Thursday, 16 April 2015

Joomla Features Overview

Joomla is one of the world's most popular software packages used to build, organize, manage and publish content for websites, blogs, Intranets and mobile applications. Owing to its scalable MVC architecture its also a great base to build web applications.
With more than 3 percent of the Web running on Joomla and a CMS market share of more than 9 percent, Joomla! powers the web presence of hundreds of thousands of small businesses, governments, non-profits and large organizations worldwide like Citibank, eBay, Harvard University, Ikea, McDonald's and Sony.
As an award winning CMS led by an international community of more than a half million active contributors, helping the most inexperienced user to seasoned web developer make their digital visions a reality.
Here are some of the Joomla! features you will love.

Multilingual

Joomla is the most popular and widely supported open source multilingual CMS platform in the world, offering more than 64 languages. Webmasters and content creators can create websites to be presented in multiple languages, without ever needing to step outside of the options available in the Joomla! core software. This is a big step forward and represents a set of capabilities that can make websites much more accessible, reaching out to a much larger audience.

Well Supported

Our worldwide, enthusiastic community is filled with individuals, and teams of world class developers and business consultants who actively help at no cost in the forums.
There are thousands of professional Joomla! service providers throughout the world who can help build, maintain and market your Joomla! projects. The Joomla community has a vetted directory of just some of these providers at the Joomla Resource Directory.

Easy Upgrades

One of the big challenges with any software is keeping it up to date. Fortunately, Joomla! has a "One Click Version Update" feature to make this process super easy for users of any skill level.
The built-in updater also has an automated checker which notifies you if anything needs updating; this includes notifications of the core software and Joomla extension that utilise this feature. Keeping your site up to date is the single best thing you can do to secure your web assets and Joomla gives you the tools to do this with little effort.

Integrated Help System

Joomla has an in-app contextual help system to help every level of user to operate their Joomla! Most pages have a help button in the top right, helping you fully understand all options on that page. There is also a glossary explaining the terms in plain English, a version checker makes sure you're using the latest version, a system information tool helps you troubleshoot. If all else fails, links to a wealth of online resources for additional help and support are available, such as Joomla! Documentation and User Forum.

Media Manager

The Media Manager is the tool for easily uploading, organizing and managing your media files and folders. You can even handle more types of files, thanks to the configurable MIME settings. The Media Manager is integrated into the Article Editor so you can access images and all other media files for easy usage and enhancement of your written content.

Banner Management

With the banner manager you have the possibility to easily add advertising and monetize your website. The tool allows you to create clients and campaigns, to add as many banners as you need, even custom codes, to set impression numbers, track the clicks and much more...

Contact Management

Not enough with just one contact form on your site? The contacts component allows you to add several contacts, departments and categories, and extend the basic contact information with miscellaneous information and an image. Easily set up a contact form for each contact you create and allow access to the public or just to some registered users, or create a listing of these contacts.

Search better, Search Smarter

With the built in search and smart search, your website visitors will be able to quickly and easily find the appropriate information on your site. And even more, thanks to the statistics you can analyze your visitors needs and streamline your content even better to serve them. You have the ability to use the included smart indexing, advanced search options, auto suggest searches - making Joomla search the best in class right out of the box.

Content Management

Joomla is a Content management system at heart and has some seriously great features that make organising and managing your content a breeze. Content creation is made very easy by the inbuilt WYSIWYG editor and allows you to edit content without any knowledge of code. After you created your content you'll find a lot of possibilities to show it on the frontend. Next to different layouts, you're able to use several pre installed modules to show the most popular articles, latest items, related articles and more.

Nested categorization

When you are managing content, organisation is a key requirement. Being able to create categories with nesting and no limits on depth is a great plus in helping manage large websites.

Tagging

When categorisation is not enough to structure your content, it's time to look at a flat organisation structure which is best served by tagging. What's more, tagging in Joomla also supports nesting, so limits are just not there!

Frontend Editing

Editing content should be easy and fast. You are reading through your site's content and see a change you need to make. No need to login to the administrative section any more for simple edits of content and modules. Simply click and edit from the frontend.

Content Versioning

You will never again lose a previous important version of your article and other changes on your site. You are now able to track exactly who made what changes, when, and, if a version note was entered, why the item got edited. Then if needed you can revert to any previous version.

Syndication and Newsfeed Management

Make sure your visitors stay updated on the new content you're adding, even when they come only once in a while. With Syndication you create a feed that users subscribe to in their favorite RSS reader and so they receive the updates. With newsfeed management, you can integrate RSS feeds to your site. Gather all posts from some of the largest news sites and show them on your site for example.

