> > Surely it is not the _last changed time_ but the _first seen time_ of each page that is pulled out of the VCS?
> > If the aim is to get the real creation times of items in weblogs, then the last times that the items were
> > changed in the VCS is not going to help. -- [[seanh]]
+>>> Typo, fixed. --[[Joey]]
> > > If you want to preserve the date of a page, the best way to do it is to
> > > use [[ikiwiki/directive/meta]] date="foo". This will survive checkouts,
> > > VCS migrations, etc. -- [[Jon]]
+> > >
+> > > > That's a good tip Jon. That would also survive renaming a page by renaming its mdwn file, which would
+> > > > normally lose the times also. (And in that case I think both times are irretrievable, even by
+> > > > `--getctime`). I might start using a simple script to make blog posts that creates a file for
+> > > > me, puts today's date in the file as a meta, and opens the file in my editor. -- [[seanh]]
+
+>>>>> I use a script that does that and also sets up templates and tags
+>>>>> for a new item:
+
+ #!/bin/sh
+ set -u
+ set -e
+
+ if [ $# -ne 1 ]; then
+ echo usage: $0 pagename >&2
+ exit 1
+ fi
+
+ pagename="$1"
+
+ if [ -e "$pagename" ]; then
+ echo error: "$pagename" exists >&2
+ exit 1
+ fi
+
+ date=$(date)
+ echo '\[[!template id=draft]]' >> "$pagename"
+ echo "\[[!meta date=\"$date\"]]" >> "$pagename"
+ echo "\[[!tag draft]]" >> "$pagename"
+ git add "$pagename"
+ $EDITOR "$pagename"
+
+>>>>> -- [[Jon]]