Customizing Joomla v1.0 Templates

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Customizing Joomla Templates
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Source Book
Building Websites with Joomla! v1.0
Building Websites with Joomla! v1.0
ISBN 978-1-904811-94-7
Publisher Packt Publishing
Author(s) Hagen Graf

Contents

[edit] Customizing Joomla!

Customizing means adaptating a standard program to the needs of the user. In our case, you are the user and the standard program is Joomla!, or more exactly the front end of your Joomla! installation.

In the Joomla! administration, you can customize your site, make changes, and fill it with content.

Typically, the first thing that the owners of a site want to do is to change the colors and layouts. So, we will first discuss this first.

[edit] A Different Look and Feel

Now that everything looks a bit more familiar, you may want your site to have a completely different design. You can do this by renaming your menus and changing the template.

[edit] Modifying the Menu Name

In order to rename the Main Menu to, say, Check this Out, open the Module Manager by clicking Modules | Site Modules.

Click on the Main Menu link to edit it. Change the text in the Title field to Check this Out and the Main Menu becomes Check this Out.

[edit] Changing the Template

In order to see what is included in Joomla! as standard, switch to Site | Template Manager | Site Templates in the Template Manager. "Site" means your website, that is, the front end. As you can see, there are administrator templates as well.

Two finished templates are included with Joomla!. The currently active template is marked with a green checkmark. If you slide your mouse cursor over the name of the template, a small thumbnail view appears, as shown below. The Solarflare template was taken from the last Mambo version and adapted to Joomla!. Marc Hinse's madeyourweb template is new. You can find out more about his templates and get tips and tricks for Joomla! in his blog.

To assign this template to your site, select the radio button before the name of the desired template and click Default in the menu bar. Switch to your site and click the Update button in the browser:

You have a different layout and a completely new appearance. After this first round of satisfying our urge to play, we now get to some more elaborate customization.

[edit] Configuration of Joomla! Administration

Joomla! offers nearly the same comfort level as any program with a graphical user interface, such as Windows, KDE, Gnome, or Aqua (Mac OS X). This is not self-evident for web pages and is made possible by the generous use of JavaScript. JavaScript is executed locally on your computer and can be deactivated in the browser. If this is done, you can no longer work with Joomla! administration. Browsers, however, have been able to deal with JavaScript quite well for several years now and there aren't any serious security concerns any more. For this reason, you should enable JavaScript. In this context, I would highly recommend the open source Mozilla Firefox browser (http://www.mozilla.org). It is more secure and easier to use than Internet Explorer.

The Joomla! administration, just like your site, consists of different elements:

In the top menu bar are the menus and on the right side are two notifications about whether you have received messages and how many users are logged on right now.

Below that is a field with a link (infobar) that has information about which components are applicable to the currently shown manager (in this case, Joomla100 / com_admin). On the extreme right is the toolbar with various dimmed icons (in this case, the Help icon) for the most important Joomla tasks. The tasks are organized in managers and the icons that are displayed depend on the manager. If you slide your mouse cursor over one of these icons, it lights up. You can click the icon and implement the appropriate function. The following table lists the common Joomla! icons and their functions:

Toolbar element Relevance
Publish The chosen element is published.
Unpublish The chosen element is hidden from view.
Archive The chosen element is moved to the archive.
New/New Item The creation of a new element (link, contact, or message) is started.
Edit The chosen element is loaded into the edit module.
Delete/Remove The chosen element is deleted.
Trash The chosen element is put in the trash container.
Restore/Untrash The chosen element is retrieved from the trash container.
Move The chosen element is moved to another section or category.
Copy The chosen element is copied to another section or category.
Save The chosen element is saved and the dialog is closed.
Apply The changes are saved and the dialog remains open.
Cancel The function being worked on is ended without any changes being saved.
Preview The chosen element is shown in a preview window.
Upload The chosen file is uploaded to the server.
Create A subdirectory is created on the server.
Help Mambo online help function is available.
Default The chosen element becomes the default.
Assign The chosen element is assigned to another element.

Table 4.1: Toolbar Elements

Under the toolbar is the workspace of the current manager. As shown in the Figure. this is the Control Panel. It is displayed after logging in and offers quick access to the most important elements. If you do not see the Control Panel, simply click Home at the top left corner in the menu bar.

On the left, there are icons that refer to various managers. On the right, you find five tabs that give you an overview of the current status of your site. In the lower area you see a navigation bar that extends right across Joomla!. Here you can set the number of lines displayed and navigate through the table if say 600 users are online at the same time. This number is quite realistic with well‑frequented Joomla! sites. Changing the number of lines displayed is possible with all table displays.

