Help me with MT filename trimming.

March 20, 2006 11:47 AM

Individual entries on my MT 2.6x installation are archived using their trimmed entry-names (i.e. blog.com/trimmed_entry_na.php). I'd like to make the filenames longer from now on (trimming to 30, probably), but I think that if I change the parameter in my Archiving prefs and rebuild, it's gonna go and change the filenames of all my preceding entries too. This I don't want. Is there a way to change the trimming for filenames, but only "from now on"?
posted by Marquis to Computers & Internet (3 answers total)

I'm pretty sure that the rebuilding process won't change the filenames of old entries. I went from the default to 30 too, but I've found that old entries only change to the 30-character name if I do "Preview" before I publish.

I don't think I've done a total rebuild since then, though, so I'm not sure.
posted by srah at 12:49 PM on March 20, 2006

Why don't you setup a test blog, create some entries and then change the Archiving prefs to see what happens?
posted by mmascolino at 6:31 PM on March 20, 2006

It probably will change. However, MT 3.2 lets you see the basename (the generated short name) and locks them forever so your URLs don't change. You could probably upgrade (it's free) and then be able to control your permalinks more easily through the UI. You could also publish individual posts under both the short and long names, and use dynamic publishing (which your current version doesn't support) so that you're waiting for the pages to build.

Let me know if I can help you get set up, and email's in my profile.
posted by anildash at 12:34 AM on March 21, 2006