Joomla Tutorials

randombar

Hi,
Does anyone have a good place to go to learn about joomla, like a crash course. thought I could dive right in but with the different catgeroies and sections and all of that it's a bit too broad for me to just pick up quickly.
Thanks
Gary

forbairt

1.0.x or 1.5 ?

randombar

1.5, even a brief idea of what's going on with it would be great, the relationship between categories sections and pages and so on? Cool SW just so so broad!

forbairt

One problem you'll find is 1.5 is relatively recent ... in terms of being able to use it in production (well it shouldn't have been used in production at any rate)

To the best of my knowledge a lot of this remains the same in 1.5
http://help.joomla.org/component/option,com_wrapper/Itemid,253/

Templating will be a lot nicer and cleaner though

randombar

Oh right? Should I roll back and use 1.0.x so?

forbairt

GaryCocs wrote: »

Oh right? Should I roll back and use 1.0.x so?

god no 1.0.x is a nightmare

I was just saying that 1.5 was only released recently so you may find support on certain things is a bit iffy ... plugins and so on ... that said a lot of developers have been upgrading their plugins in anticipation.

I ran into various problems with different rc's and plugins not working nicely and having to go in and hack code to get it to work.

Just make sure anything you install ... modules or components are 1.5 friendly

axer

GaryCocs wrote: »

Oh right? Should I roll back and use 1.0.x so?

I am still using 1.0.13 until certain components are ported to 1.5 e.g. JCE (a great wysiwyg editor) and SOBI2 (a directory component).

Bob the Builder

Still use 1.0.13 on some sites myself, until certain modules are ported over(as axer said), but on other sites, I've implemented Joomla 1.5 because it'a much simpler to use.

Google is your friend in this case OP. Type in your problem, and await an answer. still very little documentation available for the latest release.

randombar

Jebus this isn't easy stuff, unfortunately google is too friendly here, offerning me way too much and the help for 1.5 isnt on the official site just yet!

DonkeyStyle \o/

I hated joomla, it just didn't click with me... I found drupal a lot more intuitive.
Is it too late to try something else?

forbairt

I axed joomla and I've not looked back yet ... haven't found a replacement for virtuemart just yet but we'll see ... probably gonna go towards one of the commercial apps out there.

http://www.opensourcecms.com/ as always is there to try em out

randombar

I reckon it's not too late I suppose but do you think joomla after the long learning curve would be more suited since there's a greater amount of apps?

forbairt

yes / no ... depends what you're after really ... depends on what your clients need / require.

What features are you looking at exactly that you need ?

EKRIUQ

forbairt wrote: »

http://www.opensourcecms.com/ as always is there to try em out

That's built with Joomla, wonder why they picked that:rolleyes:, pity that its nearly impossible to login to most of the sites

Bob the Builder

I think Joomla is the best of a bad lot as regards Open Source CMS options. I had Drupal for a year on a cycling website which I was in charge of, and Drupal just drove me up the wall.

Every CMS will have it's own weakness, but Joomla! suits me, even though it has a lot of downfalls. Commercial is the way to go I'm afraid....

forbairt

nevf wrote: »

I think Joomla is the best of a bad lot as regards Open Source CMS options.

How many of them have you actually tried ?


1024
AIOCP
AssoCIateD
Bcoos
BigAce
BitWeaver
BloofoxCMS
CMS Made Simple
ContentNow
DBHcms
Dragonfly CMS
Drupal
e107
eazyPortal
Elxis
Enano CMS
Etomite
Exponent
ExV2
eZ Publish
Fundanemt
FuzzyLime
Geeklog
iGaming CMS
Jaws
Joomla
LoveCMS
Mambo
MDPro
MODx
Netious
OneCMS
Ovidentia
Pheap
PHP-Fusion
PHP-Nuke
phpwcms
phpWebSite
PLUME CMS
Postnuke
RunCMS
SilverStripe
SPIP
TikiWiki CMS
toendaCMS
Typo3
Typolight
Website Baker
Xaraya
XOOPS
YACS

Bob the Builder

forbairt wrote: »

How many of them have you actually tried ?
....
.....

CMS Made Simple
Drupal
e107
Geeklog
Joomla
Mambo
PHP-Nuke
phpwcms (I Think)
phpWebSite
Postnuke
Typo3
XOOPS

Them! I have tried all them, honestly... I spent a whole summer looking for them for the cycling website! Don't ask me to compare the installations because I used Fantastico to install a lot of them...

As regards the rest of the CMS's, I have never tried them, but you can be sure they lack major functionality in some way or another...or else lack the ability to easily create/find theme's and/or modules.

~NevF

forbairt

nevf wrote: »

CMS Made Simple
Drupal
e107
Geeklog
Joomla
Mambo
PHP-Nuke
phpwcms (I Think)
phpWebSite
Postnuke
Typo3
XOOPS

Them! I have tried all them, honestly... I spent a whole summer looking for them for the cycling website! Don't ask me to compare the installations because I used Fantastico to install a lot of them...

As regards the rest of the CMS's, I have never tried them, but you can be sure they lack major functionality in some way or another...or else lack the ability to easily create/find theme's and/or modules.

~NevF

I'm surprised you'd dismiss typo3 and CMS Made simple ...

I know one company doing a LOT of typo3 development and there is a huge learning curve according to my friend who worked there. They've been using it to build Uni websites.