Menu Manager

The Menu Manager allows you to create as many menus and menu items as you need. You can structure your menu hierarchy (and nested menu items) completely independent of your content structure. Put one menu in multiple places and in any style you want; use rollovers, dropdown, flyouts and just about any other navigation system you can think of. Also automatic breadcrumbs are generated to help navigate your site users.

Powerful Extensibility

The Joomla core is just the beginning, the real power is in the way you can customize Joomla.More then 8.000 extensions are available to extend your website and broaden it's funcionality. Visit the Joomla Extensions Directory or use the Joomla extension finder built right into Joomla to see thousands of ways to enhance Joomla to suit your needs.

Extensive ACL for all your access control needs

ACL stands for Access Control List , it allows you to manage the users of your site, and different groups. When you're managing large content portals or even intranets that means you need extensive control on who can see what and who can edit or manage what. The Joomla ACL is extremely powerful and can be tweaked via configuration to suit any needs you might have.

For Designers

Design Uncoupled

Joomla was one of the pioneers in open source CMS's by adopting a MVC design strategy. MVC means that views are strictly separate from the business logic. This is a huge advantage since you own the views or can override them to achieve superior custom designs. Joomla not only gives you the design freedom that you have always craved but can help you make your sites stand out in the crowd!

Responsive with Bootstrap

Joomla is Mobile Ready and allows you to build more than just websites but online applications that can respond to virtually any device. Joomla! core templates are built with Bootstrap making it responsive out of the box. Which means you have a toolset to work with which makes creating templates even easier!

Do More with Less

Spend less time coding and reduce the tedious tasks associated with building interfaces in Joomla 3. Joomla now features LESS CSS and jQuery which means you can write less code to achieve greater results. In addition the Icomoon font icon library provides a wealth of retina-optimized icons. The Joomla User Interface (JUI) library gives you a standardized backend & frontend interface.

Override Away!

With a highly advanced override system, designers get an awesome amount of power over how pages & elements of pages are presented without touching any of the core code! Practically any HTML generated by Joomla can be customized to your project.

Beautiful Fonts for that extra edge

Designers know the power of fonts for expressing ideas and design strategies. With Joomla you don not need to get constrained by standard Web fonts. The Joomla core itself opens a whole new world of expression because it allows you the freedom to use Google fonts to make that new design dream come true !

Template Management

Templates in Joomla are more than a framework for managing your designs but a powerful tool suite for making your site look exactly the way you want. You have complete control of your presentation since you can either use a single template for the entire site or a separate template for each site section or menu item. The level of visual control goes a step further with powerful template overrides, allowing you to customize each part of your pages.

For Developers

User Management

Joomla has a registration system that allows users to configure personal options. Out of the box, there are nine user groups with various types of permissions on what users are allowed to access, edit, publish and administer.
Authentication is an important part of user management and Joomla supports multiple protocols, including LDAP, OpenID, and even Gmail. This allows users to use their existing account information to streamline the registration process.
All of this can be added onto with extensions, giving you complete control over what users can access and how they authenticate to your site.

Microdata library implementation

Developers will now be able to incorporate microdata more easily into their extensions and sites. From automating the Author tag in articles, to generating detailed markup for directories of information, the microdata library will significantly enhance how you can optimise SEO with Joomla!

Cloud Storage APIs

A new API in Joomla will allow Joomla to access cloud storage services including Amazon S3, Google Cloud Storage, Rackspace and Dropbox. This allows sites to now use these services as content distribution networks without the need for third party extensions.

System Features

Speedy page loads are possible with page caching, granular-level module caching, and GZIP page compression.
If your system administrator needs to troubleshoot an issue, an extended debugging mode and error reporting are invaluable.
The FTP Layer allows file operations (like installing Extensions) without having to make all the folders and files writable, making your site administrator's life easier and increasing the security of your site.
Administrators quickly and efficiently communicate with users one-on-one through private messaging or all site users via the mass mailing system.

Web Services

In a web where content is being shared across multiple networks, Joomla makes it easy to manage your content from a single location. With APIs supporting several third party services and a connector enabling requests to anywhere on the web, users and developers have a magnitude of power and data readily available to them.

How do I install Joomla locally?

How do I install Joomla locally?

Need help installing Joomla? Read Getting Started with Joomla! for a quick introduction or visit the Joomla! 3 Installation forum with any questions you have. Visit the General Questions Forum for Joomla! 3 if you have other questions about Joomla.

Can I install Joomla! on my hosting account?

Yes you can. Download the version of Joomla! that you want to use, unpack the files locally and then upload them to your account directly using FTP. You’ll also want to create a database with a username and password. When you’re done, visit the front end of your site, and you will see the installer page and you can begin the installation process. Click here to read detailed installation instructions for Joomla! 3.

Does Joomla! come in multiple languages?

You can easily download and install language packages for your Joomla! site. Browse the accredited Joomla! language packages, and incorporate the languages that you need.

