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As I am new to Joomla maybe I donīt know how to operate it properly. My question is, can Joomla pages be edited in dreamweaver? (As there are certain things like anchor tags, hrefs, alts which need to be changed for each individual page)
Thank you.
No, you can't really edit a whole page in Dreamweaver.
Yes, you can edit the page-specific ("content") parts in Dreamweaver and copy them back into Joomla. Perhaps better, though, if you don't know HTML is to have the developer add a Rich Text Editor to your Joomla install (popular onces are TinyMCE, FCKEdit and the like).
As for the templates, you can go to your /templates directory and open them up in a text editor or the joomla docs say to
In the administration interface (backend), select Site>>Template Manager>>Site Templates.Select the template you wish to modify.
For me, helped to use Firebug in Firefox; could then find which part of a template file to edit; can also make a change in Firebug, see what effect it has, before changing the template file.
This helps w things like the size of main text; without Firebug, I found it tough to find how to change something as basic as main text size!; spacings (I felt a template I liked gave rather too much spacing between elements)
Maybe try a few templates, at least check several out, before you start making changes to one. With luck, you'll find one you're happy with.
- and maybe best to learn more Joomla, before diving into template.
For the page content, yes, an editor helps a lot.
I added H1 titles within page content; getting H1 for the main page titles otherwise tough.
Therefore back to the question: After a new page is created, can the hrefs, tags, anchors, titles be altered, so that each page is optimised for specific keywords? If so how?
Cheers!
@bleached
After a new page is created, can the hrefs, tags, anchors, titles be altered, so that each page is optimised for specific keywords? If so how?
As I say, it depends on *where*. Or more accurately, it depends on how much work you're willing to do.
You have to realize that no "page" is created until it is requested by the user. The "content" part is stored in the database and when someone asks for the page, it is created on the fly, based on the data in the DB and the template. Commonly a non-cached CMS page might require 10-40 database requests, most of which will query multiple tables. Your "page" is literally in little pieces all over the place until a user asks to see it.
So if it belongs to the content part, it is quite simple to modify that data. You just open up the admin interface and modify the page exactly as you created it. That's the essence of a CMS so it's built right in.
If it belongs to the template part, having the template change depending on context will require program logic (PHP code in the case of Joomla) that basically takes information about the request (is it a forum page? Is it a photo gallery?) and then invokes the template accordingly.
So basically, anything that you want modified for whole classes of pages (i.e. forum pages) should probably in some way be in your template. Anything that you will want to custom set for every single page, should be "content" (including meta title, meta tags, etc) and not "template" (the wireframe code that handles look and feel).
So it's a matter of setting up your entry form or content creation page or whatever you want to call it in such a way that the user fills in all the blanks with relevant, page-specific information. So on one drupal site I have a page type that requires about 15 form fields (teaser, title, details, thumbnail, thumbnail link, thumbnail alt text, length, difficulty, quality rating, meta description and a bunch more). When your create a page you fill all the blanks. The corresponding template drops all those pieces into the right slots. Simpler pages have nothing but title and content (and the teaser is merely an extract), and fewer slots for the template to fill.
In Drupal you would use the Content Creation Kit. In ModX you would use template variables. I'm pretty sure there's nothing quite as powerful as CCK for Joomla, but there must be something that allows similar behavior, I just don't know what it is.
Figuring out what fields you need and so forth is, I would say, your job. You need to write that into your spec.
Figuring out how to implement all this and explaining to you how to actually achieve it is the developer's job.
If it is built into your current site, then the developer should be willing to talk you through the process without charge. I would assume that would have been part of his/her bid. If it isn't built in, you'll need to negotiate a price I'm afraid unless that functionality was specified in a spec sheet but not delivered.
I have asked my developer to change certain things in the code so that it is SE optimised. With your response I now understand that sections have to be made to be editable. I think the section I am asking the developer to edit is standardised across the entire site.
However, a clause in the contracted stated with the developer: "Header (page title) will be placed on top of header background image for each page"
With this I presume each page in this section will be editable. For example I donīt want a header title of "I sell bananas" if the actual page I sell Apples!
You can do pretty much anything you want to do as long as you put in enough time... For example, Joomla allows you to assign templates to pages. Therefore you can have a custom template for each page.
There are several tutorials that demonstrate how to create templates in Dreamweaver.
As far as titles are concerned, there are some great ad ins that are SEO-centric. Ask a more specific question and I will attempt to help you out. (Sticky me as a reminder to respond to your post...).
After much trial and error and as well using the advice of fellow webmasterworld members there is a simpler answer. The problem was I was logging into Joomla admin as an Administrator... this basically was limiting my options. I therefore changed my level to Super Administrator to find I could basically change anything! With the great joomla components such as SEF404 my site it now truly optimised.