  • Logged: This tab gives an overview of the currently logged in users. As the administrator, you can log the user out by clicking on the red cross (x) next to the user name.
  • Components: This tab shows the currently installed software components. If these have several options (for example, Web Links), then this component is represented as a heading with subpoints.
  • Popular: This tab tells you about the most surfed pages of your site. By clicking the page name, you switch to the Content Manager and see the respective page in editing mode. If you are in Edit mode, you have to terminate the function with Cancel or Save and subsequently click Home to get back to the Control Panel.
  • Latest Items: This tab is similar to Popular. Here the content is shown in reverse chronological order. Clicking on the name also switches you to the Content Manager.
  • Menu Stats: This tab displays the number of menu elements in each menu.

The menu bar consists of nine options. On the far left is the Home link that sends you back to the Control Panel. On the far right you can see the Help link.

You can configure the Control Panel by clicking Modules | Administrator Modules.

[edit] Help Menu

The Joomla! Help work area is divided into three sections. On the top there is a search field and a bar with links as shown in Figure below. On the left is an index of the available help texts and on the right is the main display area. By default, anything new about your version of Joomla! is displayed in this space.

All but three links refer to the Joomla! server at http://help.joomla.org/. In order to use this search, you have to be connected to the Internet. You have to do this unless you are working with a local version. The other links refer to the text of the GNU Public License, to system information about your server as illustrated in Figure below, and the change log, which documents the modifications of the individual developers. For instance, you can find out that Alex Kempkens added the madeyourday template on the September 16 and that Rey Gigataras installed a new version of the WYSIWYG editor on the September 14.

The system information is divided into three tabs.

  • System Info: This tab displays a summary of the most important data. Right now I am working locally with Windows and the xampplite environment (refer to Tutorial 2 for the installation procedure). Therefore I'm running very up-to-date software versions (Apache 2.0.53 and PHP 5.03) compared to the servers rented on the Internet.
  • PHP Info: This tab displays all information from the phpinfo() function. This is the complete configuration of the PHP interpreter.
  • Permissions: This tab displays the rights of your subdirectories. All directories must be writable for Joomla! to run error-free.

[edit] Site Menu

There are settings that apply to all individual pages and to your server. All of these settings are summarized in the Site menu.

[edit] Global Configuration

The Global Configuration workspace administers changes in the configuration.php file. It contains vitally important pieces of information like the access details for the database server. This workspace is divided into ten tabs:

[edit] Site

The Site tab contains parameter switches related to various settings concerning your entire website:

  • Site Offline: This gives you the option of turning off your site while, for instance, you are carrying out changes to your site and you don't want visitors to track your development progress.
  • Offline Message: The text entered here is displayed on your site when it is switched off. If you want to use another logo, you can save one with the name of [joomla]/images/logo.png. Otherwise, you have to customize the path accordingly.
  • System Error Message: Here you can type in a message that is displayed if no connection can be established with the database server.
  • Site Name: This is the name of the site that you entered during the installation.
  • Show UnAuthorized Links: You have the ability to display individual pages only to registered users. It is possible that these pages get linked from a public connection. If you choose Yes, these links are displayed. When a visitor clicks on such a link without logging on, a message appears announcing that this is a protected area that requires registration.
  • Allow User Registration: This allows you to select whether you want to permit users to do their own registration or not. If you operate a company site, you could set up user accounts for your coworkers, but forbid them to create their own account. On the other hand, with a community site, it is desirable for users to log themselves on.
  • Use New Account Activation: In order to protect yourself from automated programs that can create 20,000 user accounts on your site, you can ask for separate activation. The user gets an automatic email sent to the address given by him or her. There is a link in this email that activates the account. After activation he or she can log on normally.
  • Require Unique Email: Choose whether each email address is to be used for one account only.
  • Debug Site: Here you can switch the site into debug mode. After activating this function, the database queries of the site are displayed. In order to generate a single Joomla! page, 83 database queries are required, as shown in the Figure:
  • Default WYSIWYG Editor: WYSIWYG is the abbreviation for "What You See Is What You Get". The term originated at the beginning of graphic user interfaces, when it first became possible to see how the printed document would look as you typed the text into your word processor. On the Internet, you normally fill out forms with no formatting ability. Formatting is done by HTML tags or program-specific mnemonics. A WYSIWYG editor is user-friendly, since you have to click an appropriate icon, just as when formatting text. This editor is automatically invoked for the text fields that require formatting as illustrated in Figure. It works with all the usual browsers:

    Joomla! also offers the ability to integrate other HTML editors. The default editor, TinyMCE, is used at this time. You can find out more about it from http://tinymce.moxiecode.com/.

