Joomla! 1.5: Beginner's Guide电子书

Joomla! 1.5

Table of Contents

Joomla! 1.5

Credits

About the Author

About the Reviewers

Preface

What this book covers

What you need for this book

Who this book is for

Conventions

Time for action—heading

What just happened?

Pop quiz - heading

Have a go hero—heading

Reader feedback

Customer support

Errata

Piracy

Questions

1. Introduction: A New and Easy Way to Build Websites

Join the CMS revolution

Why would you choose Joomla!?

What kind of sites can you build with Joomla!?

Learning to use Joomla!

What you'll learn using this book

About the example site

Summary

2. Installation: Getting Joomla! Up and Running

What do you need to start?

1. Hosting space

2. FTP software

3. A great browser (think Firefox)

Installing Joomla! in four steps

Time for action—step 1: Download the Joomla! files

What just happened?

Time for action—step 2: Place the files on the web server

What just happened?

Time for action—step 3: Create a database

What just happened?

Time for action—step 4: Run the Joomla! installation wizard

What just happened?

Got stuck? Get help!

Pop quiz - test your knowledge of installing Joomla!

Summary

3. First Steps: Getting to Know Joomla!

Making the switch: Building websites the Joomla! way

Sorry, web pages have ceased to exist

Why is this a good thing?

A website built of blocks

Introducing frontend and backend: The Joomla! interface

Your workspace: The backend

And what's that frontend thing, then?

The frontend: The website as the user sees it

Time for action—tour the example site

What just happened?

Have a go hero—get familiar with the example site contents

Taking control: Administering your site in the backend

Time for action—log in to the backend

What just happened?

Taking a closer look at the Control Panel

1. Menu bar

2. Shortcut buttons

3. Preview and Info Bar

4. Information panels

Understanding backend tools and controls

Getting your feet wet: Start administering your site

Three types of backend actions

Content actions example: Let's create some content!

Time for action—publish your first article

What just happened?

Extension actions example: Managing modules

Time for action—rearranging page layout

What just happened?

Site actions example: Configuring basic site settings

Time for action—set Joomla! preferences

What just happened?

Have a go hero—explore the configuration options

Pop quiz - test your knowledge of the Joomla! way of web building

Summary

4. Web Building Basics: Creating a Site in an Hour

What you will be making

SRUP's the word

Cleaning up: Removing the sample data

Step 1: Hide the unnecessary stuff

Time for action—hiding modules

What just happened?

Step 2: Remove sample content

Time for action—deleting articles, categories, and sections

What just happened?

Have a go hero—clean up those menus

Building your site is a three step process

Step 1: Customize the layout

Customize the color scheme

Time for action—choosing a color variation

What just happened?

Time for action—preparing a new header file

What just happened?

Time for action—display the new header image file

What just happened?

CSS ... stylesheets? Come again?

One last thing: Clean up a little whatchamacallit

Time for action—remove the whatsis

What just happened?

Have a go hero—explore layout settings

Step 2: Add content

Create a foundation first: Make sections and categories

Time for action—create a section and some categories

What just happened?

Add articles to the categories

Time for action—create an article

What just happened?

Have a go hero—add your own images to articles

Making content visible: Create a menu link

Time for action—add a menu link

What just happened?

Have a go hero—create more articles

Now that's the all-important power of menus

Add some individual content pages: Uncategorized articles

Time for action—add uncategorized articles

What just happened?

Have a go hero—clean up the Main Menu

Put some content on the home page—at last!

Add items to the home page

Time for action—adding items to the home page

What just happened?

The Front Page is not the home page (or is it?)

Step 3: Add extras through components and extensions

Components and extensions, what's the difference?

Add a contact form

Time for action—create a contact

What just happened?

Time for action—create a Contact Form menu link

What just happened?

Add a Poll

Time for action—create a Poll

Time for action—display the Poll

What just happened?

Wrapping up: Change site settings

Time for action—change site configuration

What just happened?

Pop quiz - test your basic Joomla! knowledge

Summary

5. Small Sites, Big Sites: Organizing your Content Effectively

Building on the example site

Grouping content: A crash course in site organization

Designing a site map

Time for action—create a future proof site map

What just happened?

Transferring your site map to Joomla!

How do you turn a site map into a website?

Creating content containers: Sections and categories

Time for action—create a new section and a category

What just happened?

Have a go hero—add some articles

Displaying sections and categories on your website

Time for action—create a link to point to a section

How are sections and categories displayed?

Have a go hero—create some new sections and categories

Add sections and categories

Add links

Remove an unneeded article

Refining your site structure

Time for action—move content from one category to another

What just happened?

