Menus – What are they?

/ Menu Manager

Description:

A Menu is a tool enabling a User to navigate to all the accessible Content Items of a web site. It is a list of Menu Items (shortcuts) – presented to a User – to frequently used commands, options, or Content that avoid the User needing knowledge of how or where those elements were created or are currently stored. For example clicking on a Wrapper Menu Item, displays the Content of the Wrapper – as defined in the Back-end – without the User needing to know how to create a Wrapper.

A Menu is created from a number of elements.

  • Menu – created in Menu Manager

  • Menu Module – created by Joomla! and accessed via the Module Manager [ site ]

  • Menu Items – added via the Menu Manager [ menuname ]

Create a new Menu in the Menu Manager. A standard installation (with Content) creates four Menus.

  • Main Menu

  • Other Menu

  • Top Menu

  • User Menu

Create and maintain individual Menu Items via the New and Edit functions in the Menu Manager =>[ Menu Name ]. The appearance of the Menu Item in the selected Menu will be the same, this is controlled by the Template and CSS files. The output they ultimately produce depends on to what they point.

note711_smallNOTE: Some of the Menu Item types appear in more than one group.

There are a variety of Menu Item types, split into 5 groups. These are as follows:

Content –

Produce a shortcut to a display of an existing type of Content Item, Content Section, or Content Category. In a standard Joomla! installation Content would include: News, Newsflashes, FAQ’s, for example, or, a shortcut to an editor allowing the creation of a new Content Item within a particular Content Section.

  • Blog – Content Category: Creates a shortcut to a display of all Content items in a particular Content Category, multiple Content Categories, or all Content Categories.

  • Blog – Content Category: Creates a shortcut to a list of Blog items in a particular Content Category Archive.

  • Blog – Content Section: Creates a shortcut to a list of all Content Items in a particular Content Section, multiple Content Sections, or all Content Sections.

  • Blog – Content Section Archive: Creates a shortcut to a list of Content Items in a particular Content Section Archive.

  • Link – Content Item: Creates a shortcut to a single Content Item.

  • Link – Static Content: Creates a shortcut to a single Static Content Item

  • List – Content Section: Creates a shortcut to a list of Content Items within a particular Content Section.

  • Submit – Content: Creates a shortcut to an editor to create a Content Item of a particular Section.

  • Table – Content Category: Creates a shortcut to a defined Content Category and displays a list of all the Contents within that Category in a tabular format.

Miscellaneous –

Produce a shortcut to display another web page – either internal or external in an IFrame, or allow the creation of a Separator or Placeholder in a Menu (neither of these would be linked to anything)

  • Separator/Placeholder: Allows the insertion of a divider or some ‘temporary’ placeholder:

    • A Separator may be a Descriptive title, for example, BLOGS, or a series of characters, for example, *************.

    • Use it as a Separator to break a single long menu into smaller sections.

    • Use it as a Placeholder when setting out a Menu but do not yet have the Content/Link/Category/Section to which a shortcut is directed, for example.

  • Wrapper: Creates a shortcut to another location within the current web site or to an external web site, and displays the screen display within an IFrame in the current page.

Submit –

Produce a shortcut to an editor screen allowing the creation of a new Content Item within a particular Content Section. In a standard installation Content Sections would, for example, include: News, Newsflashes, FAQ’s.

  • Submit – Content: Creates a shortcut to allow an editor to be used to create a Content Item of a particular Section.

Further Information IconNOTE: It is also possible to use the Link – URL option to create as shortcut to a particular task, for example, within a Component.

Components –

Produce a shortcut to a display of an existing type of Component. In a standard installation these would include: Contacts, News Feeds, and Web Links, for example.

  • Link – Component Item: Creates a shortcut to the output of a particular Component.

  • Link – Contact Item: Creates a shortcut to an individual Contact Item.

  • Link – News Feed: Creates a shortcut to the output display of a particular News Feed.

  • Table – Contact Category: Creates a shortcut to a defined Contact Category and displays a list of all the Contacts within that Category in a tabular format.

  • Table – News Feed Category: Creates a shortcut to a defined News Feed Category and displays a list of all the News Feeds within that Category in a tabular format.

  • Table – Web Link Category: Creates a shortcut to a tabular display of all defined Web Link(s) Category and displays a list of all the Web Links within each Category, again in a tabular format.

Links –

Produce a shortcut to a display, or function, for an existing type of Content, Component, or Web Link Item. In a standard installation these would include: News, Contacts, News Feeds (RSS),Static Content, internal/external hyperlinks for example.

  • Link – Component Item: Creates a shortcut to the output of a particular Component.

  • Link – Contact Item: Creates a shortcut to an individual Contact Item.

  • Link – Content Item: Creates a shortcut to a single Content Item.

  • Link – News Feed: Creates a shortcut to the output display of a particular News Feed.

  • Link – Static Content Item: Creates a shortcut to a single Static Content Item.

  • Link – URL: Creates a shortcut to either an internal or an external URL address. This may be to another page in the current web site or to another web site altogether. It is also possible to link to a particular task for example, within a Component.

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