How can I extend Joomla?

There are over 8,000 extensions available in the Joomla! community ready for you to download. Visit the Joomla! Extensions Directory to get help unlocking Joomla's extended features.

How do I upgrade Joomla?

The first step in any migration process is planning. Joomla! 2.5 core extensions will upgrade with a “one-click update.” All third party extensions including template need to be addressed individually. We have resources available to help with your migration planning.

Where can I find legacy versions of Joomla?

You can find legacy versions of Joomla here.

Monday, 5 January 2015

Installation and introduction of K2 (a joomla extension)

Introduction

Generally speaking, a basic article is a simple matter to create and manage. When a site gets large with a lot of articles, it can be unwieldy. This need is filled by a Content Construction Kit or CCK. Several good CCK's exist in the Joomlasphere and each has its own unique means to accomplish the task of content management and creation.
For our purposes we'll look at the CCK known as K2.
K2 provides you an integrated solution that features rich content forms - extending the basic article. This is an article with additional fields that can contain the article images, videos, image galleries or even attachments. Add nested-level categories and tags to that, and you have a very powerful system.
In this article we'll look at the installation and use of K2.

Installation and introduction of K2

In this recipe you will go through the steps to install and configure K2 in your Joomla! site.

Getting ready

You will want to download K2 from the following URL: http://getk2.org
Additionally, you may want to have a development site to install and learn this on rather than your production site.

How to do it...

  1. Installation of K2 works like any other Joomla! extension.
  2. Be sure and backup your files and database before beginning - this way you can easily roll back should something go wrong.
  3. Download K2.
  4. Log in to your Joomla! site as the Super Administrator.
  5. Click Extensions | Install / Uninstall.
  6. Browse, locate, and upload the K2 package.
  7. Install. Installation of K2 should be complete.
    If you are not running the Joom!Fish language translation extension on your site, you will see an informational message stating that K2 did not install the content elements. Joom!Fish is used to translate your site into other languages. If you have no plans on using this, then ignore the message.
    Now when you go to Components, you'll see the K2 icon. Clicking it will show you this screen:

  8. The next step is to bring all of our current content (articles, media, and so on) into K2.
  9. While in the K2 Dashboard, look at the upper right-hand side for the Import Joomla! content button.

    You will see this message (or a similar one depending on your K2 version):

  10. Click Ok to start the process.
  11. Once complete, you'll see all your content now shows up in the K2 Items menu. Here are the sample Joomla! data items that have been imported.

Keep in mind that all of your pre-existing Joomla! sections, categories, and articles are still in the core Joomla! areas. All these items are simply duplicated in K2 now. If you have existing content take a few minutes and go into the Article Manager of Joomla! and unpublish them. You may need to update menu links to your new K2 categories and articles as necessary.
Additionally, you'll note that the main Joomla! administrator page has been updated to include the K2 dashboard.


Further configuration of K2

K2 has a powerful, nested-category system. It offers you the ability to configure in detail, each category, allowing any category to inherit from another category's parameter settings.
Let's use this feature of K2 to configure a master category that will allow other categories to inherit the settings. This means you can change one category and affect them all at the same time – which is quite time-saving.
A word of caution, this could impact your search engine-friendly URLs depending on the extension you use to create them.
  1. Open the K2 Dashboard.
  2. Select Categories.
  3. Click New in the upper right-hand side.
  4. Fill in the following details:

    • Title is the title of your category
    • Title Alias is the internal reference
    • Parent category should be left as –None-- - all other categories will inherit from this category
    • Inherit parameter options from category should be left as –None--
    • Associated "Extra Fields" Group should be left as None.
    • Published is Yes
    • Access Level is Public
    I have filled mine out and the following screenshot is the completed Details section. For now, this is all you'll need to do. Later recipes will utilize this:

    This is my master category that all other categories will seek out their parameters from. The reason for this will be clear shortly.
    When you have finished, save the category.

How it works...

K2 is nearly a content management system, like Joomla!, in itself. It actually substitutes many of the native Joomla! functions like article management, section, and category as well as providing some access control functions.
When using K2, you will no longer use many of the native Joomla! menus, but rather you will use the K2 version of the tools. If you install this component, it has the ability to pull in all the data (users, articles) into K2 through the import feature.

Configuration of your master category

The following screenshot shows a new category created, which is the child of the master category. Thus, it will inherit its settings from the master.

Never assign anything to the master category, always set up a new category for articles, sections, blogs, or other content. You can then tweak the individual categories based on their own requirements.
The two important parts of the details in this category are the Parent category and Inherit parameter options from category. These can be set for different options and using the master category is a style choice, not a technical one.
What this tells our new category is that it should inherit its parameters from the master.
Revisiting our master category, we can see there are many, many options to choose from. Continuing on let's set up our parameters.

