Joomla! 1.5x Customization: Make Your Site Adapt to Your Needs电子书

Joomla! 1.5x Customization

Table of Contents

Joomla! 1.5x Customization

Credits

About the Author

About the Reviewers

Preface

What this book covers

What you need for this book

Who this book is for

Conventions

Reader feedback

Customer support

Errata

Piracy

Questions

1. The Skills Required to Customize Joomla!

The architecture of the Internet

HTML

CSS

Server-side scripting and PHP

MVC programming and PHP

Client-side scripting and JavaScript

Asynchronous JavaScript and XML (AJAX)

JavaScript frameworks—Mootools and jQuery

Database work with MySQL and SQL

Summary

2. Setting Up Our Environment

Types of tools

File transfers

Code editing

Image editing

Web browsing

Database administration

Storing code

Checkout

Update

Commit

Add

Delete

Revert

Ignore

Building locally

Practical—picking our tools

Practical—using our tools

Inspect Element

Summary

3. Planning Our Site

Why is it so important to plan?

The Frankensite effect

No one can hit a target they don't have

How to plan

Mission

Practical—write our own mission statement

Monetization

Practical—decide our monetization model

Goals

Practical—set our goals

Licenses, encryption, and commercialism

Licenses

Open source

Proprietary

Encryption

Commercialism

Using the Joomla! Extensions Directory and Google

Choosing extensions from our goals

Practical—turning goals into extensions

Display audio and video

Submit pictures of customers' own house to a public gallery

Ask questions to each other and discuss topics

Grow an income from ad-supported free members and subscriptions

Customer comments on our articles

Ability to collect, moderate, and display user testimonials

Convert default web page URLs to human-readable links

Essential extensions

NinjaXplorer

JoomlaPack

JCE

EasySQL

Summary

4. Installing and Configuring Extensions

Configuring Joomla!

Core extensions

Components

Modules

Plugins

Global Configuration

Configuring content sections and categories

Clearing out the sample content

Creating sections

Creating categories

Buying in Japan

Renting in Japan

General Housing Matters

Configuring extensions

AEC

Subscription plans

Payment gateways

General Configuration

Customization

Micro Integrations

Authentication plugins

PayPal

Creating subscription plans

Joo!BB

Configuring boards

Overall Configuration of Joo!BB

Configuration details

Board settings

Latest post settings

Feed settings

Attachments

View settings

View footer settings

Registration User Settings Defaults

Avatar settings

Captcha settings

!JoomlaComment

General

Security

Posting

Layout

Ninja Custom Gallery

Categories

Custom fields

Buildings

Gardens

Interior

Galleries

Settings

sh404SEF

Other extensions

Summary

5. Installing and Modifying Templates

Finding a template

Choosing a template

XHTML and CSS validation

Template structure

Extra features

Browser compatibility

Typography

Template performance

Installing a template

Modifying a template

Template images

Image considerations

Image compression and formats

When images aren't visible

Originality and copyright

Finding and modifying images

Vector and bitmap images

Modifying our sample site images

Logos

The showcase area images

Favicon

Template PHP

Editing PHP files

Editing our sample site's PHP

Template CSS

Editing CSS files

Editing our sample site's CSS

Summary

6. Customizing Modules

Module construction and operation

Module in a module

Module customization

Modifying top ten members

Step 1: Understanding the existing code

en-GB.mod_fbmodule.ini

helper.php

index.html

mod_fbmodule.php

/tmpl/default.php

mod_fbmodule.xml

readme.txt

Step 2: Plan out our changes

Decide our changes

Mark out our changes

Step 3: Make our changes

helper.php

tmpl/default.php

mod_fbmodule.php

mod_fbmodule.xml

Step 4: Install and test our module

Summary

7. Customizing Plugins

Plugin composition and operation

Plugin types

Authentication

Content

Editors

Editors-XTD

Search

System

User

XML-RPC

Plugin events

Plugin order

Customizing a Plugin

Step 1: Understand the existing code

en-GB.plg_content_njaccess.ini

Description handling in Joomla! Plugins and modules

Our custom Plugin description

njaccess.php

njaccess.xml

The rest?

Step 2: Plan out our changes

Step 2.1: Decide on our changes

Step 2.2: Mark out our changes

en-GB.plg_content_njaccess.ini

njaccess.php

njaccess.xml

Step 3: Make our changes

en-GB.plg_content_aecsubshider.ini

aecsubshider.php

aecsubshider.xml

Step 4: Install and test our Plugin

Summary

8. Customizing Components

Component composition and operation

Out with the old, in with the new—MVC

Before MVC

After MVC

Execution flow for components

Customizing components

Customizing component output

Change 1: Adding rounded corners to the forum

Change 2: Replace the heading background

Change 3: Replacing the buttons

Summary

9. Finding and Fixing Problems

Understanding common errors

PHP code

Incorrect extension parameters

Diagnosis

Fixing the problem

PHP code error

Diagnosis

Fixing the problem

PHP version

Diagnosis

Fixing the problem

Server settings

Diagnosis

Fixing the problem

JavaScript code

Library conflicts

Diagnosis

Fixing the problem

Same library loaded twice

Different libraries loaded

Too much JavaScript

Diagnosis

Fixing the problem

Multiple "once per page" scripts

Diagnosis

Fixing the problem

Hacking the core

Solving the unsolvable

Self support

Search the support forum

Search the Internet

Read the Manual/FAQ

Ask a skilled friend

Support requests

Forums

Tickets

Email

Support request etiquette

Act like we respect the helper and their time

Choose our forum/category/email target carefully

Write a useful, meaningful subject line

Please help/I need help/can someone help me/help me!!!!!!!!!!

Urgent/help now/important

Slideshow module doesn't work

Magic Slideshow V1.02—no animations due to JavaScript error

Provide as much information as possible

Summary

10. Promoting and Tracking

Promoting our site

SEO

Web page URLs

Content

Metadata

Images on our site

Image alt text

Title text

Text surrounding the image

File name

Inbound links

Outbound links

Traditional marketing

Advertisements

Mailing list

Article marketing

Press release marketing

Social marketing

Blogging

Social networking sites

Twitter (www.twitter.com)

Facebook (www.facebook.com)

LinkedIn (www.linkedin.com)

MySpace (www.myspace.com)

Tagging and Social Bookmarking sites

Forums and comments

Tracking visitors to our site

Google Analytics

Tracking visitors

Summary

11. Monetizing Our Site

The Internet and the free economy

Monetization models

Advertising

Google Adwords

Other advertising services

Private advertisers

Affiliate advertising

Selling information

Selling products

Selling services

Monetization implementations

Freemium

Cross subsidy

Advertising removal

Monetization models for our site

Advertising

Google Adwords

Private advertising

Affiliate advertising

Professional services

Subscriptions

Extra content

Advertising removal

Site benefits

Status

Discounts on services

Discounts from partners

Summary

Index