  • List Length: Lists, like news and links, will crop up every now and then on your site. With this, you can set the default number of entries that such a list can have.
  • Favorites Site Icon: Every site can offer the surfer a favorite-site icon (favicon). This small picture is displayed to the left of the URL, as well as in the bookmarks of the browser. This works really well in most browsers:

    In Internet Explorer, however, this works only under certain conditions:

The icons have to be available in a specific format. You can specify the name for the icon. You will find the file in the main directory of Joomla!. You can create icons using an icon editor such as SnIco Edit (http://www.snidesoft.com/staticpages/index.php?page=20050504142037205).

[edit] Locale

With this tab, you can localize your page as illustrated in the figure. Localization means adaptation to country-specific conventions. The options available are:

Language: Here you specify the language of the site. All available languages are indicated in the option drop-down menu. The Language Manager subsection discusses the installation of new language packs.

  • Time Offset: This setting can be used to display the correct time; for example, if the server that Joomla! runs on is located in the USA, but the site is meant for visitors in Germany.
  • Country Locale: Every country has certain conventions for the display of numbers and dates (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Locale). This option lets you specify the format. PHP offers the ability to implement different functions depending on the mnemonic entered as locale. The approach is sound; however, this does not always work when creating a template.

[edit] Content

The settings for the content display of the entire site are set here. You may set your preferred settings in the following options:

  • Linked Titles: Here you can set the title of a content element to be shown as a link. This link then refers to the same target as the Read More link.

Read More Link: A lot of content consists of a hook (intro text) and the actual text. Here you decide whether you want to have a Read More link under the hook, which refers to the complete text:

  • Item Rating/Voting: This lets your visitors evaluate the contents of the site. If you click Show, an evaluation component is displayed above the item.
  • Author Names: This setting allows you to display the name of the author of the content. If you select Show, then the name of the author appears above the article as shown in Figure:
  • Created Date and Time: This setting allows you to display the date and time of creation of content. If you select Show, text such as Wednesday, 12 May 2004 is written above the article as shown in Figure.
  • Modified Date and Time: This setting allows you to display the date and time when the content was modified last. If you select Show, text such as Last Updated (Wednesday, 07 July 2004) is displayed under the text, as illustrated in Figure.
  • Hits: Here you decide whether to display the number of hits on a content item:
  • PDF Icon: Here you can assign a PDF icon to be displayed above the content . After clicking this icon, your content is prepared as a PDF file! In order to view the PDF file, you need the free Acrobat Reader (http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/).
  • Print Icon: Here you can determine whether a print icon is to be displayed above the content. After clicking this icon, the content is prepared for printing.
  • Email Icon: Should an email icon be displayed above the content? After clicking this icon, a form is displayed that allows you to send a reference about this content to somebody else, as illustrated:
  • Icons: Here you decide whether to show PDF, Print, and Email as icons or as links.
  • Table of Contents on multi'-'page items: It is possible to write content that covers several pages. For that, a Mambot is contained in the text. We will discuss this Mambot in greater detail in Tutorial 6. If you select Show, a table of contents is automatically produced for this piece of content.
  • Back Button: This setting allows you to have a Back button on every page.
  • Content Item Navigation: If you select Show here, a bar with Next and Previous buttons that you can use to navigate through items is placed under the content.

[edit] Database

This tab shows you the access information for your MySQL server:

[edit] Server

In the server section you'll find more information about settings that you can change:

  • Absolute Path: The absolute path on your server is the path from the root directory of the server to your Joomla! installation. For example, on a local machine running under Windows, it will be C:/xampplite/xampp/htdocs/Joomla!; on a Linux server, however, it is something like /is/htdocs/wp1007226_40G0RIWV3E/www.
  • Live Site: The Live Site is the URL by which the site is accessible on the Internet.
  • Secret Word: This is the encoded administrator password. Refer to the Appendix to find out what to do if you forget your admin password.
  • GZIP Page Compression: This enables you to compress pages. If the browser and web server support this function, the pages are delivered in ZIP format and unpacked by the client browser. This can substantially increase the speed of page download, especially with slow Internet connections.
  • Login Session Lifetime: If you log on as a user, you produce a session. Even if you do not log yourself out, this session is deleted after the number of seconds that you set here.
  • Error Reporting: With these switches, PHP's own error reporting mechanism is activated.
    • System Default: Here the settings from the php.ini configuration file are used.
    • None: Errors are not logged.
    • Simple: Errors and warnings are logged. This setting corresponds to the error_reporting (E_ERROR|E_WARNING|E_PARSE) parameter.
    • Maximum: Errors, warnings, and references are logged. This setting corresponds to the error_reporting (E_ALL) parameter.
  • Help Server: Here you can register another URL for the Joomla! help server.
  • File Creation: If files on the server are created by Joomla!, the standard rights set up on the server are applied to these files. These settings are usually sufficient. If you have problems with uploads, select the second CHMOD new files option and overwrite the server settings.
  • Directory Creation: The setup options described for files (refer to the above point) also apply to directories.