The extreme right shows all our parameter settings in the category. Due to the number of different parameters, this will be broken down into several images.
Under the layout template, I have selected and installed a third-party K2 template from the site http://www.k2joom.com. In our example, I am building a 'blog' style website, and will use separate categories to represent different potential authors on the site. All will use the Blog template from K2Joom.com and as such, I have the 'blog' selected in the template field. The rest of the fields deal with columns and leading articles, and so on. The defaults are fine.
The rest of that column shows this:

Next up is Category view options.

Most of these are self-explanatory, however I want to point out to you that the Title should be disabled, or, it will show the category title, in the website.
Each category that inherits its parameters from the master category can be set individually. However, consider if the changes would be better made in the master category, thus changing all inherited categories. For example, you have the ability to define multiple master categories to fine tune your inherited categories.

Master category one has the following inherited categories:

  • Sub-category - Blog on Surfboards
  • Sub-category - Blog on water skis
Each of these has specific settings that match their content.

Master category two has the following inherited categories:

  • Sub-category - Blog on politics
  • Sub-category - Blog on current world events
In these cases, you could tweak just the master categories and touch all the subcategories. The simple advantage for you is it is time-saving.

Item image options


The next set of parameters allows for images to be set by px size. This will vary strictly by your site and content.

Item view options in category listings

There are many options in this section; so again we'll break it down into a couple of images to make it easier to follow:

Some of these will be familiar and others will be new to you. The primary choices I want to point out to you are:
  • 'Featured' notice (next to title): If this is turned on, it displays a nice corner banner on the right upper-corner of the article. This grabs the readers' attention.

  • Extra Fields - Hide or Show: This will hide or show any 'extra fields' that have been added. If you use only one master category, I suggest you refrain from putting extra fields in the master category. Rather, put it in the inherited category. This setting will show them or hide them. Here is an example of extra fields in use on the K2 demo site.

  • The rest of the fields correspond to their normal Joomla! equivalents.

Second half of Item view options in category listings


  • Video: The Video Hide or Show corresponds to any video content you put into K2.
  • Enable K2 plugins: It corresponds to the earlier reference of all videos and simple image gallery. This should be set to Yes. The rest of the items are self-explanatory and can be left as default unless you have other requirements. Then you may change them to fit your needs.
    The last option field has many choices and will be displayed in multiple images.

Item view options


Again, most of these are self-explanatory and I'll hit the highlights.
  • Social button: This adds a very nice set of buttons for your visitors to employ social media through your site. This includes Twitter, Facebook, Delicious, Digg, Reddit, StumbleUpon, MySpace, and Technorati.
  • Rating (voting): This is to allow people to vote on the article or content.

  • 'Tweet this' link: This will take the visitors over to their Twitter accounts to share your site with their followers.
  • Extra Fields: Shows or hides the extra fields on the article. Extra fields give you the ability to add in any extra information you need. Such as price, weight, color, length, width, and so on. This is the final part of the long list of configurable items. Most, if not all, should be self-explanatory.

    Now that these are all set, click Save in the upper right-hand side. This completes the configuration of your master category.

Extra options to enhance K2

The developers of K2, JoomlaWorks.gr offer a few extensions that are top in the categories they exist in. Integrating these into K2 will give your site that extra professional touch.
  • JoomlaWorks "Simple Image Gallery PRO" plugin: It allows you to add image galleries inside your Joomla! articles. As it is a plugin, it will work within articles by simply giving a quick code snippet in the article. As an example, if I had a number of images of automobiles on display, I can add this {gallery}autophotos{/gallery} inside the article. This extension will display all the photos as a gallery. In this example, everything uploaded from autophotos displays as an image gallery. You can obtain this plugin from JoomlaWorks.gr
  • AllVideos plugin: This allows you to embed online-streaming videos inside your articles. Your video and audio content can reside on your own server or an outside server. One common usage model is to upload a video, say about your company, to YouTube and then use this to display that video on your site.
When these two plugins are installed on your Joomla! site, K2 will automatically detect it and will allow the use of these in K2. It is a low cost, but high-reward setup.

Extra fields and groups

K2 has an interesting feature called extra fields and extra groups. Think of these as mini-custom forms you can add to the content. A typical use would be in the catalogue mode of K2. It does work well for things like, author biography on magazine articles or product catalogue extra information such as weight, size, color.
In each article, you can select the group and fields to add. This offers many combinations limited by your imagination. The use of extra fields is completely optional.

Adding extra field groups:

  1. Open up K2 Dashboard.
  2. Click Extra Fields group.
  3. Click New.
  4. Add your group name (example: Products Group).
  5. Save. You've created a group to hold your extra fields. Next you will want to create the extra fields.

