[Typo3-dev] Shared contents and several content area templates with TemplaVoila?

Sat Jun 18 19:25:10 CEST 2005

Hello,

On 6/18/05, tapio <tapio.markula at dnainternet.net> wrote:

> But how difficult it is a user of typo3, who has no experience of using
> CMS - who is a newbee using CMS.
> The basic page view seems relative simple at least the user don't need
> to select a different "column" setting (it would be better to write
> about content areas).
> If the customer needs only only layot, TV even deserves a "LITE" version
> of Typo3.
> Selecting alternative content area set should NOT make CMS too difficult
> to use - at least selecting different content are alternatives using TV
> snould NOT be more difficult than selecting with the template selector a
> different content area template.
> Designing alternatives should not eiher be much more difficult than
> creating alternative content area templates using MTB.

It isn't more difficult. It's simply different. Basic instructions:

1. Build a TV page template. This should basically be s shell (i.e. it
should be just the main container for the page)
2. Build an FCE where the DS contains the _maximum_ number of content
areas that are possible to have on your site.
3. Build multiple TOs to go with the DS from step 3. These will be
your different content layouts, and by utilizing the same DS to make
them, you can change which one is used without having to re-insert the
actual content elements.
4. Make sure to create icons to go with the different TOs (as shown in FTB).

What I would _guess_ you haven't fully realized is that with FTB you
can insert content elements INTO other content elements! You can
achieve ANY layout with FTB that is possible to achieve with HTML in
the first place. I'd also guess that you haven't fully grasped that
you can use TS from TV page templates and FCE almost exactly as in any
of the other Typo3 templating methods.

Take a close look at that screenshot Kraft posted; there is a 'main'
content area, and the two-column content area - into which you can
insert more content elements - IS a content element. This means  that
it's pretty simple to do layouts that have, for example,

|---------------------------------|  One column
|----------------|----------------|  Two column
|----------|-----------|----------|  Three column
|----------|----------------------|  Two columns 
|--------|--------|--------|-------|  Four columns

> Well the problem was that I didn't figured how to use several "columns"
> with TV without making a new main table. 

Well, if you haven't figured it out, wouldn't it have been better to
ask how to do it rather than just complaining that it can't be done?
Honestly, part of the problem is probably the use of tables for layout
(e.g. the layout sketched above would be extremely difficult without
nesting tables at least two levels deep along with all the
accompanying markup bloat...it's not difficult at all with nested
divs), but using TV is no impediment to using tables or whatever kind
of layout you like.

In any case, look: content elements are _always_ going to occur in the
context of a page, right? That being the case, your (very much
simplified) page template might look like this:

<html>
<head>
  <title>Title</title>
</head>
<body>
<table id="layout">
  <!-- Your content elements will fill in this part of the layout -->
</table>
</body>

...while your content elements might look like this:

<!-- Beginning of FCE -->
<tr>
  <td id="header">
    <!-- You'd probably call a TS object for the header to maintain
consistency between content elements, but in this scenario, you'd call
it from all of your 'top level' FCEs -->
  </td>
</tr>
  <!-- In here go your actual content divisions; do whatever you like.
Each of the cells can be used to insert other content elements -->

<!-- End of content areas -->
<tr>
  <td id="footer">
    <!-- Again, you footer (if needed) can just be a TS cObject, or
possibly a BE-editable content element called from TS -->
  </td>
</tr>
<!-- End of FCE -->

This will let you vary page layout on the basis of a single TV page
template in about the same way as is possible with the Template
Selector/Autoparser setup.

> BUT even if I would get learn to make flexible content elements (which I
> can't now do), which would correspond content area templates of MTB I
> have still a problem.>
> 
>  > Well .. combining TV and MTB isn't really the intention of Robert when
>  > he developed TV I guess ...
> 
> Well then Robert didn't think about shared contents!
> 
> I can do SHARED contents using MTB. When I put for example into pid 41
> content to the LEFT column, it is in ALL pages on the left BELOW
> the normal content to the column LEFT.

You'd better explain this better. You can share content in _exactly_
the same ways with TV as with any other configuration in Typo3.
Available options:

1. Using 'insert records' content element
2. Calling a TS content object from inside an (or every) FCE
3. Calling a specific content element (probably stored in a sysfolder)
from a FCE with TS.
4. Calling a TS content object from inside a TV page template
5. Calling a specific content element from inside a TV page template with TS.

If you want editors to be able to edit e.g. header and footer content,
you'd go for 3 or 5.

-Christopher