Prevent Blank Blog (Wizbang)

Today's Movable Type lesson (this includes TypePad) is inspired by this post at InstaPundit wondering why Tom Maguires blog is blank. The Movable Type help file explains this behavior.

By default, an index template displays the last N days worth of entries, where N is defined in your weblog configuration. For example, if you set the number of days displayed on the index to 7, Movable Type will, by default, display all entries from the last 7 days on all of your index templates. Note that 7 days means the last 7 consecutive days, not necessarily the last 7 days on which you posted an entry. So if you have posted on just 3 of the last 7 days, only the posts from those 3 days will be listed on your main indexes.

If you don't post for a while you end up with "blank blog." Fortunately this is easily preventable.

In your Main Index template, replace this:
<MTEntries>

With this
<MTEntries lastn="25">

Change the numeric value to however many posts you want on the main page. Save your changes and rebuild your Index templates. Blank blog will be vanquished forever.

The Wizbang® Network

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Comments (3)

Is there any way to set it ... (Below threshold)

1. Posted by Jim | December 31, 2003 7:58 AM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)

Jim:

Is there any way to set it so the last N days that had posts are represented?

Posted on December 31, 2003 07:58

No.It may be possi... (Below threshold)

2. Posted by Kevin | December 31, 2003 8:09 AM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)

Kevin:

No.

It may be possible with custom code or a MT plugin.

Posted on December 31, 2003 08:09

I've been using 'lastn' for... (Below threshold)

3. Posted by Kathy K | December 31, 2003 8:32 AM | Score: 0 (0 votes cast)

Kathy K:

I've been using 'lastn' for ages. It lets me do 3 'main pages' for those who want to read more articles without going to the archives. I put 20 articles on each page.

Posted on December 31, 2003 08:32

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