Joomla! How-To's

I just found a thread in the forums that is a must-read for all Joomla! beginners. The thread is titled Anna's Joomla Tips, and I strongly recommend you read it if you are a beginner.

Anna's Joomla Tips

A relatively new feature of Joomla! is the ability to display the same module in multiple positions, and varying it depending on which page you are looking at. For example, you might want to display the search module in the header position on home page, but you want it in the left position on each sub page. Here is a quick and easy way to accomplish this.

Joomla! has a problem that you may or may not know about. It is a minor problem (or major, depending on whom you ask), and it will not really affect how your website functions.

The problem exists in how Joomla! renders menus. By default, the main element that contains the menu (in the case of a "flat list" menu, it is the "ul" element) is given an id=mainlevel. This is not a problem if you are using one menu on a page. But, if you are using multiple menus on a single page, there is a conflict.

Proper XHTML markup should not have more than one element with the same id. An id should be unique for each element that is given an id, so the browser can tell them apart for the purpose of style sheets and javascript. If you use multiple menus on the same page, you are using improper XHTML markup, and you will fail XHTML validation.

You can rest easy, though, because there is a solution. Read on to find out what it is.

You've installed Joomla!, installed all of the components, modules, and mambots you need, and you've created your content and menus. Now you want to create a custom look for your Joomla! site, but you don't know how to create a template. This article will step through the creation of a very basic template in Joomla! Hopefully, by the end of this article, you will have a basic understanding of what goes into a Joomla! template. (Note: This information only applies to Joomla! 1.0.X. It does not apply to version 1.5.)

By default, Joomla! displays the FrontPage component on the home page. The FrontPage component takes a list of content items that are published to the FrontPage and displays them in a blog layout. This will work for most sites, but some webmasters want the option to display something else on the home page. If you would like to change what is displayed on your home page, follow these steps:

1. In your administrator panel, click Menu->mainmenu.
2. Create a new menu item that links to what you want to display on the home page.
3. Re-order your menu items such that the item you want to display on the home page is listed first.

It really is that easy. Joomla! displays the first menu item in mainmenu as the home page. You can set anyting in your site as your home page using this method.