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| Make a template |
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This document provides instructions on how to make your own template which is compatible with PHP-Update. Most of the page you make will be regular HTML, but it will require a few lines of PHP to be added. These are detailed below. This document is intended for those who already know HTML - if you don't, feel free to use one of the pre-defined templates!
Please note the way templates work has changed in version 2 and you will need to re-edit your template.
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| Headers/footers |
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Templates are no longer completely stored in one file. Instead, you have a header - which goes before the body text - and a footer, which comes after. These files should be named templatename_h.php for the header and templatename_f.php for the footer.
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| Validation |
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If you look at the included templates, you will notice they all start in a particular way:
"; ?>
This code is required to make sure your template is XHTML-compatible - although you can change the encoding if your site is in a foreign language.
Also important are these lines, within the head area:
\n";
else echo "\n"; ?>
These allow the use of "static" URLs on your site, the META tags function, Javascripts used on the site and let Firefox, Opera and other browsers know if they're on a page with an RSS feed.
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|Site/page titles |
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Firstly, in the header, make sure you have the following line of code:
<? echo $pagetitle; ?>
This ensures your site's title will appear in the title bar of the web browser.
Where you want the title you have entered for the specific page a user is currently visiting to appear, enter the following code:
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| Site menu |
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To insert the site's menu, enter the code below. Please note that if you use a graphical menu and don't use the built-in menu function, you will need to use the "back" button while using the site editor.
If you wish to include a submenu, you need to put in this line:
To edit the way the menu appears, go into the Setup section of the site manager.
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| Body text |
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Within the content manager, or the templates, if you want the mailing list box to appear enter:
For the current poll to appear, enter:
If you wish to include a counter, enter:
And if you wish to include a contact form for visitors to e-mail you, enter:
For a handy dropdown box for visitors to access categories of blog postings, use:
Please note that in SQL if you wish to use mailer, poll or contact WITHIN a page, you must use the following syntax instead:
#mailer# #poll# #contact#
The other options can only be used in a template.
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| Switch template |
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You can now allow users to switch between different templates - for example, to a high contrast version of your site. To do this, insert the following line where you would like users to be able to switch:
Back to regular template"; ?>
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| The end |
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This script is free software, but I do ask that you leave a link back to my site in the footer of each page so more people can find out about it. A suggested link is something like the one in the standard templates:
Powered by PHP-Update
David Bennett
August 20, 2004