How to create a second (or more) front page in Joomla? (Joomla 3.1.5 here)?!
My dream website would be a website with several Homepages, but I haven't figured yet how to make it....
What I mean: for example if you have website on sports - you want a Homepage for: Hockey, Football and Basketball
- each with all 18 (or so) template positions, full page of Modules, etc....Exactly like it is on actual Front Page, but each on different topic....
How to do this?!
and how to get over 'question quality standarts' - everything is described above;
You need to create menu items, assign them to different templates, assign the modules et voilà.
Create the new featured menu items and filter them by category, assuming one is Hockey, Golf etc.
Then in the template manager, install your new template or create a new style for one of the templates based on your requirements, and assign the newly created menu item.
If you're looking for a howto, you might want to start from Joomla.org or google.
It's not a matter of quality, but of context. This is a developers site, not a Joomla usage forum.
Unless you have a total different requirements that what you have described, one way to achieve what you are after for in Joomla 3, is to create several featured articles menu-items with the category settings you want, and also configure your template to work the way you want, with the module positions and the module assignments.
There are also other custom content components, you may want to try, like k2, that offers a variety of options when creating blog layout pages.
And to add to Daniel Bottner's comment that under conditions, this was also possible even with J1.5.
similar simple example in J1.5:
example-page1
example-page2
'Riccardo Zorn' did answer this question pretty well.
What you basically wan't to do is to create a website with kind of a following structure.
site:
1: category 1 (sport x)
2: category 2 (sport y)
2.1: subcategory to 2(sport y ~ men)
2.2: subcategory to 2(sport y ~ women)
...
While each category would be a seperate menu as well as very likely a different template.
It is up to you to filter for the templates and menues which modules are shown there.
But you will have one basic entry point for the website.
No offense but what you want to do is basically default in joomla since at least version 1.6
Related
I am really confused about these 2 concepts. I am basically wanting to change the appearance of the Joomla category page that lists the sub-categories in it. I dont like the default "Alternative Layout" options of Blog and List type. I want to show the sub-categories with an image + sub-category title style similar to some Portfolio layouts I've seen. So I started googling and reading a few docs on how to do this. During this time, I came across the Layout Overrides in Joomla which says that we can create alternative Joomla Layouts to display Modules, components, Category and Menu Items.
Q1) So does this mean that I can create a new layout (for portfolio category as an example) and if I place them inside "templates/myTemplate/html/com_contact/category" folder this layout option will be listed under Alternative Layout drop-down list in admin panel?
While I was reading some more, I then came across the K2 method where it says that K2 allows creating sub-templates to have different styles for each categories. I havent decided if I am going to use K2 or the core Joomla articles. But my main concern is to style some category pages differently to the default blog or list options. When I read the above article, I thought this can be done in Joomla core itself. But when I read the K2 article on Templating with K2 (and the concepts of sub-templates), it said that the core Joomla doesnt allow sub-templating and K2 can do that.
Q2) What is the difference between creating sub-templates for K2 categories and creating custom template layouts for Joomla categories?
I am totally confused here. If Joomla allows to create different layouts for categories which can then be chosen from the admin panel on what layout to use for that category, what is so special about K2's sub-templating which claims that only K2 allows the flexibility of choosing a different layout for different categories?
Can someone help me understand this please? I have been searching to understand the difference for several hours and I am still stuck on this...
I am new to Joomla and I am using the Joomla version 3.3.
There is a big difference in Joomla core Alternative-Layouts and K2's approach. Hard to explain in theory...
Joomla:
The core feature offers two choices: Either create Alt-Layouts and assign them to each Category and (each!) Article in Backend. Or with a new, alternative MenuItem. The latter is achieved through an additional XML file with same name and location. As long as you work with Categories and Listings, the result is quite similar. But it is different when it comes to the Article Fullview: You won't get an alternative layout for full view automatically! You have to assign the layout in backend or use 1 global setting from the article options. The latter will only apply to articles that have no respective Alt-MenuItem. This can result in a "chicken-egg-situation". AFAIK, frontend submission requires an alternative MenuItem for each edit-form. You can't get an alternative full-view layout when you click on a blog/list item "easily". The links from your category items still lead to the "default" without extra work. In my experience, full-view layouts are displayed in the following setups only:
Alt.MenuItem (XML) for Category and Article. A MenuItem for each article has to exist, to automatically pickup your alt.Layout.
Alt.Layout assigned to each Article. (manual work)
Alt.Layout set for Category (no XML). Only 1 global setting in Article's manager options.
