How to use Blot Metadata

Metadata

How to change the publish date, permalink, tags and other properties of your posts. The link and date of each post are generated from the contents of the file and the date it was created. You can override this and other metadata as needed.

Setting your own metadata is optional. If you want to set your own metadata, you must do so at the very start of the file. Blot also understands front matter.

Date: November 29th, 2023
Link: introduction

Metadata must be separated from the rest of the post by at least one blank line. You must leave a space after the colon between the metadata property (e.g. Date) and its value.

Dates

The publish date for a post is copied from the file’s creation date. You can set your own publish date using your folder or in the file’s metadata, like this:

Date: November 29th, 2023

Blot supports a variety of date formats. These all produce a post with the same date:

11/29/2023   
November 29, 2023
11.29.2023     
2023-11-29 00:00

You can use underscores, dashes, slashes and dots to separate the numbers in the date.

Set the publish date using your folder

You can specify a post’s publish date in its path. For example, all of these files become posts with the same publish date and time:

2023› 11› 29› Portrait.jpg

2023› 11› 29-Portrait.jpg

2023› 11-29-Portrait.jpg

2023-11-29 Portrait.jpg

2023-11-29 18-03 Portrait.jpg

Please note that a date specified inside a file overrides a date specified in its path.

Scheduling a post for publication

If you specify a date in the future, your post will be scheduled for publication at that future date. You can verify the date of publication if you click on the file on your dashboard.

Set tags using your folder

You can add tags to a post in the file’s name or path. Include the tag, wrapped in brackets. For example, all of these files become posts tagged Pictures and Sicily.

[Pictures]› [Sicily]› Palermo.jpg

[Pictures] [Sicily]› Palermo.jpg

[Pictures] [Sicily] Palermo.jpg

Metadata reference

Title	Defaults to the text of the first heading in the post or the file’s name.
Link	Defaults to a URL-friendly version of the post’s title. Specify a different link in the file’s metadata, or adjust the default link format.
Date	Defaults to the file’s creation date. Specify a different date in the file’s metadata with one of the supported formats. You can also change a post’s publish date using the file’s path.
Comments	Determines whether comments are enabled on the post or the page. Can be ’Yes’ or ’No’. Defaults to ’Yes’ for posts and ’No’ for pages. Has no effect if comments are disabled in the blog settings.
Summary	Defaults to the text of the first sentence of the first paragraph in the file.
Teaser	Defaults to the first few paragraphs of the post. You can specify a teaser in the file’s metadata or insert the breakpoint `{{more}}` yourself. You can specify the end of the teaser using the `{{more}}` tag somewhere in the file. Everything above the `{{more}}` tag, including this line, will be in the post’s teaser.
Search	Determines whether a post is included in your blog’s search results. Can be ’Yes’ or ’No’. Defaults to ’Yes’.
Tags	You can tag a post in the file’s metadata or using the file’s path.
Thumbnail	Defaults to the largest image in the post. You can specify a URL, or a path to an image in your blog’s folder.
Draft	Determines whether a file becomes a draft. Can be ’Yes’ or ’No’. Defaults to ’No’ unless the file is inside a folder called ’Drafts’.
Page	Determines whether a file becomes a page or a post. Can be ’Yes’ or ’No’. Defaults to ’No’ unless the file is inside a folder called ’Pages’.
Menu	Determines whether a file appears on your blog’s menu. Can be ’Yes’ or ’No’. Defaults to ’Yes’ for pages and ’No’ for posts.

Custom metadata

You can also define your own metadata for use in your template.

Metadata in HTML files

You can use a comment at the start of an HTML file to specify metadata.

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<!--
Date: November 29th, 2023
Link: /metadata
-->

The comment containing metadata in an HTML file
<b>must</b> start on the file's first line.

Metadata in YAML front matter

You can also use YAML front matter to declare the metadata for your post:

---
Date: November 29th, 2023
Link: Apple
---

Blot is able to extract the metadata from this post too.

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