ZedneWeb / Profile for web threads / Example templates

Example templates illustrating the web threading HTML profile

This document provides some template fragments for popular weblog systems intended to illustrate how to support the HTML profile for web threads. Currently, these examples are theoretical, as I have had no opportunity to try them out, and it should be emphasized that they are only suggestions, not complete templates. In particular, this is not an endorsement of one particular weblog post style (such as having a footer which reads “Posted by Author at Time” follow each post) over another.

Readers are encouraged to contact me with corrections, suggestions, or working examples.

  1. Blogger
  2. MovableType

Blogger

Blogger posts are traditionally identified by their ID number, which can be used in a div id just as easily as in a named anchor. (Officially, the values of id and name are required to begin with a letter. This could be resolved by adding a “p” before the BlogItemNumber tag, but doing so would unfortunately break any existing links.)

For the archive pages, use a div with class post and a unique id:

<div id="<$BlogItemNumber$>" class="post">

<$BlogItemBody$>

<p class="postinfo">Posted by <span class="author"><$BlogItemAuthor$></span>
at <a rel="archive" href="#<$BlogItemNumber$>"><$BlogItemDateTime$></a></p>
</div>

For the main page, use a div with class mirrored-post, and identify the post by its archive link:

<div class="mirrored-post">

<$BlogItemBody$>

<p class="postinfo">Posted by <span class="author"><$BlogItemAuthor$></span>
at <a rel="archive" href="<$BlogItemArchiveFileName$>#<$BlogItemNumber$>">
<$BlogItemDateTame$></a></p>
</div>

MovableType

The MovableType template language is similar to Blogger’s, but more powerful. In particular, the date formatting is flexible enough that we can create dates using the W3C suggested format. (One concern: How intelligent is MovableType about daylight savings time?)

The examples use level-two headings for the post titles. Naturally, this would need to be adjusted to match the posts’ actual heading level on those pages.

For the archive pages, use a div with class post and a unique id:

<div id="<$MTEntryID pad="1"$>" class="post">
<h2><$MTEntryTitle$></h2>

<$MTEntryBody$>

<p class="postinfo">Posted by <span class="author"><$MTEntryAuthorName$></span>
at <a rel="archive" href="#<$MTEntryID pad="1"$>"><span class="date"
title="<$MTDate format="%Y-%m-%dt%H:%M:%S"$><$MTBlogTimezone$>"><$MTDate
format="%h:%M %p"$></span></a></p>
</div>

For the main page, use a div with class mirrored-post, and identify the post by its archive link:

<div class="mirrored-post">
<h2><$MTEntryTitle$></h2>

<$MTEntryBody$>

<p class="postinfo">Posted by <span class="author"><$MTEntryAuthorName$></span>
at <a rel="archive" href="<$MTEntryLink$>#<$MTEntryID pad="1"$>"><span class="date"
title="<$MTDate format="%Y-%m-%dt%H:%M:%S"$><$MTBlogTimezone$>"><$MTDate
format="%h:%M %p"$></span></a></p>
</div>

Dave Menendez