Have a go hero—moving entire categories

Renaming sections or categories

Time for action—rename a section

What just happened?

Have a go hero—name and rename!

Changing section and category settings

Building a site without sections or categories

What sites can you build with uncategorized content only?

How do you go about building a small site?

Have a go hero—organize a site!

Pop quiz - test your site organization knowledge

Summary

6. Creating Killer Content: Adding and Editing Articles

Articles, content pages, what's the difference?

Creating and editing articles: Beyond the basics

Making it look good: Formatting article text

Time for action—add styling to article text

What just happened?

Have a go hero—change the formatting

Adding images to articles

Time for action—upload images

What just happened?

Time for action—inserting and aligning images

What just happened?

Have a go hero—adjust the image settings

Changing the way the article displays

One lump or two? Split the article in an intro text and main text

Time for action—creating an intro text

What just happened?

Creating multi-page articles

Time for action—using page breaks to split up an article

What just happened?

Use it wisely

Tweaking the details: Changing article settings

Parameters (Article)

Parameters (Advanced)

Metadata Information

Archiving articles

Time for action—creating a news archive

What just happened?

Pop quiz - test your site article expertise

Summary

7. Welcoming Your Visitors: Creating Attractive Home Pages and Overview Pages

Why do you need overview pages, anyway?

Creating the perfect home: Mastering home page layout

Changing the way your home page is arranged

Time for action—rearrange the layout of articles on the home page

What just happened?

Have a go hero—tweak the home page settings to your liking

Adding items to the Front Page

Controlling the order of Front Page items manually

Setting criteria to automatically order Front Page items

Time for action—show the most recent items first

What just happened?

Have a go hero—try out the Front Page settings

Parameters (Basic)

Parameters (Advanced)

Parameters (Component)

Parameters (System)

The alternative way: Creating a single article home page

Time for action—creating a different home page

What just happened?

Have a go hero—undo!

Creating section and category overview pages

Blog Layout or List Layout?

The first type of overview page: Creating Blog Layouts

Time for action—create a facebook using the Blog Layout

What just happened?

Have a go hero—add a category description

Showing full articles on a category overview page

Have a go hero—experiment with Blog Layout settings

The second type of overview page: Lists

Creating Section Lists

Time for action—change a Blog Layout to a List Layout

What just happened?

Have a go hero—undo!

Customizing lists: Exploring Section List Layout parameters

Parameters (Basic)

Parameters (Advanced)

Parameters (Component)

Parameters (System)

Using Category Lists

Parameters (Basic)

Parameters (Advanced)

Pop quiz - test your knowledge of home pages and overview pages

Summary

8. Helping Your Visitors Find What They Want: Managing Menus

How many menus can you have?

Creating user-friendly navigation: Cleaning up the Main Menu

Option 1: Change the order of menu items

Time for action—change menu item order

What just happened?

Option 2: Add a separate new menu

Time for action—step 1: Create a new, empty menu

What just happened?

Time for action—step 2: Move hyperlinks to the new menu

What just happened?

Time for action—step 3: Tell Joomla! where to display the menu

What just happened?

Tweaking the menu styling

Time for action—tweak the menu position and orientation

What just happened?

Option 3: Creating submenu items

Time for action—create a secondary menu item

What just happened?

Creating split submenus

Have a go hero—arrange menus any way you like

Exploring menu module settings

Details

Menu Assignment

Module Parameters

Advanced Parameters

Other Parameters

Have a go hero—try out available menu settings

Creating menu links

Have a go hero—try out some Menu Item Types

Why do you have to create menu links manually, anyway?

Creating plain text links

Time for action—creating text links

What just happened?

Pop quiz - test your menu knowledge

Summary

9. Opening Up the Site: Enabling Users to Contribute and Interact

Creating user accounts for team members

What different types of user accounts can you create?

1. Registered users

2. Frontend content contributors

3. Backend content contributors and administrators

Time for action—giving a user frontend authoring permissions

What just happened?

Enabling team members to log in to the frontend

Time for action—create a Login Form

What just happened?

Time for action—logging in as a frontend content contributor

What just happened?

Have a go hero—create a frontend User Menu

Reviewing and publishing team content submissions

Time for action—reviewing submitted content

What just happened?

Have a go hero—explore different User Group permissions

Find out what editors and publishers can do

Find out what backend users can do

Allowing visitors to register

How do you enable users to create an account?

Displaying a link to a Login Form

Time for action—register yourself and log in

What just happened?

Hiding content for non-registered users

Time for action—hiding content for non-registered users

What just happened?

Have a go hero—change access level settings

Getting your visitors to 'register to read more'

Time for action—partially hiding content from non-registered users

What just happened?

