CODEWITHSUNDEEP
joomlajoomla2.5joomla3.0
user2317093
user2317093

Reputation: 766

Choosing Joomla Module Positions - Better Way?

I have been using Joomla a couple of weeks now and a few things frustrate me about choosing module positions - I just want to check with you "Joomlexperts" if I am overlooking something...

  1. I am using Joomla 3.1. In many of the tutorials and videos I see people get to choose their module positions from a popup window with checkboxes - mine is just a dropdown list - did they do away with that feature in Joomla 3.1? Or am I missing something?

  2. Is there any way to remove the module positions of templates I am not actually using form the list of available modules positions? I find it confusing and irritating and I often select the wrong one.

  3. Why is it, after say for example choosing the "module position 1" under "My custom template" and saving, that later when I go back and look at the module position assignment it is listed under the dropdown submenu of "custom position: module position 1" instead of appearing to be assigned under "My Custom Template: Module position 1"? That again, feels misleading and confusing.

Joomla is a fairly mature platform, this seems like poor UI design - it doesn't make sense, which is why I am querying this because my assumption is that I must have overlooked something.

And finally, why not have a small iconic/pictoral indication (a page map) of which module position instead of using abstract names? OK, that is maybe getting into ranting territory - I know, I should not criticise GPL software unless I am willing to improve it - but again, maybe such a thing exists and I am oblivious to it.

Upvotes: 0

Views: 938

Answers (2)

Brent Friar
Brent Friar

Reputation: 10609

To expand on what Lodder said -

  1. This can also be controlled by the admin template you are using. Admin templates can be customized just like front end templates. This can also be changed by extensions. Advanced Module manager uses a lightbox that contains a list of positions that can be filtered and searched.

  2. Sure, there's a very easy way to remove the positions of the templates you are not using. Uninstall the template if you never plan to use it. The reason they are there is because a single site can use multiple templates so you would want to be able to assign a module to a position in a specific template, not just the default one. Uninstall templates in the Extension Manager.

  3. Elin touched on this, what you are seeing is the description string associated with each module position. You can change that to anything you want in the en-GB.tpl_TEMPLATE-NAME.sys.ini file or by creating this file if the template does not have one.

Last, one very good reason that there is no built in module position map is because the positions can be controlled by CSS. It's is trivial to add a little CSS that would move a module position depending on the page that it appears on, without doing anything to the template code or modules in the position. For example, the Bootstrap framework stacks all of the module positions on smaller screen sizes. That said, you can do as Lodder suggested and use the preview module positions option, but it would only show you the placement with the default CSS. There would be no way to efficiently account for the infinite way positions can be controlled by template HTML and CSS overrides.

Upvotes: 1

Lodder
Lodder

Reputation: 19733

  1. Module position are always chosen from the drop down list. I'm not sure where you saw a modal box to select a position. It might have been something else they were selecting that uses modals.

  2. I would not recommend this. This would involve editing the templateDetails.xml file. Updating the template would override any changes and what if you wanted in future to use one of those positions? Simply be careful when choose a position from the list and ensure you select the correct one ;)

  3. I assume you have correctly defined the position and it works even though it's saying "custom position: module position 1". I'm not too sure why this is appearing differently for you.

There is a map of the module positions that can be previewed. Go to your Template Manager, then click "Templates", then click "Preview" for whichever template you're using. If you see the message: No preview available for Administrator templates, then go to "Options" (top right hand corner) and enable the "Preview Module Positions" parameter. Please don't forget to disable it when finished as I believe there is some sort of issue when keeping it enabled.

The UI design is not poor. A lot of work and testing went into making it good ;)

Upvotes: 1

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