[edit] Metadata

Metadata is data about data, for example a description of your site. Metadata plays a role with search engines. How large this role is, however, is disputed. Nevertheless, metadata represents a good way to describe your site in short and concise words. If you look at the HTML source code of a Joomla! page, you can see the following meta tags in the upper area: 

 <meta name="description" content="Joomla - the dynamic portal engine and content management system" />
 <meta name="keywords" content="Joomla, joomla" />

Here you can set default values as shown below:

  • Global Site Meta Description: This description of site content is often displayed as the result by search engines. One should therefore pay special attention to this tag, because it is on the basis of this information that the surfer decides whether to visit your site or not.
  • Global Site Meta Keywords: Keywords are the most important words in a document. They should describe the main purpose of your site. Some search engines particularly favor the keywords. Individual words are separated by commas and several words can be included between two commas with normal blanks. The keywords should be limited to a maximum of 1,000, as more than that are not selected. Note that the use of fewer key words helps each individual word get a higher priority in the search engine. Deliberate about which the most often used keywords are and which are likely to be searched for most.
  • Show Title Meta Tag: With individual content pages, the content title is blended in as a meta tag.
  • Show Author Meta Tag: With individual content pages, the author's name is blended in as a meta tag.

[edit] Mail

Under this tab, you can decide the methods for sending Joomla! mail, as shown below:

  • Mailer: Here you can select whether you want to use the PHP mail function, Sendmail, or another email account, for example, Yahoo! or GMX.
  • Mail From: For mail generated by Joomla!, this email address is automatically displayed as the sender.
  • From Name: This name is automatically displayed as the sender for mail generated by Joomla!.
  • Sendmail Path: If, instead of the PHP mail function, you want to use the Sendmail program that is presumably available to all Linux servers, you have to enter the path to the program in this textbox.
  • SMTP Auth: Chose whether you want to use an external mail server.
  • SMTP User: This is your user name for this email provider.
  • SMTP Pass: This is your password for this email provider.
  • SMTP Host: This is the SMTP server of this email provider.

[edit] Cache

A cache is a temporary storage facility. Your browser, for example, has a picture cache, which makes pictures already downloaded available faster:

Joomla! uses a similar mechanism on the server to cache pages generated by PHP. This option can drastically reduce response time with frequently visited pages.

[edit] Statistics

Here, you can enable or disable the statistics functions for your site:

  • Statistics: Here you determine whether or not to generate statistics.
  • Log Content Hits by Date: Here you enable daily updated content statistics. Not just the complete page accesses, but hits on individual elements of an HTML page are also tracked here. Unfortunately, there is still no analysis program for this data at this time. By the way, very large data sets are produced within a very short time.
  • Log Search Strings: This switch can give very interesting results. It collects words that visitors to your site enter into the search field.

[edit] SEO (Search Engine Optimization)

This subject is about search engine-friendly URLs. Normally a URL of a content management system looks something like http://localhost/Joomla!/index.php?option=com_contact&Itemid=3. Such URLs are not normally stored by search engines, since the search engine assumes that the content is constructed dynamically and will probably change soon.

  • Search Engine Friendly URLs: With this switch you can make a search engine‑friendly URL from a dynamic URL. If you set the switch to Yes, links look something like this: http://localhost/component/option,com_contact/Itemid,47/. The principle is based on a feature of the Apache web server. With its rewrite engine it can manipulate URLs at will. Besides the switch, you also have to rename the file htaccess.txt in the Joomla! directory to .htaccess. With Windows, such a renaming is only possible with certain programs, for example, the Ultraedit editor. With Linux, the renaming function is problem-free; the file, however, is subsequently no longer displayed in its FTP client (depending on the server configuration). In addition, the provider may not permit .htaccess files, since they represent a security risk for the web server.
  • Dynamic Page Titles: No matter what, you should switch this to Yes. The title of your content is then displayed with the page name in the title bar of the browser window for each and every page access:

[edit] Language Manager

The Language Manager allows you to select the language for the site; it also allows you to install new language files here. This can be accomplished by uploading the language file. Joomla!, however, also allows you to load files onto the server via FTP and then to install them from the file system. The advantage with this is that you can install several language files in one processing step:

[edit] Media Manager

You can think of the media manager as a file explorer or an FTP program in your operating system. With it, you can upload files with the .gif, .png, .jpg, .bmp, .pdf, .swf, .doc, .xls, or .ppt extensions into different directories and administer them.