Enabling users to rate articles or write comments

Pop quiz - test your knowledge of Joomla! user management

Summary

10. Getting the Most out of Your Site: Extending Joomla!

Extensions in all shapes and sizes

Where do you get them from?

Enhancing your site using core extensions

Time for action—adding a Newsflash to the home page

What just happened?

Have a go hero—change the Newsflash settings

Creating a custom HTML block

Time for action—add a short content block

What just happened?

What other extensions are part of the Joomla! core?

Enhancing your site using third-party extensions

Trying out an alternative News flash

Time for action—downloading and installing an extension

Time for action—putting the extension to work

What just happened?

Have a go hero—experiment with News Show settings

Showing images in a gallery

Time for action—create an image gallery

What just happened?

Do you want more from your photo gallery?

Using extensions to enhance your work space

Time for action—replace Joomla!'s default text editor

What just happened?

So much more to explore

Pop quiz - test your knowledge of Joomla! extensions

Summary

11. Creating an Attractive Design: Working with Templates

This is what templates do

This is why templates are so much fun

Where can you find templates?

Changing the default template

Time for action—activating a different template

What just happened?

Have a go hero—adjust the template settings

Downloading and installing a new template

Time for action—step 1: Downloading and activating a new template

What just happened?

Time for action—step 2: Getting the Main Menu module to display

What just happened?

Have a go hero—fill those module positions!

Find out which positions are available

Assign content to empty positions

Customizing a template: Tweaking CSS styles

Understanding the very basics of CSS

Tweaking template CSS, part one: Changing site colors

Time for action—adjusting the template colors

What just happened?

Tweaking template CSS, part two: Adding a graphic logo file

Creating an image file

Time for action—replace the header text with an image

What just happened?

Have a go hero—tweak the layout to your taste

Diving deeper into Joomla! CSS tweaking

Time for action—editing CSS on the fly using Firebug

What just happened?

Expanding your CSS toolkit

Expanding your CSS knowledge

Editing the template HTML

Time for action—removing the fixed footer text

What just happened?

Backing up and restoring a customized template

Creating your own template

Template building resources

Pop quiz - test your knowledge of Joomla! templates

Summary

12. Attracting Search Engine Traffic: Tips and Techniques

Why do you need to accommodate for search engines?

Optimize your articles

1. The article title: Make it meaningful

2. The article structure: Use clear formatting

3. The article body text: Use relevant keywords

4. The images: Explain what they're about

Update articles regularly

Add meaningful metadata

Time for action—personalize the site metadata

What just happened?

Have a go hero—find metadata to fit your site

Entering metadata for individual articles

Time for action—add metadata information for an article

What just happened?

Have a go hero—explore the art and science of metadata

Don't forget to choose the perfect site name

Use search engine friendly URLS

Time for action—enable search engine friendly URLs

What just happened?

Have a go hero—make your URLs even prettier

Add extra links to your content

Time for action—turn article titles into hyperlinks

What just happened?

Creating an automatically generated list of hyperlinks

Time for action—add a list of links to popular articles

What just happened?

Have a go hero—add link lists

Using a site map

Time for action—adding a site map component

What just happened?

Have a go hero—tweak that site map

Make it easier to discover new content: Using RSS

Time for action—enable RSS feeds

What just happened?

Have a go hero—provide a newsletter service

Getting to know more about your site traffic

More SEO resources

Pop quiz - test your knowledge of Joomla! search engine optimization

Summary

A. Keeping the Site Secure

Tip 1: Upgrade regularly

Tip 2: Change the default Administrator Username

Tip 3: Choose a strong password

Tip 4: Protect files and directories

Choosing file permissions

Tip 5: Use extensions to secure your site

Tip 6: Have a backup ready

Creating a Backup with JoomlaPack

Restoring a backup

Tip 7: Stay informed!

B. Pop quiz - Answers

Chapter 2

Installation: Getting Joomla! Up and Running

Chapter 3

First Steps: Getting to Know Joomla!

Chapter 4

Web Building Basics: Creating a Site in an Hour

Chapter 5

Small Sites, Big Sites: Organizing your Content Effectively

Chapter 6

Creating Killer Content: Adding and Editing Articles

Chapter 7

Welcoming Your Visitors: Creating Attractive Home Pages and Overview Pages

Chapter 8

Helping Your Visitors Find What They Want: Managing Menus

Chapter 9

Opening Up the Site: Enabling Users to Contribute and Interact

Chapter 10

Getting the Most out of Your Site: Extending Joomla!

Chapter 11

Creating an Attractive Design: Working with Templates

Chapter 12

Attracting Search Engine Traffic: Tips and Techniques

Index