On a recent project I had a Movable Type blog with entries containing embedded videos hosted on YouTube and Vimeo, and I needed a way to get a thumbnail image for each video so they could be displayed somewhere else on the site.  Here is my solution...

Dan from eatdrinksleepmovabletype.com has released a new theme for Movable Type and Melody called 'Patrick'.  It sports an impressive 13 settings screens that let you change everything, from colours, columns, labels, headers and footers, but also if (and how) to display Facebook comments, Twitter integration, highlighted entries, and much, much more.

Among my resolutions for the new year: be more active in updating this site again...

The error "Error saving plugin settings: Could not register story template with Facebook: Unknown method" has been popping up more and more among users of the FacebookCommenters plugin for Movable Type.  The cause is a change to the API at Facebook.  Six Apart is aware of the issue (check the Fogbugz ticket here if you have access) and a fix has been committed but not released yet.   I have been told the updated version of FacebookCommenters will be bundled with the upcoming Movable Type 5.13/4.38 release.

I recently came across the blog of Sebastian Kleine, a German PHP coder.  He wrote he recently had to use Movable Type for a work-related project, but couldn't find any good (recent) introductory books so he decided to write one himself.  The result is an ebook available from Amazon, titled 'Blogging with Movable Type'.  I haven't read it myself, but he describes it as:

I missed it because I was abroad, but last saturday was Movable Type's 10th birthday.  To celebrate, Six Apart has posted some stats about the recent development activity and a picture of a lovely birthday cake.  Happy birthday MT!  You certainly changed my life.

Having a list of related, similar entries below each entry in your blog is a good way to entice your readers to stay on your site longer.  But how do you generate such a list, making sure only the most relevant entries are listed?  And how can such a list be kept up to date, especially on older entries? 

I have moved this site (and a lot of other projects) to a brand new server at a new hosting provider.  If you see anything strange, let me know!

So I'm back from my holiday and what do I see on Twitter?  Six Apart Japan has revived the @movabletype twitter account.  Curious to see what they'll post...

Using the standard 'Display options' link in the create/edit entry or page screens in Movable Type 4 or Melody you can reorder and toggle the display of the various custom fields that you may or may not have added to entries or pages on your blog or installation.  But once you save the ordering and visibility you like, it is only valid for the user account you are currently logged in with.  Changing the default order and visibility for all users on a blog used to involve either logging in as all of them one by one and changing the settings manually, or some pretty hairy database manipulation.  But now there is a better way.