Now that your copy of MT-Notifier is installed and the settings are configured, you need to create some subscriptions. There are three ways to do this.
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#1: Use the itemset action menus inside of Movable Type.
Every list of items in Movable Type (for instance, entries) is called an itemset. Along with this itemset, you'll see a list of available actions in a drop-down control, from which you can select an action to perform on selected items. In this case, you can choose to Add Subscription(s), Add Subscription Block(s) or View Subscription Count(s). Each of these is fairly self explanatory. Just select items from the list by clicking, then choose the item from the menu and click Go. Your selection will apply to every item you have chosen.
For the first two selections (Add Subscription(s) and Add Subscription Block(s)), you will be presented with another screen that allows you to add names (for adding subcriptions or adding subscription blocks). The third option provides you with a quick count of the number of subscriptions and subscription blocks for the selected items. Keep in mind, however, that if you run this last item across blogs, it may have to process a large amount of data - so it may take a while!
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#2: Create a standalone subscription form.
To allow users to subscribe without you having to create subscriptions for them, you can simply add an HTML form to your pages. Just make sure you create it outside of any other forms that you have (including any comment forms). The form should look something like this:
<div class="widget-subscribe widget">
<h3 class="widget-header">Subscribe to Blog</h3>
<div class="widget-content">
<form method="get" action="<mt:cgipath><mt:adminscript>">
<input type="hidden" name="__mode" value="verify_subs" />
<input type="hidden" name="blog_id" value="<mt:blogid>" />
<input id="email" name="email" size="16" />
<input type="submit" class="button" value="Go" />
</form>
</div>
</div>
Please note that this form varies slightly from prior releases - both in that it's now calling the Movable Type script (rather than mt-notifier.cgi) and the HTML elements are named differently, to fit in with the default MT4 templates. The parameters have changed slightly too. I'm sorry for the change, but it was necessary due to the changes in MT4.
Once you have added this form to the page, users can subscribe to be notified of new entries that are posted on your site. To allow your users to subscribe to a category instead of the entire blog, specify a field name of category_id (with a valid category ID) instead of blog_id, and to provide an entry subscription, replace blog_id with entry_id (and use <$MTEntryID$>).
Because there is no category ID tag within an entry, MT-Notifier includes a template tag for use in your templates called <$MTNotifierCatID$> that you can use to fill in this field automatically, easily providing a "subscribe to this category" function if you so desire.
In MT-Notifier version four, you can visit the blog settings page (Preferences -> Plugins -> MT-Notifier -> Settings) and have MT-Notifier automatically create this widget for you. Then you can use the widget in a Widget Set or an <$MTInclude$>. Try it out, it's easy!
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#3: Add a checkbox to your comment form for those leaving a comment.
This is the simplest change, but it requires that someone leave a comment. Just go into your template that contains your comment form and add this HTML:
<p><label for="subscribe">Subscribe to This Entry:</label>
<input type="checkbox" name="subscribe" value="1" /></p>
Once you have added this checkbox to your comment form, then anyone leaving a comment on your blog just needs to check the box and they will automatically be notified of any comments that are left.
Note that this is good for comment notifications only, where the first example of using the itemset action menu, and the second example of using a standalone HTML form, were good for entry notifications as well. You cannot use the comment form method for entry notifications!
If you wish to allow users to subscribe to comments on an entry without having to leave a comment, you can do so by creating a standalone form as described above and then replacing blog_id in the example with entry_id and inserting a valid entry ID (likely using the <$MTEntryID$> template tag).
Should you encounter any problems creating your subscriptions, you might want to visit the Troubleshooting Forms page.
