| Internet,
Intranet, Extranet, E-Commerce:
Strategy, Design and Planning,
Security, Project Management, Training and Promotion. |
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In late 2006 I became involved in a
volunteer project team tasked with designing a web specification,
sourcing resources to build it and then implementing it for a non-profit
service organisation for which I am a member. Joomla very soon
became a target of interest. Then in early 2007, I was asked to
build a "simple" website for a classic car enthusiast club of
which my husband is a member. By April it became obvious that
Joomla could be used for both. I decided to use the car club site
as a learning / test bed. What follows are key learning's as I
proceeded through the installation:
Day 1:
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I decided
to host with one of my bulk hosting companies so set about working
up some web space for the site. Completed in no time.
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I utilised the "Fantastico"
module of the web hosting to install Joomla. Completed in no time
without hitches.
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Initial login yielded a security
warning about REGISTER_GLOBALS = on. I managed to get confused
between RG_EMULATION and REGISTER_GLOBALS and so went off on a wild
goose chase to edit RG_EMULATION in the globals.php file in the root
directory of my Joomla installation. It was off anyway. Then I
discovered that it is a server function and that the physical host
box can only have it on or off. Despite me finding something that
suggested a change in the vhosts file of my domain name could get
around this (also to be done by those that run my virtual hosting
machinery) I was told the only way available to me was to add a
php.ini file to every directory and sub-directory in Joomla
containing php files. This ini file would have just one line
in it: register_globals = Off . Let me just say there are lots of
those directories and each time you add a module, template, etc.
other ones are created.
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The security warning is also pertinent
in that it points out that Joomla is no different to any other
scripted environment on the web and as such requires some
administration to "lock it up". I made a mental note
to re-visit the security elements prior to going live. Sadly, too
many enthusiasts get onto the web and say things like "My
installation went smoothly so why should I bother with things like
turning register_globals = off?" Simple answer - you are
putting the resulting website at risk which is fine if it is yours
and you are happy to take that risk but not fine if the site is for
a client. (Apparently there is a downside - some modules require
register_globals = on - so you end up with a decision to make in
that case. I'd suggest finding an alternate module.)
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Problem: I discovered when viewing
the Administration section, all the graphics were broken. I quickly
decided it had something to do with the fact that when setting up
Joomla I told the installer the final domain name even though I knew
it wouldn't be propagated (I hadn't even delegated the domain). In a
way, I had guessed something wouldn't work. And the menu items
didn't function properly either. Solution: There was a simple
solution - edit the configuration.php file in the root directory of
Joomla and provide a temporary http: path. This must be
changed back to the proper domain path when the domain has been
delegated and propagated and the site goes live. The constant
that needs updating is:
$mosConfig_live_site = 'http://path-to-website.com';
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I decided for this site I wanted to
get the template theme right before doing too much else. I happily
went off and searched for a "Free" theme that I could
easily alter a couple of images to get the desired result. I
found just what I wanted at rockettheme.com
who have some sort of partnership going with the team at Joomla.
The template used is the ShowCar one. Mistake -
Simply unpacking and ftp'ing the theme up to the templates
sub-directory. My graphics weren't showing properly even
though they were up in the template directory. Solution -
delete and upload properly through the Administration screen of
Joomla. (Installers; Templates-Site).
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Editing - template graphics. As a
result of choosing a template close to my desired result, all I
needed to do was change about half a dozen images in the images
folder for that template and alter the background colour and the
headings/sub-headings colour in the css. The editing was
relatively pain free once I'd worked out how to properly load the
css.
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Search engine friendly (SEO)
stuff. I ended up going down another blind alley here because
early on in my setup, I got clever and turned on search engine
friendly URLS in the global configuration section of the
Administration menu. Not giving it another thought, I
proceeded to try and alter the content behind the Contact Us button
and kept getting a "File Not Found" error. Looking at the
URL provided it was easy to see why - the URL looked like it was
trying to find content in a non-existent subdirectory which puzzled
me given it should have been pulling from the database. After
going round and round in circles it became clear that something
wasn't right with the SEO side of things. If I turned that off, the
links worked. Mistake - Read closely what the system says.
If it says "Rename htaccess.txt to .htaccess" do that. I
merrily renamed htaccess.txt to htaccess. Solution -
What did I forget? The period (full stop) in front of htaccess. That
said, it still didn't fix my problem. In the end I decided it had
something to do with mod_rewrite not working as it should. More on
that problem in Day 2.
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Adding some content to Contact Us.
Joomla has a clever way of doing this. Whilst you could create a
static page and then link this to the various menus where you want
it, you can utilise the (Components; Contacts; Manage Contacts)
component. If your contact person (or people) is going to be a user
of the system then it pays to first add them through the User
Manager menu. You're continually having to re-think your process
with content and kind of work from the ground up rather than the top
down. Once I added the users who would be the site contacts, I went
back to the Manage Contacts section. I did consider adding more
contact categories but decided I only really needed one so left the
default. The only strange thing is that even though I selected the
contact, I still had to re-add their contact information. I would
have assumed the information would flow but maybe it has something
to do with what would happen if the user was deleted.
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