While I realise Joomla appeals to a a lot of people I just fail to see the major attraction ... its not that simple to template (I've done various templates for it and I realise you can't just jump right into it)

I also don't really like the way pages work and the limit of the sections and articles .. I know there are plugins available but once you go down the route of adding in this plugin and that plugin you've to wait for it all to become stable when the various core bug fixes are released. (The same could probably be said about any CMS though)

randombar

For me the main advantage to the CMS would be the fact that I can easily share my work and the site with others, because it's a GAA site I won't be able to meet with the others to explain my code etc etc

I also think it's about time i started to figure out these CMS

forbairt

GaryCocs wrote: »

I also think it's about time i started to figure out these CMS

I use a fair few cms's ... wordpress / joomla / sNews / textpattern / MT4 / CMSMadeSimple .. and a few others ...

They all have good points and bad points ... why do I use different ones ... well some fit the needs better than others ... MT4 for example is a publishing system as I see it and quite powerful because of it. There are also a HUGE amount of plugins available. Again it really depends on your requirements. Work out the key features you need and go from there. Don't just jump on the Joomla bandwagon because everyone else does.

ChicoMendez

forbairt wrote: »

god no 1.0.x is a nightmare

just out of interest - why is it a nightmare ?

forbairt

ChicoMendez wrote: »

just out of interest - why is it a nightmare ?

Lack of intelligent sub pages and sub pages and sub pages ...

Lack of a decent default template (tableless design) Most plugins / modules / components .. also using table based design ...

To each their own though .. I don't mean to put anyone using it down its just my own views on it.

ChicoMendez

forbairt wrote: »

Lack of intelligent sub pages and sub pages and sub pages ...

Lack of a decent default template (tableless design) Most plugins / modules / components .. also using table based design ...

To each their own though .. I don't mean to put anyone using it down its just my own views on it.

no probs i was just interested in why you though that - sure there are good and bad points to each as you say .

just on the template :i would not of thought the standard template would be a deciding factor as i personally would never use that (yes its crap) - and im sure any webmaster would not be looking at actually using that for a client/their own work , moreso designing a custom template

forbairt

ChicoMendez wrote: »

just on the template :i would not of thought the standard template would be a deciding factor as i personally would never use that (yes its crap) - and im sure any webmaster would not be looking at actually using that for a client/their own work , moreso designing a custom template

I'd base any templates I would design on the core template ... it being bad means I'll have to go find a decent one. I don't buy templates so having a decent css based design would have meant I could easily pick apart the template and modify it completely for my needs.

Yes there are ship loads of templates out there its not the point for me.
Its also taken them a while to get it to a stage where a lot of the core is no longer table based ??? ( sorry I've not looked at the final release that closely so I could be talking out my hat ) I'll assume all plugins will have to be modified as well.

Bob the Builder

forbairt wrote: »

I'm surprised you'd dismiss typo3 and CMS Made simple ...

I know one company doing a LOT of typo3 development and there is a huge learning curve according to my friend who worked there. They've been using it to build Uni websites.

The TYPO3 admin backend just doesn't really work for me, and I also found that it was a pain the arse to template, update.

CMSMS was good, but when I tried it, it was still fairly new, and was buggy, and if my client, and I knew well my client at the time wouldn;t like it. I hope it has improved since then, because it had so much potential.

While I realise Joomla appeals to a a lot of people I just fail to see the major attraction ... its not that simple to template (I've done various templates for it and I realise you can't just jump right into it)

I also don't really like the way pages work and the limit of the sections and articles .. I know there are plugins available but once you go down the route of adding in this plugin and that plugin you've to wait for it all to become stable when the various core bug fixes are released. (The same could probably be said about any CMS though)

Meh, Joomla! is powerful, and has so much potential when one learns to use it. Also, programming new modules for it has become so much easier in Joomla! 1.5. It has it's downsides, but it has more advantages than any other CMS I have tried.

Out of interest forbairt, do you build your own templates/modules?

For me the main advantage to the CMS would be the fact that I can easily share my work and the site with others, because it's a GAA site I won't be able to meet with the others to explain my code etc etc

Yah, if the people in charge of managing the CMS's "don't like the look of it", you can be sure they'll lose interest and stop updating it... Just make sure they know what they're doing in the first place, and it should be alright.

just out of interest - why is it a nightmare ?

It has a learning curve much greater than what a CMS should have, it's pretty complex and tbh to learn how to use it, you're as well off just learning Dreamweaver..

Coding templates and modules as well was a pain in the arse, compared to other one's that I tried, so I just gave up. Hopefully, 1.5 will be the be all and end all that everyone was hoping for...

forbairt

nevf wrote: »

Meh, Joomla! is powerful, and has so much potential when one learns to use it. Also, programming new modules for it has become so much easier in Joomla! 1.5. It has it's downsides, but it has more advantages than any other CMS I have tried.

Out of interest forbairt, do you build your own templates/modules?

Yes I build my own templates ... I've ended up hacking various modules but only ever created some basic ones.

I've spent the last 6 - 7 years developing websites / webapps

nevf wrote: »

Yah, if the people in charge of managing the CMS's "don't like the look of it", you can be sure they'll lose interest and stop updating it... Just make sure they dont what they're doing in the first place, and it should be alright.

I don't find the interface intuitive as such ... compare it lets say to wordpress which I've given to various people and they've been happy as larry

randombar

Ya sod it, gone with wordpress in the end! Not enough apps for 1.5 just yet from what I can see!

Bob the Builder

forbairt wrote: »

Yes I build my own templates ... I've ended up hacking various modules but only ever created some basic ones.

I've spent the last 6 - 7 years developing websites / webapps

I don't find the interface intuitive as such ... compare it lets say to wordpress which I've given to various people and they've been happy as larry

I've never created any big modules, just simple hacks to get it to do what I want. I usually just edit modules.

I just get a template with a nice layout, and edit all the images, etc. It saves having to do out all the CSS and the layout again, which is very time consuming.

I've never spent too much time with wordpress but it just didn't work as a CMS for me I'm afraid, it made more of a blogging system, but it was a very well created application.