Adding extra fields:

  1. Open up K2 Dashboard.
  2. Click Extra Fields.
  3. Click New.
  4. Add the name of the Extra Fields in Name (example: Widget Specs).
  5. Click Published Yes.
  6. Pull down the Group (example: Products Group) and choose the correct group or you can create a new group here.
  7. Next choose the type of field you want:
    • Text Field: Displays a single field for text
    • Text Area: It is a large field for text that spans several lines
    • Drop-down Selection list: Provides you any number of fields, allowing you to prepopulate. When you create your article, you can select from the list. Again an example is size, weight, color, and so on.
    • Multi-select list: Allows you to do a multiple selection from a list.
    • Radio buttons: This is the traditional select ‘one' from a list of many.
    • Link text: Allows you to offer a URL with display text, and controls to open a new window or stay in the same window.
    • CSV Data: Upload of CSV data - great for pricing - you can have a single file loaded with pricing. Change the one file in your extra fields, and the pricing would change automatically across your site.

Using the extra fields and groups

Recall that we said a master category can be the overall place holder for your site's settings. It allows you to update settings globally in your site, without touching every article. It allows you to update settings in inherited categories in your site, without touching every article.
You may not want to set your extra fields and extra groups at the master category level but rather choose a subcategory that covers that information.
Taking our concept of a product website we may have something as follows:

This screenshot shows the master category used to globally specify our parameters. The other two categories main New articles and Product Pricing and Specifications are subcategories. Notice the Associated extra fields groups. That tells K2 to allow the use of the Product Pricing extra fields in all articles created in that category. Anytime you create an article, assign it to this group, and include those fields, they will be displayed. Using our CSV field, you can update pricing once - in the extra fields section and it will update all your articles.
One tip to recall, if you have not assigned extra fields to a category, articles created in that category will not display the fields.

Summary

In this article we scratched the surface of K2 by learning how to install, configure, and set up categories. We also explored how to set up a master category enabling you to take advantage of the inheritance features.

Joomla quickstart package installation problems and solutions

In Joomla quickstart package installation process, you may have some problems which generally disturb your works whether you are beginers or not. You may not be able to start your Apache server or your process hangs on in any step...
Here are solutions for Joomla 2.5 and Joomla 3.x as well that you can follow. They are assured by my real experience.

1. Cannot start Apache service


It's a common problem while starting XAMPP, specially Skype users. The default port of both Skype and Apache service is 80. In order to use both of them, you should change the port number for one of them.

Change Skype Port:

+ Go to: Skype -> Tools -> Options ->Advanced settings -> Connection
+ Unstick "Use port 80  and 443 for additional incoming connections"
+ Change Use port to other number (I use port 81)
Change Apache Port:
+ Go to: C:\xampp\apache\conf
+ Open file: httpd.conf (recommend: open with Notepad++)
+ Find line: Listen 80
+ Change 80 to any other number (example: 8080)
+ Save and restart Apache service
Note: On browser, you should type: localhost:8080 instead of localhost as normal.

2. Stuck in database installation


While installing both Joomla 2.5 and Joomla 3.x, I see a common problem is that it cannot turn the database installation to next process. It seems to be a never-ending process.


There're some tips to solve the problem. You can combine all of these tips if a single one cannot effectively solve.

Open file php.ini in C:\xampp\php\php.ini

Note:  Stop Apache server before doing any modifications and start it again after saving these modifications.


Tip 1: Turn off "display errors"

In php.ini, find line "display_errors=On" replace with "display_errors=Off"

Tip 2: Increase execution time in php.ini

Find line "max_execution_time=30" change to "max_execution_time=3000"

Tip 3: Increase memory limit

Increase "memory_limit=128M" to "memory_limit=256M"

Note: Joomla 3.x installation freezes at Creating database tables



In case of Joomla 3.x installation freezes at Creating database tables in spite of using all these above tips, you can use the following method:

Find the term "ENGINE=InnoDB" and replace ALL with "ENGINE=MyIsam". It can be changed in /installation/sql/mysql/joomla.sql.

3. Nothing happen when click "Language Setting"


Some of you may be in this situation. And you wonder why and how for the problem.



In Joomla installation folder, go to: installation/views/ftp
Open file: 'view.html.php' rename the class ‘InstallationViewFTP’ to ‘InstallationViewFtp

In conclusion, these above errors are the most common problems which Joomla users face while installing quickstart package.  By following How To Install Joomla Quickstart Package guide you will reduce the risk of error for your process.

