From the Dashboard or the sidebar, click on the New entry link under the Blog section.

There are two mandatory fields - Title and Content. The toolbar located right above the input area allows you to enhance the layout, insert links or pictures, include an attachment and create key-words.

Whatever the default input format you have chosen for your entire blog in the Blog settings page, you may change it for a given entry using the Text formatting drop-down menu in the right panel. Dotclear lets you choose between wiki syntax and xHTML.

When entries are displayed as a list on your blog, for example on the home page or when you select a category, if you have filled the Excerpt field, only its content will be displayed, followed by a "Continue reading" link.

If you have only filled the Content field, it will be displayed in full.

When an entry is displayed on its dedicated page, the excerpt will be displayed if it exists, followed by the content.

You can insert a picture in your entry by clicking on the relevant icon in the toolbar, and choosing the picture to be inserted from the Media manager.

You can also add any type of media as an attachment (see below).

You can attach a file to your entry by clicking on the Add files to this entry link in the right panel, then choosing the file to be attached from the Media manager. A link to this file will be displayed at the end of your entry.

Once you have written your entry, or in the middle of the process if your entry is long, click on Save. The entry is now saved in the database.

If you have the requires user permissions, you may choose the entry status among four options :

• pending : undefined status (default setting)
• scheduled : lets you plan when the entry will go online.
• unpublished : the entry is kept offline.
• published : the entry is online.

The Published on field lets you modify the date and time of the entry, either by typing directly in the field or by choosing a date in the calendar. If the date you enter is after the current date, and your entry status is set to scheduled, the entry will be put online at the date and time you set.

By default, the author of an entry is the one who created it. To change this information, select the entry from the Entry list then choose the Change author.

If you have created categories, the drop-down menu located on top of the right panel lets you assign the entry to one of the categories.

Dotclear lets you attach tags to an entry by clicking on the Add a tag link from the right panel of the entry edition screen. Simply type them in the field separated by commas, or, if you want to reuse tags you already created, pick them from the list by clicking on the Choose from list link.

The small cross located next to each key-word allows you to remove the tag from the entry.

One of the toolbar button lets you create tags on the fly and automatically links it to the current entry.

The Entry lang field lets you indicate in which language the entry was written, allowing the entries to be sorted by language. The language value is a 2- or 5-character code (ex : en, en-gb…)

This area located under the entry input field is a private space for you to take notes related to your entry (or whatever you like). Only people allowed to edit this entry will be able to access this field.

You can delete entries from the entry list screen. Tick the checkbox located next to the entry you want to delete, then select Delete from the drop-down menu at the bottom of the entry list.

You may change the status of an entry to Scheduled as well as the date and time of the entry to put it online on the chosen time and date.

Tick the Selected entry checkbox to display the current entry in the "Selected entries" section of your blog.

These checkboxes are ticked or not depending on the default settings of your blog. You may chane them for the entry you are currently editing.

The Password field lets you define a password required for visitors to access the entry.

By default Dotclear builds entry URLs as http://blog-url/post/date/title. You can change the "date/title" part by unlocking the Basename field and typing in the address of your choice.

To send a trackback to another blog, you have to save and publish your entry first. Then select the Ping blogs tab above the entry title field.

The new panel is divided in three sections.

The first section shows the content of your entry.

In the second one, type the ping url of the entry to which you want to send the trackback. You will generally find this address near the relevant entry - it is usually called "ping/trackback url".

The third section contains the excerpt that will be sent to the targeted entry. This field defaults to the first few words of your entry. You may change it by copying and pasting another excerpt from the first section if you wish.

Finally click on Send and a message will inform you whether the action succeeded or not.

You can manage the comments of a given entry from its edition screen by selecting the Comments tab.

This displays a list of all the comments and trackbacks attached to the entry. Here you can see the content of all comments and access various actions (more details later on), but you also get two extra pieces of information: the email address of the authors if they filled in this normally mandatory field and their IP address.

The drop-down menu located at the bottom of the comment list offers you several actions: delete, mark as junk, unpublish, edit, put offline, mark as pending. You may also edit individual comments by clicking on the corresponding icon. Except for the timestamp and the IP, you may edit all the fields.

Next to the Comments tab, the Add a comment tab lets you leave a comment from the administration interface.

Click on the link mentioning the entry total in the Dashboard or the the Entries link from the left menu to display a list of your blog's entries.

Entries are listed in the reversed chronological order (the newest on top).

Each line, preceded by a checkbox to select entries for actions, gives you several types of information: title (link to the entry edition interface), publication date, category (link to the category edition interface), author, entry status (represented by an icon). If an entry was marked as "Selected", a yellow star on a blue background is added at the end of the line.

Note:

The icon, located at the very beginning of the line, lets you extend an entry to show its full content.

The upper part of the entry management panel lets you apply sorting filters to the entry list.

The Filters link lets you choose sorting criteria so as to display only entries of interest. If you are unsure about an option, click on the Help button - the white question mark on a blue background - to toggle the help panel.

You can apply an action to several entries at a time by selecting the corresponding tickboxes on the left of each entry line, then choosing the action of your choice from the drop-down meu located at the bottom of the list. You can also apply the action to all the entries of the list by clicking on the select all link in the bottom left corner of the panel.

The following actions are available depending on the user permissions:

• publish - publication rights
• unpublish - publication rights
• schedule - you will then have to choose a new date from the calendar or type it in by hand. - publication rights
• mark as pending - publication rights
• change author - be careful. You have to indicate the author's Login and not the display name or the complete name - blog administrator
• change category - writer
• delete entries (if you select this option, a confirmation windows will pop-up for you to confirm the action) - blog administrator
• add tags - lets you add common tags to all the selected entries