This manager is extremely convenient, especially if you have administration rights but no FTP access:

  • Create Directory: You can enter a name for a new subdirectory in this field. After clicking the Create icon in the toolbar, the subdirectory is created and can be selected from the options list in the top area (directory).
  • Directory: Select the desired directory, whose content is to be displayed.
  • File Upload: Click Browse and select the desired file from your local hard drive. Subsequently, click the upload icon in the toolbar. The file is uploaded and displayed. Joomla! uses media as it is. Remember that it is not a good idea to put a 3 MB picture from a digital camera on your web page in that size. On the Internet, pictures should be no larger than 50 KB. There are people who still do not have high‑speed access to the Internet! You should have the following times in the back of your mind as a ground rule for the download time for 100 KB (about the size of a portal web page with pictures):
    Connection type 100 Kilobyte download
    DSL Depending on the configuration, less than a second!
    ISDN About 15 seconds.
    Modem (56 kbps) About 25 seconds.

    Table 4.2: Time taken to download a 100 KB file

    The maximum upload size per file depends on the PHP configuration of your provider. In my case it is 16 MB. Larger files would have to be uploaded via FTP.

  • Media Bar: This bar lists the files (media). Depending on the type of file, you will find more information about each below. A stylus icon and a trash can icon are displayed. With a click on the stylus you can create a complete HTML link, which you can then copy and paste into your content. If you click on the stylus of the Joomla! logo, for instance, the Code field displays the following: 
      <img src="http://localhost/Joomla100/images/stories/asterisk.png" align="left" hspace="6"
  alt="asterisk.png" />

    That is the HTML code to display a picture left justified with a border of 6 pixels.

[edit] Preview

Here you get a preview of your site:

You have three options:

  • In New Window: The preview is displayed in a new browser window.
  • Inline: The preview is shown in the workspace, with scroll bars on the sides, if the page is too large to fit on the monitor.
  • Inline with Positions: The preview is shown in the workspace, with markings for the individual module positions.

[edit] Statistics

Here you can evaluate the statistical data that was collected by enabling the feature in the Statistics tab in Global Configuration (refer the Global Configuration subsection) as shown in Figure:

  • Browser, OS, Domain: In this area you get three tabs with information as to which browser, operating system, and domain has visited your site. This is based on the data that a browser supplies automatically to the web server. However, if any spider for example, Google visits your site with a program to incorporate your pages in its index, no information is retained.
  • Page Impressions: Here you can see the individual pages, their creation date, and the number of hits.
  • Search Text: The search words entered by your visitors are tracked here.

[edit] Template Manager

You are already familiar with the Template Manager from where we installed another template for the site in the Changing the Template subsection:

[edit] Site Templates

Here you can set up the templates for your site.

  • Default: Pick a template and click the Default icon to use it as the default template for your site.
  • Assign: Select a template and click on assign to apply it to individual pages:
  • The existing menu elements are indicated to you. Mark the appropriate elements that you want to which to apply the template. You can choose more than one by holding down the Control key while clicking on all desired elements one after the other.
  • New: You install a new template here. There is a large selection of existing templates (http://www.mambohut.com/), which you can install either by means of an upload or via installation from a directory.
  • Edit HTML/Edit CSS: Here you can work directly on the HTML or CSS source code of the selected template . I'm sure that seeing how a template is developed is interesting even for the beginner. Templates always consist of an HTML and a CSS file:
  • Delete: Here you can completely delete an installed template.

[edit] Install

This is the installation mask for site templates. You wind up here if you click New in site templates or if you come directly from the Site | Templates Manager | Install menu. You can install new template file packages by uploading or by doing a directory installation.

[edit] Administrator Templates

What applies to your site, naturally also applies to the administration interface. You can assign other templates and install new ones, just as with the site templates of your non-administration interface. Currently Joomla! has only one administrator template that you can use.