Duplicate Pages in Joomla: Causes, Most Common Errors & Solutions

Everyone who has a Joomla website sooner or later faces the problem of duplicate pages. So let’s have a look at this problem from inside, we’ll sort out what duplicate pages are, how search engines react to them, and how to get rid of these evil twins.
So, page duplicates are identical documents on your websites that are available via different URLs. Actually page duplicates are weak spots of most CMSs, not only of Joomla. All these pages are harmless until they are indexed by crawlers. The main thing to watch for indexing and promptly take action to remove these pages from the results, it's much best to think over the structure in advance and avoid these situations.
The main reason for duplicates to appear is the wrong structure of the website. First of all, you need to think over the hierarchy of categories and menu items. If you create multiple categories in advance this can prevent duplicate pages from appearing in future.
When you just start a website you need to think over its structure and identify main categories and subcategories. With the growth of your resource there is no need to change existing structure, simply add necessary additional sections. Restructuring your website at the peak of development is a heavy blow, which can sit you for months. In fact, some pages (or all of them) will change their addresses, which will lead to inevitable reduction of positions in search results and attendance.

So How Do Search Engines Find Duplicate Pages?

The most common cause are the extensions and components that devs install onto Joomla website. Example - news module on homepage can give different address. Sometimes these page duplicates can be seen even in the sitemap, for example, if you have Xmap installed.
If your site is already indexed, then its not that hard to find duplicate content, just copy couple unique offerings from the page and insert this material in quotation marks in Google search. If your site is not indexed, you can try XENU (in case your website is not really big), it will find all possible ways to the site.

Why Do We Need to Get Rid of Page Duplication?

Search engines "don't like" and try not to index websites having great amount of identical pages cause their necessity for search is somehow questionable. While optimizing pages for certain keywords most relevant pages are selected and content is optimized for them. If those pages have duplicates, during update search engine may substitute relevant pages with their doubles (this is accompanied with a sharp fall in positions and subsidence of traffic).

6 Ways to Get Rid of Doubles

Each subject (website) is unique, let’s have a look at most popular methods that work perfectly fine in 99% cases. Feel free to choose any of these options or use some of them in complex. Generally, these solutions can be applied to any other CMS.
All of these examples are valid if you turned on standard SEF and URL redirection in general settings of Joomla.

1. StyleWare Content Canonical Plugin

The content canonical plugin resolves the issue with multiple URLs of single page. So if you have component/content/article/32-something.html and something.html, both will be indexed from one URL (something.html). That's an awesome plugin that does what it’s supposed to.

2. Robots.txt for Joomla

The file is included into the standard package of Joomla, planted into the root directory and is available via link yourwebsite.com/robots.txt. It gives instruction to search engines on how to index website. With it’s help you can shut down some parts of your website. Additionally you can use following instruction to the default data in the file:
Disallow: /*? #each links that contains this sign will not be indexed *
Just one line saves you from storing great amount of chunk, like:
  • page materials for printing;
  • link to rss feed;
  • the search results page on the site;
  • will also close the page pagination;
  • there may be other options, depending on the extensions used.
Whether to use this line* or not, is up to you, keep in mind that too large robots file is considered to be fully permitting. Please note: the line must not cover something important like sitemap, thus you can simply add line Allow: /site_map You can read more about Sitemap in google help.

3. Redirect 301

Redirect 301 is appropriate if you have changed URLs, but all documents still exist. In this case, for proper bonding you need to use redirect 301 in .htaccess file. Search engines will know that the document was moved to a new address. This method allows you save both your website performance and PR.
301 redirect can be used also for gluing page doubles. For example, widely-known duplicates of the home page in a Joomla website are /index.php and the alias of the menu Home, for example: /home or /homepage, these items can be glued pretty easily: open your .htaccess file and enter:
Redirect 301 /index.php http://site.com/
...or else you can make the redirect 301 in the index file of your template:

<?php
if($_SERVER['REQUEST_URI'] == '/index.php') {
header("Location: /",TRUE,301);
exit();
}
?>

Here is a classy example of a website url with and without www.
RewriteEngine On
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^www.example.com$ [NC]
RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://example.com/$1 [R=301,L]
* example.com replace with your site domain name.
In this blog post you can find more ways on how to use redirect 301.

4. Meta Tag Robots

One more way on how to prevent indexing page duplicates - use meta tag robots:
<meta name="robots" content="noindex"/>
For now this option is much better for Google than to use blocking instructions in robots.txt file. For example to close the page version for printing you need to take the address, you can open the component.php file in the root of your template and enter the tag ?tmpl = component in <head> </ head>.
To close pages for search results you can use standard com_search in index.php of your template simply add following condition:

<?php if ($option == 'com_search') : ?>
<meta name="robots" content="noindex"/>
<?php endif; ?>
But firstly you need to specify variable:
$option = JRequest::getVar('option', null);

5. Deleting URLs from Webmaster's Panel

One more way to get rid of duplicates is to delete them manually from webmaster’s panel, for Google — https://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/home?hl=en

6. X-Robots-Tag Titles

Google recommends to use X-Robots-Tag as an alternative to the 4th method in this roundup.
HTTP/1.1 200 OK
Date: Tue, 25 May 2010 21:42:43 GMT
...
X-Robots-Tag: noindex
...
As you see there are lots of ways on how to remove duplicates, though you need to understand how each of them works, to pick most appropriate option for you.

