 2) Brad's PHP version of MTSimpleCommentCount is producing empty text -- I read a reference elsewhere on the web that said it seems to work only inside MTSimpleComments blocks and that seems to jibe with what's happening on my blog. I had to move to the unofficial 1.31 version of that tag to get the right behavior.
Greetings! I've tried my hand at a SimpleComments mod (Perl version) that gets it living in harmony with MT 3.2's SpamLookup suite: http://www.joesapt.net/archive/2005/09/09/00.21.59/
So I've got MTSimpleComments working and I'm doing a "Recent Commenters + Pingers" list in my blog sidebar. BUT what what I've got it to say for a ping is "J.A.S.O.N. pinged from What Sort of Intellectual Are You?" The title of the post is his post and it links back to his post. What I want is for it to be the name of my post that he pinged and the link to that same post (I'll liknk their name back to their post). That's the way my comment links are like: "kazza on Christmas Tree Assembly" Any tips? I thought I had it working but then I realized the name of the post they pinged from was identical to my post name... I'm using MT3.2 and my site supports php and mySQL and SimpleComments 1.32. THANKS! I'll keep trying but I'm considering it might not be possible.
looks cool
The link to simplecomments1.33.zip doesn't seem to be working.
You forgot to change the version number to 1.33. It still says 1.32 in SimpleComments.pl
well, it seems like someone fixed it, thank you.
MTSimpleCommentCount off by one in 1.34? It looks like it on my first entry. Not sure what's going on, will look at that and see if I can help trace it down.
These are the last 15 comments. Read all 84 comments here.
This discussion has been closed.
Joe D'Andrea
February 28, 2005 7:24 PM
Wishlist request (or if this is pilot error, let me know that too): Would like to be usable outside of individual entries (and give the total tally), just like can be used in a similar fashion. (Nice job with the plugin BTW!)