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Browsing Category: "Joomla"

Creating a template for Joomla 1.5

Joomla, Great Ideas, graphic design, Web Development, FireFox, PHP July 2nd, 2008

There is not too much secret to create a template for Joomla 1.5. The concept is the same as breaking a design for any site and you just need to know some content anchors and some “must have” files to make it work.

Let’s start with the “must have files”. No matter what kind of template you are building you will need the following:

index.php
templateDetails.xml
template_thumbnail.png
a css folder with template.css (or whatever name you want to use.css) inside
a images folder with at least the logo.png file (must have this name)

If you have this, your template is half away to be complete.

The templateDetails.xml is tricky and it have changed from the 1.0.x version to the 1.5.x version. Anyway this file must have the following parameters:

xml opening tag: <?xml version=”1.0″ encoding=”utf-8″?>
install open with version and type described: <install version=”1.5″ type=”template”>
- name: this will be the name displayed on joomla for your template, but it will be as well the directory of the template
- creationDate
- author
- copyright
- authorEmail
- authorUrl
- version: the version of the template
- description: the description that will be shown for the administrator on joomla
- and files: all the files that you use on your template
  - with filenames (off course has to contain the “most have” files)

Now all you need to do is break the design and attach the content anchors on your file and this is how it works. When you go the module manager on Joomla you will see a bunch of module positioning availabe. Copy those names, you will need them. They are the current anchors that you have available to use on your template. You can definitly change what module is on which positioning on the module manager, and that can affect the use of your template.

Anyway, for any module positioning on your template, let’s say, left, you will use the following command:

<jdoc:include type=”modules” name=”modulename: left for example” />

You don’t need to write a html header, those Joomla will take care of, but you will need to tell Joomla to do that and for that you will need to use:

<jdoc:include type=”head” />

At the very first line of your index.php you will need to test if you can execute Joomla. It’s required for the template. Anyway, you still have to work out some other checks needed for Joomla to work, so this is how your header must be:

“<?php
defined( ‘_JEXEC’ ) or die( ‘Restricted access’ );
JPlugin::loadLanguage( ‘tpl_SG1′ );
?>
<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC “-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN” “http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd”>
<html xmlns=”http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml” xml:lang=”<?php echo $this->language; ?>” lang=”<?php echo $this->language; ?>”>
<head>
<meta http-equiv=”Content-Type” content=”text/html; <?php echo _ISO; ?>” />
<?php if ($my->id) { initEditor(); } ?>
<jdoc:include type=”head” />
<link rel=”stylesheet” href=”templates/system/css/system.css” type=”text/css” />
<link rel=”stylesheet” href=”templates/<?php echo $this->template ?>/css/template_css.css” type=”text/css” />
</head>

Now, construct your template how it should be. Add the anchors and for the content area, add the following anchor:

<jdoc:include type=”component” />

You are done. Keep these tips and tricks in mind and you will create a Joomla Template in no time.

Cris

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Setting PHP INI Settings with .htaccess

Cool Shit, Joomla, Web Development, PHP June 13th, 2008

Sometimes you just don’t have access to the PHP INI and now what?

It’s pretty simple, just use the .htaccess file to set the PHP.INI setting that you need.

For instance setting down Register Globals you would use:

php_flag register_globals off

Cris

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Joomla Template Builder

Joomla May 20th, 2008

Joomla Template Builder

The Joomla! Template Builder is a free-to-use set of tools designed to enhance creativity, giving you precision control of the look and feel of your template by simply selecting your options and choosing your colors. The Joomla! Template Builder generates the configuration and all the necessary CSS, and images for you based on your selection.

John

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Login error on Joomla

Joomla, PHP February 8th, 2008

If someday you see a message like this and you have just installed or restored your Joomla installation, you might consider this solution.

error_joomla_login

Joomla uses a set of tables to config it’s core access control layer and the user login information. The tables are the jos_core_acl_aro (and extensions from it).The jos_core_acl_aro table is set, on the SQL script, with the engine MyISAM and it does not support a large key type, so the table is not created (or recreated) and your login information cannot be processed.

To fix this is simple, open you SQL script and change the engine to InnoDB. Run the script again and you issue should be solved.

Obs. All the users on the users table most have an entry (or a relation - ex. group) on the jos_core_acl tables.