Tuesday, 23 December 2014

Top 10 social extensions for Joomla

1. Joomla Coala Web Social Links

ACoalaWeb Social Links is a Joomla social extension that help site visitors bookmark content on your site as well as follow you through a variety of social networks. You can choose which bookmark and follow us links to display depending on your website needs plus it’s packed full of other configuration options to make it as flexible as possible. CoalaWeb Social Links is a complete social media package to help your site visitors bookmark content, follow you through a variety of social networks and vote for particular content with social buttons.

Download: http://coalaweb.com/extensions/joomla-extensions/coalaweb-social-links

2. Joomla Social Share and Vote button

Social Share/Vote Button is a popular Joomla plugin that shows social share or vote button in articles / content. It contains all popular social networks or share/bookmark sites that supports button/badge for vote/share.

Download: http://codeboxr.com/product/social-sharevote-button-plugin-for-joomla

3. JoomShareBar

Ultimate Social Sharing for Joomla! / K2
  • Display as Floating Skyscraper or Horizontal Bar
  • Lazy Loading (asynchronous) Buttons = performance!
  • Social buttons follow when scrolling your page
  • Fits Your website (design it yourself)

Download: http://www.joomarketer.com/joomla-extensions/joomsharebar

4. JExtBOX Social Share Buttons

This plugin adds social share buttons to your article, making it easy for your visitors to submit your articles and build traffic to your website.

The plugin supported Mongolian social websites (Biznetwork.mn) and new Google+.
Features
  • Postion – The positions (Top, Bottom and Both) of the buttons into your article
  • Excluded/included categories, articles
  • Excluded/included views (full article, featured, category)
  • Show or hide title. Title – The text which is located on the icons
  • Custom CSS
  • Facebooks og:tags, Twitter tags
Supported social sites
  • Biznetwork.mn
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Google Plus
Download: http://jextbox.com/jextbox-social-share-buttons.html

5. BT SocialShare plugin

BT Social Share is a joomla extension that add social icons to your joomla article. Extension can be published at various locations in content, with 2 options display top or bottom of article. Plugin has backend settings where you can customize it. You can enable/disable each social network individually or show or hide them on specific sections, categories, individual articles or specific menus.

Download: http://bowthemes.com/joomla-extensions/bt-social-share-plugin.html

6. JFBConnect

Complete Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and LinkedIn integration for Joomla! Add Facebook, Twitter and Google+ Login and other Facebook features to your site.

Provides Facebook, Google+ AND Twitter registration; Facebook Open Graph; Facebook Invites, Facebook, Google, Twitter and LinkedIn social widgets; Facebook Page Tab & Canvas support.
Download: http://extensions.joomla.org/extensions/social-web/social-display/facebook-integration/7215

7. Joomla Youtube Plugin

YouTube plugin is the best, simplest and the most popular Youtube plugin! Youtube plugin now supports versions 2.5 and 3.0!

This simple little YouTube plugin will display the YouTube Flash player in your articles when inserting the YouTube ID for chosen Youtube video, Youtube playlist or Youtube custom player, between a starting youtube tag and an ending youtube tag. Both defined with brackets (simple instruction is included when you install the youtube plugin).
Download: http://extensions.joomla.org/extensions/social-web/social-media/video-channels/3659

8. KA Facebook Like Box

Fan box also known as Like box is a Joomla Module that displays Facebook Fanbox/Likebox into Joomla websites. 
The Fan Box lets users:
  • See how many users are already fans/like
  • Read recent posts from the Page
  • Let visitors become a fan with 1-click

What You Need:
Before you add a Like Box to your website, you need the following:
  • A Joomla 1.5, 1.6, 1.7 or 2.5 website,
  • Ability to install modules
  • A Facebook Page that promotes your website

Download: http://www.khawaib.co.uk/component/kadirectory/downloads/item/4-ka-facebook-live-stream.html

9. We Ultimate Facebook Comments

Facebook comments WITH SEO BOOST! for your Joomla site is here! With the plugin you can add the ability to your visitors to comments your artciles with their Facebook Account! With module you can add the same ability to any page/menu you want! Ultimate Facebook Comments supports multiply components intergration like K2,LyftenBloggie etc


Download: http://extensions.joomla.org/extensions/social-web/social-comments/13880

10. Joomla Simple Disqus Comments

Simple Disqus Comments is a Joomla! plugin that enables you to integrate Disqus Comments on your website.
By using unique identifiers, Simple Disqus Comments is compatible with all SEF extensions and also with JoomFish. Using unique identifiers, Simple Disqus Comments will always identify the Disqus comments associated with an article regardless of the article URL.
Simple Disqus Comments is able to automatically detect Disqus language based on article language.
Simple Disqus Comments enables you to separate or merge Disqus comments ​​on multilingual websites.

