Writing
Friday 7 February 2003
Removing evil image links from Movable Type
When Stef first started using Movable Type he cursed the Trotts for making the menus out of images. Not only is it bad for accessibility but if you’re addicted to Mozilla’s Type Ahead Find feature it’s even more annoying. (Type Ahead Find lets you type a few letters and the first text link on the page that starts with that sequence is highlighted; press Return and you follow the link. No more mouse!)
I never used the feature so I just laughed. Ha ha! But now I’ve started trying it and must agree those menus are hugely frustrating. So I did something about it and you can too. Go to the directory in which your Movable Type CGI scripts are stored. From there go to the tmpl/cms/ directory. The top-of-the-page menu is in logonav.tmpl, the left-hand menu is in mininav.tmpl. Back the files up. Then if you know HTML you can just remove the images and replace with text. You might want to add some cellpadding or spacing; mine ended up looking like this which is far more usable and downloads quicker. It might all be destroyed by an MT upgrade, but it’s not a big deal to do again.
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Removing MT Image Links
Phil Gyford describes a technique for removing the Movable Type command image buttons. Although I don't use Mozilla, I've been wanting to do the same thing just to reduce the page size. I didn't change the top images (in logonav.tmpl),
At 'Cantoni.org' on Friday 7 February 2003, 10:57 PM
Comments
Very cice... I may consider that for my installation of MT. Have you figured out a way to work around the no-Mac-browser shortcuts for bold, italics, underline, and hyperlinks that all the IE-PC users see when they post an entry?
Came looking for ways of moving the coloured top bar down below an advert but i like the idea of getting rid of the images too.
I also realised that by a very different connection, I posted a pernickerty comment to your Pepys' Diary yesterday (about the meaning of "present"). Small world.
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