One simple thing many people want to do on their blog home page is to add some new links on the sidebar. We'll use this task as an example of how to modify the main index.
From the main Templates page in Movable Type, click "Main Index" to bring up the code for the main index file. The Main Index is structured with many divisions ("div"), including <div id="links">, which is the overall container for the sidebar. Find the part of the file that reads:
<div class="sidetitle">
Links
</div>
<div class="side">
<a href="">Add Your Links Here</a><br />
</div>
You can simply type in your links over "Add Your Links Here," a la:
<div class="sidetitle">
Links
</div>
<div class="side">
<a href="http://www.umn.edu">University of Minnesota</a><br />
</div>