Title field

Hi ginger,

The Title field is only "required" (to not be blank) because that's how it's configured by default. There's a checkbox to change this if you'd like — you can find it here: Admin > Section Editor > modify your section > modify the Title field > Input Validation > Required.

The Title field is used for whatever you'd like it to be used for. You could use it for the page title (<title>) as well as a heading (<h1>), or you could create another field for either if you wanted them to be different. If it turns out that you don't want to ever change the Title, you can even remove that field.

If you'd like, you can describe what it is you're trying to build and I can suggest how you might want to set up your sections and fields.

I hope this helps! Please let me know if you have any questions.

Thanks so much for the quick response, Chris. I got sidetracked yesterday and couldn't get back to this. I understand what you're saying about the title field, so I guess I would just create additional title fields (named differently) if I want one for the <title> and something else for an <h1> tag or something. I would also create text fields for meta tags if I want each page to be different. I guess I can also just edit those fields in each php page myself.

What I have is a site where there will be two (or more) separate sections, one will be services provided to individuals, and one for services provided to professional firms. I've pretty much set up the home, about and contact pages (and viewers), as well as one multi-record page for events, but I'm a little unsure about how to set up the others. Should I create the section editors for the two different types of services as "multi record" menu types? What is the "Category Menu" option?

I'm trying to create a site without limitations on design or functionality, but don't quite understand how I can set it up and turn it over to my client where they cannot only just edit existing pages, but add to the site if necessary. Is there a way to set up some sort of template that they could use?

Thanks so much for any tips!

ginger

Hi ginger,

It's definitely more complicated to set up a website with fewer limitations. It would be possible to allow your client to add new single pages to their site and have them automatically added to the site's navigation: you'd want to do this using a Multi Record section. You might be able to have it drive your Home, About, and Contact pages too. Setting things up like this will be a little more complicated though — you and your client might be better off saving some of your client's budget for when they actually want changes made.

If your Individual Services and Professional Services will share all the same fields, it would be possible to have them share the same section and have a List Field to select whether a Service is "individual" or "professional". If you're displaying Individual Services and Professional Services on different parts of the site, however, it would probably be simpler to use two separate sections.

If you're expecting your client to want to keep adding different types of Services, using one Multi Record section for Services would be the way to go.

A Category Menu is like a Multi Record section, but each record can also have a "parent record" also within the same Category Menu. Essentially, it's a Multi Record section which you can organize into a heirarchial (i.e. tree) structure. I don't think you'd need to use a Category Menu for this site.

I hope this helps! Please let me know if you have any questions.

Yes, I think they want two distinct sections, each with its own "About" and "Services" as well as other sections, so the way I currently have it set up is to have the default single record About page as well as a single record About page that will go in the Professional Firms section. Then, depending on if the client wants an additional detail page "for each" service, I'll create a multiple record page for each of the two "Services" sections, or if they want all services listed on one page for each section, I'll just leave it as I currently have it which is a single record Services page for each section. Does this sound correct?

There will probably be sections that I would like to use a dropdown menu in the navigation. How would I go about this? Is there a way for this to be dynamic or do I have to hard code the menu? (I understand that these sections would require a multi-record page.)

I'd like to incorporate a breadcrumb trail to make it a little more clear where someone is on the site. Can you tell me what field is used to identify each page in the breadcrumb trail?

Sorry for all the questions. I thought I had a handle on how it works, but I obviously still have lots of questions.

Thank you for your help,
ginger

Hi ginger,

That sounds like a good plan, yes.

To create a dynamically-populated dropdown, you'd use a FOREACH to output <option>s for each record. For example:

<select>
<?php foreach($serviceRecords as $record): ?>
<option value="<?php echo $record['_link'] ?>"><?php echo $record['title'] ?></option>
<?php endforeach ?>
</select>

I'm not sure what you mean about a breadcrumb trail. It sounds like most of your pages will be hardcoded, so you can just hardcode something like:

<a href="/">Home</a> &gt; This Page

And on your Multi Record Detail Pages:

<a href="/">Home</a> &gt; <a href="/services.php">Services</a> &gt; <?php echo $record['title'] ?>

Does that help? Please let me know if you have any questions.

Thanks Chris. That does help.

You say "[font "Verdana"]It sounds like most of your pages will be hardcoded". By "hardcoded", do you mean created outside of CMSB? I guess I thought that's how CMSB worked ... I create the page and leave places to insert the CMSB code that will be replaced by the content that I want to be editable.

[font "Verdana"]I guess I'm a little confused because, while I haven't used a CMS before, most of the ones that I have looked at create the navigation, breadcrumb trail and the pages. I realize that this is what makes CMSB more flexible for the developer/designer, but also means that the client will need me to make changes other than editing existing page content.

[font "Verdana"]Am I understanding correctly? Just wanted to make sure that I understood what you meant by "It sounds like most of your pages will be hardcoded." I guess I didn't know there was any other way.

[font "Verdana"]Thanks again for your help!
ginger

[font "Verdana"]

Hi Ginger,

"Hardcoded" means that the content has been typed directly on the page and not being brought in from CMSB, which is dynamic.

For example this code:

<title>My Page</title>

We would say the text "My Page" is hard coded, because no matter what you do to view the page, it will always be the same.

This code, however,:

<title><?php echo $record['title'];?></title>

This would be Dynamic, meaning that the value of "title" would change depending on what was in CMSB. You could therefore change the title of your page without ever having to change the code on your page.

Hope this helps clarify. Let me know if you have any other questions.

Thanks Jason. Yes, I knew that you could display the contents of any CMSB field dynamically. What I wasn't sure about was whether there was another way of allowing CMSB to dynamically create my pages rather than me creating them.

Chris' comment that "it sounds like most of your pages are hardcoded" made me think that there was another way. Now that I think about it a little more, I think what he meant was that most of them were detail pages (single record) as opposed to multi-record.

Thanks,
ginger