K2:
The layout folder structure is simpler. All layout files live in the same folder, you just rename that container folder. e.g. products. The inner files keep their default names. This results in an easier and automated "workflow". A layout is assigned to a category and/or its sub-categories. Article full-views pick up their layout automatically, due to the file/folder structure. There is no difference between frontend/backend. No manual assignment on article edit is needed. Nor single K2 items in the menu. (not to mention, that you get extra fields per category)
Hope this helps.
I'm setting up a Magento site and have some design requirements that we can't quite get right. What is the best way to setup for the website, store, store view and then the categories for the needs below?
Overview:
One domain name, one set of customers
3 similar product lines that appeal to different industries
Specific Requirements:
The home page should show static content about the company and featured products from all three main categories of products
Each main category of products should have a distinct visual design that carries through when looking at any of the products in those categories
It should be seamless for customers to move from one category of products to another and have the design change without having to choose a store from a dropdown etc.
Home Page: Design A, any and all products may show.
Category 1: Design 1, products only from cat 1 show
Category 2: Design 2, products only from cat 2 show
Category 3: Design 3, products only from cat 3 show
Every combination of websites and stores and store views that we have tried results in strange behavior like changing a store and getting "There was no Home CMS page configured or found." instead of seeing the unique design and category it should be showing. So far we can only get the designs to be different by making new CMS pages which doesn't seem practical.
This seems like something that Magento is made to do and I have to be missing something.
Thank you for any help.
-Shane
Your design needs imply work and considerations from multiple areas of configuration. I'll tackle them in turn. The tl;dr is that there may be more than one way to accomplish what you want, with the number of options at your disposal depending on your needs.
1) One domain name, one set of customers
Domain names (URLs) are configurable for all configuration scopes: Global (aka "Default"), Website, and Store (aka "Store View"). Ultimately, Magento configuration comes down to the most granular/specific scope, which is the store ("Store View") scope. If a configuration value is not specified at the store scope, its value is derived (inherited) from the website or global scope.
Customers are configured to "belong" to all websites or to an individual website (System > Configuration > Customer Configuration: Account Sharing Options). There is no out-of-box capability to restrict customers to a particular store.
2) 3 similar product lines that appeal to different industries
Depends on things discussed below.
1) The home page should show static content about the company and featured products from all three main categories of products
Assuming that you are using the standard configuration of having the Mage_Cms module serve up the home page (System > Web > Default Pages), that CMS page should be visible for all store views. CMS blocks and pages are restricted based on store. Now, later on in your post you mention that you see different behavior in the home page "instead of seeing the unique design and category it should be showing", which indicates that you would like to have different but analogous content for each store's home page. You can use one homepage to do this, but rather than specify content in the content area, you'll need to include your content by specifying a block in Layout XML Update - this block will load a particular category based on the store.
2) Each main category of products should have a distinct visual design that carries through when looking at any of the products in those categories
Establishing theme variants from global scope is possible at the website- and store-wide scopes. Theme variants can also be specified per CMS page, product, and category [each entity having a tab in its admin panel for effecting this change], with the latter having the option of "waterfalling" its custom theme settings to "child" categories and products. Which approach you take depends on your catalog hierarchy as well as the variations present in your themes.
It should be noted that if you need to present different category structure, or if you need to enable/disable products differently based on context, then you will be dealing with multiple websites. This is because category structure relies on root categories, and only websites are associated with root categories. As a reminder, "websites" in Magento have no implicit connection to distinct URLs, it's just an unfortunate naming convention for a scope level.
3) It should be seamless for customers to move from one category of products to another and have the design change without having to choose a store from a dropdown etc.
Based on this final stated requirement, and assuming that you are relying on Magento's native navigation, you are locked into one category structure, and will be using the approach of waterfalling category design, which you will set for each top-level main category under your single root using the "Custom Design" tab:
Another approach would be to create three distinct websites with distinct root categories and then build a menu by hand which links to each of the three stores, but I think this is less ideal based on your stated needs. You could also use one root category and then hide categories by website. Again, less likely that this will be appropriate for you.
Based on the information above you might end up clarifying or adding to your question. I'll update my answer in response if necessary.
I'm evaluating Magento for a particular client of mine. They want to enforce a particular workflow for browsing the catalogue. They're a travel company which puts together custom holiday packages and want to make sure users enter things like the number of adults / children before selecting accommodation (as number of people will affect available accommodation and pricing).
Note that accommodation is just an example, there are several other different components to a holiday package. And they've given me a 7 step (mostly) linear workflow they want users to follow before we get to anything which might resemble a checkout process (and even then their concept of "checkout" is quite different to Magento's).
I'm thinking of storing accommodation (and each of the other package components) in separate product categories. Then I can restrict what users can see as they browse the catalogue based on what they've already added to their shopping cart.
