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My guess, from the error off your Trackback link on this story, is your moveabletype/mt-tb.cgi does not have "execute" permission; the apache error.log may have more detail, but the net result is the server cannot run it as a script.

Apart from that, it appears you did decode the instructions. TrackBack is a block of hidden HTML code which tells the blogger's browser to 'ping' mt-tb.cgi (post an XML message to mt-xmlrpc) when they post their story about your story, the mt-xmlrpc.cgi records the origin of that ping (and maybe a few words from it's post).

So to make this happen, you needed to place that cryptic hidden code into your main index and individual story templates (so it's there when someone clicks to "blog this page"), you need the 'mt-xmlrpc.cgi' to receive these pings, _and_ you need to have that mt-tb.cgi working so you can display them.

MovableType's TrackBack implementation actually has nothing to do with mt-xmlrpc. mt-tb handles the majority of TrackBack functions.

(For the technically inclined: TrackBack uses a RESTful architecture of HTTP and XML not XML-RPC.)

David: what are you stuck on? Where to start or is it something else? Could you ellaborate?

FWIW, mt-tb.cgi does have exec permission (755). Good thought, though, MrG.

Where am I stuck? I *think* I have put in the right markup, having followed the movable type documentation as carefully as I could. But it don't work none. I'm at sea about what exactly is broken.

All help gratefully accepted, and then shared...

I'm not even going to pretend I understand the underlying technology. But you get the philosophy,right? Smart, interlinked commenting. I can comment on something you write on my blog, which is where I like to keep all my writing...

As for implimentation, you have checked "allow pings?" for each post? If I c/p you link/archive of this post and comment on it on my blog, then MT will autodiscover your trackback link and send a ping to this post. Now, when clicking trackbacks, you can travel to my blog to see my responses to your post. You should then be able to do the same to me, comment using the archive link of my post, the if you've enabled "autodiscover", a trackback ping will be sent to me. Suddenly we are having a conversation that is transversable across blogs.

I'd have done this as a trackback post, but...

I hope I'm not repeating stuff you already know?

I'm not even going to pretend I understand the underlying technology. But you get the philosophy,right? Smart, interlinked commenting. I can comment on something you write on my blog, which is where I like to keep all my writing...

As for implimentation, you have checked "allow pings?" for each post? If I c/p you link/archive of this post and comment on it on my blog, then MT will autodiscover your trackback link and send a ping to this post. Now, when clicking trackbacks, you can travel to my blog to see my responses to your post. You should then be able to do the same to me, comment using the archive link of my post, the if you've enabled "autodiscover", a trackback ping will be sent to me. Suddenly we are having a conversation that is transversable across blogs.

I'd have done this as a trackback post, but...

I hope I'm not repeating stuff you already know?

Damn.

I do understand what TB is supposed to do. And, unfortunately, I do have "allow pings" turned on by default. I'm making some other, even stupider, mistake.

is there anything in the apache error.log that shows up when we've tried to make these posts? Look for a timestamp around 10:11 am EST when I tried.

your config seems correct because when I tried to blog this page, my MT bookmarklet form correctly sets the track, and when I commit my post, I see your URL in the list of pings as http://www.hyperorg.com/movabletype/mt-tb.cgi/475 which looks just like the one's in my own (working) rdf section (when I view-source) on that page, but I see in my MT "activity log" the message

Ping 'http://www.hyperorg.com/movabletype/mt-tb.cgi/475' failed: HTTP error: 500 Internal Server Error

which is the same error I get if I call it directly. something to check: the first line of mt-tb.cgi should point to your perl program, so just make sure that it does point to your perl and not to some alternate location. If you have shell access, you can also try to run mt-tb.cgi from the command line to see if it gives any clues in it's output (500 can mean your program returned something other than HTTP headers)

btw, inductive errors made while decoding cryptic blackbox SETI signals is not a sign of stupidity; the act of trying to decrypt this code is a sign of intelligence and curiousity.

Launching an $8B/day war against an inferior gun-thug state while 2.8 billion people do not have access to potable water, that is stupidity.

sorry for the digression on a point of semantics.

Great thread! I learned by reading it. I hope David does get it working; sounds way cool! And Mr. G, you know your stupid. You may enjoy reading:

http://www.conspiracypenpal.com/columns/impeach.htm

And if that's not enough, try the scribblings of notable conservative Patrick Buchanan (don't hurl, read...) in "Whose War? - A neoconservative clique seeks to ensnare our country in a series of wars that are not in America’s interest" at:

http://www.amconmag.com/03_24_03/cover.html

Very interesting! Here are what look like relevant lines from my 6MB error log. Can anyone interpret this SETI-like information?