Download: http://extensions.joomla.org/extensions/social-web/social-comments/19482

11 most famous Joomla Twitter Modules

1. Latestweets
Latestweets, one of the best multi twitter module in Joomla allows you to display your latest tweets on your Joomla site or blog. You can display any twitter-user tweets on your site by simply adding the twitter user-name. The best feature with this plugin is, it supports both single and multi-user tweets display. This Joomla module is compatible with all advanced versions of Firefox, Chrome and Internet Explorer 7, 8. It is very easy to configure and has been developed in a user friendly manner. This module is also available for Magento.
2. Twitter Fan Page
This ultimate Joomla module allows you to display your twitter fans on your site. Twitter Fan Page also allows you to display your fan list on your twitter page. It is its awesome look that stands to be a best feature. While adding the fans, there occurs no page refresh or reload. It supports all modern web browsers (Firefox, Chrome, IE7, etc).
3. Twitter Show
Twitter Show is a Joomla module to display your tweets with features to choose and include colors that match the theme of your website. This extension is recognized as one of the best Joomla twitter module, with classes for widget type, profile or search. The module has a wide variety of options for appearance, preferences and number of tweets.
4. Twitter Feed
Twitter Feed is a simple module that displays a configurable number of updates (Tweets) based on the Twitter Search API. The result is a powerful component that enables you to have a great deal of control over which updates are posted to your website. Right from filtering out certain hashtags to displaying items with links, this module serves the best. It also allows you to apply a custom CSS styling to the rendered links. The tweet updates are rendered in CSS friendly DIV tags and can be easily styled to fit the look and feel of your website. It undergoes a simple configuration and the only required field is your Twitter username. The module allows you to display or hide updates as links, with configurable link text. It also comes with advanced filtering and search capabilities that leverages the Twitter search API.
5. Twitter-Roll
Twitter roll is an updated extension for Joomla 1.5 &2.5. This is a free plugin which allows you to have an unlimited number of scrolling tweets with in your Joomla content. Twitter roll can be used to display a specific Twitter search or an advanced Twitter search. By clicking on your tagged Twitter search keyword, a styled pop-up box will be displayed, which shows up to 15 recent scrolling tweets based on your search tag. The module makes use of jQuery library script and has been tested on every available Joomla versions.
6. Twitter FollowMe
Twitter FollowMe, again a Joomla module that shows your last tweet, follower count and you can be followed in the same browser window. It is the lightweight factor that is unique with this kind of module.
7. Tweetme
Tweetme is a Joomla CMS module that supports 10 URL shortening services. With this module, you can define your own Twitter username in the retweets. You are also able to choose between the Standard button or a Compact button. You can exclude or include the button from specific Section, Categories or Articles. Another best feature with this plugin is, you can define your own CSS for the button placement or background. While installation of new versions, it is not needed that the old versions need to be un-installed first. It is very simple, light weight and looks better on any site.
8. Jtweet
JTweet is a Joomla module that is based on the jquery script developed by Sea of Clouds. It comes with an elegant interface for displaying your twitter tweets in Joomla site. The module has been upgraded to version 2 and the update includes the following new features:
* Drag and drop tweet templating.
* New layout options including pagination and scroller.
* New theme options.
* Automatically refresh the tweet stream.
* Intelligent admin interface
* Display retweet, favourite and reply button.
* Open links in a new window
9. TwitterTalk
The TwitterTalk widget will display the most recent tweets for any twitter user who has their tweets set as public. It allows you to display up to 20 tweets and includes a link to your twitter profile and a twitter icon or your profile picture. The module updates automatically and looks excellent in any sidebar or widget area. It displays real time search results. TwitterTalk is available for Joomla 1.5, 1.6, 1.7, 2.5.
10. Custom Twitter Display
Custom Twitter Display, a Joomla Twitter module that comes with a plenty of features like twitter search query, Twitter title caption, customized twitter dimensions, customized twitter width / height, auto twitter width appearance, customize twitter shell background, custom twitter shell text, custom twitter color tweet background, custom tweet color link color preferences, twitter scrollbar and much more.
11. Twitter Master
Twitter Master is the Joomla module that will put your website in the world of social share. This plugin can be a best way to make your websites cope up with some of the most important social networks existing. It comes with a Follow Us button and Re-Tweet button that boosts your website visits and user interaction. The module is available in more than 30 languages and therefore is able to suit the requirements of any Joomla site location. Twitter Master is tested with all the latest versions of Chrome, Firefox and IE.