[edit] Install

Just as with the site templates, you can also install administrator templates. You wind up here if you click New in administrator templates or if you come directly from the Site | Templates | Install menu. New template file packages can be installed by uploading or by a directory installation.

[edit] Module Positions

Here the display positions of the modules of a template are administered. You can define up to 56 different positions.

[edit] Trash Manager

The Trash Manager contains your garbage bin. It collects content and menu elements that you have disposed of by clicking on the trash icon, and files it under two tabs, Content Items and Menu Items. You can retrieve items from the trash by selecting the element and clicking Restore; if you click Delete, it is irretrievably deleted.

[edit] User Manager

Users play a very special role on your Joomla! site. At the moment, you are the only user (admin) that the Joomla! administration knows. If you allow user registration on your site (see the Global Configuration section), there will be a lot more very shortly.

In the User Manager, you can change, delete, block, and assign different rights to users.

In the overview list you can see the real name of the user, if the user is logged in at the moment symbolized by a green check mark (Logged In), if the user is activated (Enabled), the UserID, the Group, his or her email address, and the date of his or her last access to your site. This refers to their last login to your site, not login to Joomla! administration.

[edit] New

With New you can create a new user. By clicking on New you get an appropriate form . The following options are available for you:

  • Name: The real name of the user.
  • Username: The user ID.
  • Email: The email address. Depending on the settings in the Site | Global Configuration menu, an email address can be used just once or several times (see the Global Configuration section).
  • Password: The password has to be entered twice for verification.
  • Group: The group affiliation is divided into two large areas:
    • Users that are only allowed to visit your Public Frontend (Table 4.4)
    • Users that are allowed in the Joomla! administration (Public Backend) (Table 4.5).

    All content in Joomla! can be allotted to these groups.

The front-end user group consists of the Registered used, Author, Editor, and Publisher:

Group Rights
Registered A registered user can log in and see some parts of the site that the visitor cannot see.
Author The author can see everything that a registered user can. An author can write and modify his or her information. There is generally a link from the user menu for this.
Editor The editor can do everything that an author can. An editor can write and change any information that appears in the front end.
Publisher The publisher can do everything that an editor can. A publisher can write and change any

information that appears in the front end. In addition, a publisher can decide whether information is published or not.

Table 4.4: Front-end User Groups

The back-end user group consists of the Manager, Administrator, and Super Administrator:

Group Rights
Manager A manager can create content and can see various information about the system. He/she is not

allowed to: Administer
users
Install modules and components
Upgrade a user to super administrator or modify a super administrator
Work on the menu option Site | Global Configuration
Send a mass mailing to all users Change and/or install templates and language files

Administrator An administrator is not allowed to:

Upgrade a user to super administrator or modify a super administrator
Work on the Site | Global Configuration menu option
Send a mass mailing to all users
Install or change templates and language files

Super Administrator A super administrator can execute all functions in Mambo administration. Only a super administrator can create another super administrator.

Table 4.5: Back-end User Groups

  • Block User: Here you can block a user and forbid him or her access.
  • Edit: With Edit you can modify a user.
  • Delete: Delete allows you to delete a user.
  • Force Logout: With Force Logout you can force the immediate logout of a user.
  • Special Users: A special user is any user that has more rights than an author. At the moment, it is not possible to create your own user groups in Joomla!. The group, special users, is helpful in limiting content elements to this group. That can be very helpful if, for example, one wants to offer links to internal help files only to these special users.

[edit] Menu Manager

The individual menus are administered here. Joomla! has four different menus in the sample data (main menu, other menu, top menu, and user menu).

Each menu is coupled with a module, which is administered in the Module Manager. The four menus are shown to you in the Menu Manager workspace and in the menu bar .

You can access the existing menus from the menu bar or by clicking the respective menu item icon in the Menu Manager. The editing steps are the same for all menus:

[edit] Customize Existing Menu

Go to Site | Menu Manager | mainmenu . The first published menu entry on this list is shown as the starting page of your site. At the moment this is the front page. But you can make any other element the starting page:

[edit] New

This allows you to create a new menu. We will do this in the next section.

[edit] Edit

Here you can modify an existing menu, for example, the Links. Clicking on Links, takes you to the form for modification of menu elements as shown in figure.