My research indicates that Magento doesn't really do this kind of thing out of the box. Am I mistaken? Are there add-ons which would support this kind of thing?
If I was to go down this road, would I be redesigning (or indeed, replacing) a large chunk of Magento's catalogue browsing functionality?
Well there are several approaches that you can take to implement something like this; but all require that you do custom development work.
You could define your packages as simple products with attributes for each of the specific package options and use that to filter each package from the others, now you would need to create a new module that adds a route on the frontend that is going to be your multistep form that will get all the information once you have all the information you can get a collection of all the products(packages) that match those attributes.
Now the deal there is if that price changes depending on the options selected if that's the case then you might need configurable products or something custom to change the price of each package.
It's really hard to say without real specifications of what your client needs, but if the question is if it's possible with Magento then the answer is yes it all depends on your level of skill :)
Kind Regards
So I ended up going with Magento as a product base and extending it using some custom code (been a while since I've developed in a LAMP environment!)
I created a static block which is used as the root of the workflow. There are 8 steps in the workflow which get listed in an ordered list. Each item has two custom Magento widgets next to it, which are a) a little tick image displayed when you've completed the workflow stage and b) a link which displays when you're up to that stage, clicking the link takes you to an appropriate catalog page (eg: choose accommodation, hire car, confirm shopping cart, etc).
I disabled the normal top catalog navigation to encourage users to keep within the workflow. That is, the mouse over to see more catalog detail of the "holiday planner" is disabled (although you can just navigate to the correct urls if you know them, or are smart enough to use the SEO link at the bottom of the page!).
Everything in your holiday is added as cart products (which has the positive side effect of Magento will remember your holiday if you get part way through it).
There is a big state machine in a helper class to determine what stage of the workflow you're up to. This checks your cart to see if products with particular sku's or from a particular attribute set are added.
I also overrode many URLs and redirects (eg: after you add a product) to send the user back to the root holiday planner page. This added to the workflow as almost every action you did or product you add bounces you back to that workflow page (which always tells you what the next step is).
I'm trying to make a "Chapter selector" for my organization's website. I want to be able to select, say, the "Bay Area chapter" and have the site display articles and events for the Bay Area chapter (while keeping the chapter-independent parts of the site the same). How do I accomplish this?
I'd need a little more detail but here are some of the things to consider -
I am a fan of K2 for being able to nest categories, but you can at least categorize all of your Chapter information in to separate categories within a single section in the Joomla content manager.
For each Category you will need a menu item - Articles > Category > Category blog Layout
In the module manager you will need corresponding modules that display category related information. Be sure to associate the modules to the correct menu items in the module's Menu Assignment area.
I'd do the chapter selector as a menu. Create a menu to contain your chapters and then publish a module for that menu which allows you to pick your items with that chapter.
On my Joomla website, I'd like to have a "about our company" article always be the first article on the front page. I want the other articles to shift down in position as new articles are added, but to keep the "about our company" one constantly on top.
I tried setting the order of that article on the front page manager to -1, but it still shifted down when I added a new article.
Any ideas?
You could write that info in a module and publish that module in a position that shows up before the component.
Do you have the front page sorted by date? If you do then make the about us article have a created date of 2099-01-01 and make sure you switch off show date for that article
Unless you find an adequate plugin for this specific need, I'm afraid you have to manually modify the template.
Depending on the setup, you can use the section or category info as a "fake" article. Enable showing the section/category description in the menu item (it's off by default) and you'll have a text that is always at the top.
I was struggelng with the same issue,... and have found the solution in the joomla documentation.
In the frontpage manager set order number for the article that you want to be "always-on-top" to -1 (minus one). This will make sure it will always have a lower order number than the other articles, even when other people submit articles.
For Joomla 1.5, go to your FrontPage Manager. The article you want to always have at the top, type is -1 in the ORDER column (as William said above). Now next to the name of this column, there is a picture of a floppy disk - you MUST click on this icon to SAVE the order.
Now your WELCOME article is numbered -1 and will always be at the top of your front page.
This question is Google top result, yet Joomla has been upgraded many times since it was asked and answered. Here is a more recent option:
In Joomla 3.4, you can do this by going to the settings of the category that displays the articles, then to its Blog Layout, then set Article Order to Featured Articles Order. This makes featured articles appear above normal articles.
In 2020, one could add Custom Fields (available since Joomla 3.7) to Joomla articles, or just to articles in a certain category, and then modify the template to query this Custom Field and handle articles accordingly.
in the order number in joomla 1.5 setting the order number to a minus figure doesn't work, it keeps reverting back to the default number.