BTW, I just re-uploaded mt-tb.cgi just in case. It is the unaltered original file, except I changed the perl path. Line #9 is:

use strict;

---------------
Bareword found where operator expected at /v/hyperorg.com/www/movabletype/mt-tb.cgi line 9, near "$
use strict"
(Missing operator before strict?)
Unquoted string "strict" may clash with future reserved word at /v/hyperorg.com/www/movabletype/mt-tb.cgi line 9.
Name "main::use" used only once: possible typo at /v/hyperorg.com/www/movabletype/mt-tb.cgi line 9.
Can't call method "Exp" on an undefined value at /v/hyperorg.com/www/movabletype/mt-tb.cgi line 4.
[Wed Mar 19 09:57:06 2003] [error] [client 68.36.33.243] Premature end of script headers: /v/hyperorg.com/www/movabletype/mt-tb.cgi
Bareword found where operator expected at /v/hyperorg.com/www/movabletype/mt-tb.cgi line 9, near "$
use strict"
(Missing operator before strict?)
Unquoted string "strict" may clash with future reserved word at /v/hyperorg.com/www/movabletype/mt-tb.cgi line 9.
Name "main::use" used only once: possible typo at /v/hyperorg.com/www/movabletype/mt-tb.cgi line 9.
Can't call method "Exp" on an undefined value at /v/hyperorg.com/www/movabletype/mt-tb.cgi line 4.
[Wed Mar 19 09:57:30 2003] [error] [client 68.36.33.243] Premature end of script headers: /v/hyperorg.com/www/movabletype/mt-tb.cgi
[Wed Mar 19 10:05:20 2003] [error] [client 66.191.244.167] File does not exist: /v/hyperorg.com/www/favicon.ico
[Wed Mar 19 10:08:54 2003] [info] [client 64.75.32.137] (32)Broken pipe: client stopped connection before rwrite completed

---------

Y'all are fabulous. Thanks for all the help.

Try commenting out the "use strict;" line by putting a # before it. Could it be your webhost either does not have the strict package installed or using an older Perl that does not support it? This is just a wild guess.

Computers are simple machines, made up of tens of thousands of simple parts, programmed by thousands of people who never met each other, each creating simple parts that behave within themselves. If I'm not mistaken, the coupling of simple harmonic systems in a chain/grid lattice is one example of a chaotic system -- frankly, I'm amazed that computers work as well as they do!

I checked your entry and noticed the TrackBack data is now in your pages. Look for the commented out markup that starts

It seems odd that the rest of MT runs fine, but this particular script bombs out. One thing to try "just to be sure" is uploading that particular script again in text (ASCII) mode. On a few occasions in my career I've mistaken uploaded a Perl script in binary mode so Microsoft's version of a linebreak makes it through and causes Perl to go ape. Usually after beating my head vehemently against my monitor for hours do I learn the truth of the matter -- that I am an idiot.

One other quick thing to check is that you have template code in the TrackBack Listing Template (listed under Miscellaneous Templates).

Based on the 500 error I'm seeing and the error.log lines you posted this one jumped out at me:

/v/hyperorg.com/www/movabletype/mt-tb.cgi
Bareword found where operator expected at /v/hyperorg.com/www/movabletype/mt-tb.cgi line 9, near "$
use strict"
(Missing operator before strict?)

Can you verify that the mt-tb.cgi script look something like this?

#!/usr/bin/perl -w

# Copyright 2001, 2002 Benjamin Trott. This code cannot be redistributed without
# permission from www.movabletype.org.
#
# $Id: mt-tb.cgi,v 1.2 2002/06/28 05:41:01 btrott Exp $
use strict;

(The date and version doesn't have to necessarily match.) The error line I highlighted seems to indicate that there is a break in the Perl comment (# and anything after it) before use strict. Perhaps right before that last $. Another possibility is that the # at the beginning of the line is missing however I would assume that the error message would point somewhere close to the beginning of that comment.

I don't think MrG's "wild guess" of the strict module not being present is the case. Ben Trott, being an enlightened Perl programmer, uses it religiously through out all of MT. The TrackBack script would not be the only thing giving David grief. Besides strict is part of the core Perl distribution for a *really* long time.

Tim's got it, I'll bet! Yes, the $ is at the line before "use" and Perl thinks it's the same line -- now whether you transfer binary or text, I suppost it all depends on which was the origin operating system and which is the target, so just try both of them.

This is a head-whacker for sure: Yes, the $ was suspicious.

Congratulations! Drop by the Little Orphan Annie Decoder Ring site and pick out your prize -- http://www.liss.olm.net/loahp/jimc.html

Too bad they didn't give us one of these rings when we buy these machines.

Thank you MrG! Thank you Tim! The problem turned out to be a cgi script with a bad word wrap in it and maybe some other, invisible, bad character because ultimately uploading a fresh copy (provided by MrG) did the trick.

BTW, MrG (=Gary) blogs about this little adventure quite fetchingly:

http://www.teledyn.com/mt/archives/000699.html

Hello! Pages like this one make people think time and again. It's right that you do it.

I'd have done this as a trackback post, but...
I hope I'm not repeating stuff you already know?

Innouncement!!!

I could use "Trackback for Dummer" Really can't get it going on MT. Can anyone out there write something simple that is understandble in plain english?

Try:

http://www.movabletype.org/trackback/beginners/

http://www.plasticbag.org/archives/2003/03/what_is_trackback_part_one.shtml

Great post - can't say I totally agree, but nice way of expressing your point of view.

k

Someone needs to send the clean-up crew in here and save this blog before its too late!

kserokopiarki, kserokopiarka

Kopiarki

Wherever there is a way people will find it. I dont think this blog is too poluted and if you put nofollow in it will save a lot of problems.

Here is some information on trackbacks. It has detialed information.
http://www.movabletype.org/trackback/beginners/
http://www.plasticbag.org/archives/2003/03/what_is_trackback_part_one.shtml

Trackback is a good idea on paper, but it's a real chore to find trackback links for each post that you make. What would be cool if there was a program that automically found *relevant* trackback links for each post you made.

YNNk0i Hey, there is what you need.