In the left area, you can set up the details and on the right the parameters. The number and the type of parameters depend on the type of the menu entry:

Details

  • Name: This is the name of the menu that appears on your site.
  • Component: This gives you the type of content hidden behind the menu entry. This setting is specified while creating the menu entry. In our case, the Web Links component is being addressed.
  • Url: This is the part following the domain with which you access your site. In this case, it is index.php?option=com_weblinks&Itemid=23.
  • Parent Item: The parent item is the superordinate element to this menu. Top means at the top level; all other entries represent existing menu entries. If, for example, you arrange and store Links under News, the display in the Menu Manager and the display on your site changes. On the site, the menu entry Links has now slipped into News. You first have to click News, in order to see the Links entry.

    This way your site can be structured like a directory tree very simply and effectively, as shown :

  • Ordering: By clicking on the upward and downward pointing triangles you can modify the sort sequence within the menu. In the Ordering field you can do this in a listing. That way you don't have to keep clicking on the triangles.
  • Access Level: You can decide whether this menu is to be made available to all visitors (Public), only registered users (Registered), or a special circle of users (Special).
  • Published: You can publish or lock the menu here.

Parameters

  • Menu Image: Here you can specify a picture to be displayed along with the menu. To do this, the image must be in the root directory of the Media Manager (/images/stories/). The position in which the picture is displayed depends on the template; in this case, it is displayed on the left, next to the menu entry.
  • Page Class Suffix: Here you can specify a class from the CSS file of your template, with which this menu entry is to be formatted.
  • Back Button: Here you can assign the global settings for the back button, display it explicitly, or hide it.
  • Page Title: With this, you can display or hide the title of the page.
  • Page Title: Here you can specify the page title as shown in the following figure. If you don't enter anything here, the name of the link is assumed:
  • Table Headings: Here you can display or hide the heading above the listing.
  • Hits: The hits on the links are displayed in the link list. You can change these in the global settings or via an appropriate selection.
  • Link Descriptions: Here you can enable the description that is displayed under a link in the link list.
  • Category List - Section/Category: If you click on Links, you can see the default text or your own text if specified in the parameters. This list can be turned on and off with two switches.
  • Description: Here you can switch the general description of the link components on or off.
  • Description Text: Here you can overwrite the standard text of the link components with individual text.
  • Image: Here you can specify a picture from the root directory of the Media Manager (/images/stories/) to be displayed along with the text. Depending on the image align parameter, this picture is displayed on the left or right of the description text, as illustrated in Figure:
  • Image Align: This is the setting for the alignment of the picture.
  • Icon: This is the icon that is displayed to the left of the list of links.

[edit] Publish

If you select one or more menu elements and click the Publish icon, they are published.

[edit] Unpublish

If you click Unpublish, marked entries are no longer displayed on the site.

[edit] Move

This is used for moving menu entries to a different menu. Select one or several menu elements and click Move. This opens a form listing the available menus . Select the menu into which you would like to move the marked menu entries:

[edit] Copy

In order to copy menu entries, select one or several menu elements and click Copy. A form is opened, listing the available menus. Select the menu into which you want to copy the marked menu entries.

[edit] Trash

In order to throw menu entries into the trash can, select one or several menu elements and click on the trash icon. The marked menu entries are then dumped into the trash can.

[edit] Create a New Menu

Let's create a new menu with the name Joomla_book and a link to http://www.joomla.org/. Go to Menu | Menu Manager | New:

  • Menu Name: The name of the menu. This name does not show up on the site, it only serves to make a connection between module and menu. I am selecting Joomla_book.
  • Module Title: The name of the module as it appears on the website. I am selecting Joomla_book. After clicking Save, Joomla! produces a new menu with the given name :

Now click the menu items icon or call up Site | Menu Manager | Joomla_book in the menu bar. You will see the overview mask about the content of the Joomla_book menu. Since no content is there yet, click New.

You can now select content from four different areas from the selection mask that appears on your screen:

[edit] Content

Content is divided into blogs, links, and tables. A blog, in the Mambo sense, is a list of entries with a hook and a read more link. A link refers directly to a certain piece of content. A table is a list of links. A section is a grouping element. Within a section there can be categories. You can find the meaning of the options in Table 4.6:

Option Relevance
Blog - Content Category Blog page that relates to a category (for example, latest news).
Blog - Content Category Archive Blog page that relates to archived categories (no entries yet).
Blog - Content Section Blog page that relates to a section (for example, news).
Blog - Content Section Archive Blog page that relates to archived sections (no entries yet).
Link - Content Item Link to a content element (for example, Sample News Item 2).
Link - Static Content Direct link to a static content page. There is a static content page in the sample data (Joomla License Guidelines).
Table - Content Category Link to a table that represents the content of a category.
Table - Content Section Link to a table that represents the content of a section.

Table 4.6: New Menu Item Content Options

[edit] Miscellaneous

Option Relevance
Separator / Placeholder Insertion of a hyphen into the menu.
Wrapper Here an external page can be displayed within the site; for example, parts of your old site or an already existing guest book.

Table 4.7: New Menu Item Miscellaneous

[edit] Components

Option Relevance
Link - Component Item A link to a component (for example, login)
Link - Contact Item A link to an entry in the contact list
Link - Newsfeed A link to a piece of news in the news section
Table - Contact Category A link to a table that contains entries of a contact category
Table - Newsfeed Category A link to a table that contains entries of a newsfeed category
Table - Weblink Category A link to a table that contains entries of a weblink category

Table 4.8: New Menu Item Components

[edit] Links

Option Relevance
Link - Component Item A link to a component (for example, login).
Link - Contact Item A link to an entry in the contact list.
Link - Content Item A link to a content item (for example, Sample News Item 2).
Link - Newsfeed A link to a piece of news from the news section.
Link - Static Content Direct link to a static content page. There is a static content page in the sample data

(Joomla! License Guidelines).

Link - Url Link to a URL (for example, http://www.joomla.org).

Table 4.9: New Menu Item Links

In order to insert a link to a URL, you mark the last selection field Link - Url and click Next in the toolbar. You can specify the details and the parameters of the link in the form that opens on your screen:

  • Name: Name of the link that appears in the menu (Joomla!).
  • Link: The link to the page (http://www.joomla.org).
  • On Click, Open in: What is to happen, if someone clicks on the link? Should the target be executed in the same browser window, a new browser window with navigation, or a new browser window without navigation?
  • Parent Item: Should the menu entry be a submenu of a superordinate entry?
  • Access Level: Should the menu entry be visible to Public (visitors), Registered, or Special groups?
  • Published: Should the menu be published?

If you click Apply, your data is stored. By clicking on Save, the data is stored and the dialog is closed. Now you have created the menu and provided it with a link. Before it can be displayed, you have to publish the module in the Module Manager. Click Modules | Site Modules and then Published:

You can change the position of the menu with the help of the blue triangles. If you now call up your site, your new Joomla_book menu should be displayed above the Main Menu:

On clicking the Joomla! link, a browser window with navigation should open and the project website should be displayed.

[edit] Installers Menu

All installers are summarized in the Installers menu.The menu branches out to installers for:

  • Site templates
  • Admin templates
  • Languages
  • Components
  • Modules
  • Mambots

[edit] Messages Menu

The Messages menu manages administrator messages. Joomla! has a small communication network that enables sending of messages within the administrators group. In addition, system messages are also delivered; for example, if someone has posted a new content element.

[edit] Inbox

The messages for the administrator are collected here. By clicking the New icon, you can send a new message to users who are permitted access to Joomla! administration.

[edit] Configuration

Here you can configure the communication system.

  • Lock Inbox: You can lock your mailbox and thus suppress the receipt of messages. This is OK if you are the only administrator; otherwise you should leave your inbox open.
  • Mail me a new Message: This feature is really useful. Joomla! sends the messages to the email address given in the user administration.

[edit] System Menu

The System menu consists of only one element. This is a global checking-in of all content elements in process.

[edit] Global Check-In

If an entitled user calls up the editing mode of a content element, then the Global Checkin element is checked out. Only the entitled user may work on this element. During processing, other users will see a lock icon in front of the name of the element. If the document is stored after the change, it is then automatically checked in again and the lock icon disappears.

If the user closes his or her browser window, or if there is a sudden break in their Internet connection, the element remains checked out and cannot be changed any more.

Here the Global Check-In comes into play. By clicking this menu option, all elements in process are checked in and you receive an appropriate list of the elements.

The disadvantage of global checking-in is the fact that all elements get checked in. If one person is just about to change some particular element, this element is also checked in and someone else can also make changes to it at the same time. Be careful with this function and pay attention to who is online.

[edit] Additional References

  • For instructions on Handling Joomla! Errors, click here
  • For instructions on Creating Joomla v1.0 Templates, click here
  • For instructions on Debugging and validating Joomla Templates, click here
  • For instructions on Creating Accessible Joomla Templates, click here
  • For instructions on Installing Joomla! 1.5, click here
  • For instructions on Debugging Joomla! 1.5x, click here
  • For instructions on Error Handling - Joomla 1.5 Development Cookbook, click here

[edit] Source

The source of this content is Chapter 4: Customizing Joomla! of Building Websites with Joomla! v1.0 by Hagen Graf (Packt Publishing, 2007).

[edit] Related Links

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