Marni Derr - Joomla!: Visual QuickStart Guide (2nd Edition)

Visual QuickStart Guide

Second Edition Marni Derr Tanya Symes Visual QuickStart Guide
Joomla!
Second Edition
Marni Derr and Tanya Symes Peachpit Press
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Berkeley, CA 94710
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Peachpit Press is a division of Pearson Education
Copyright 2011 by Marni Derr and Tanya Symes Project Editor: Nancy Peterson
Development Editor: Bob Lindstrom
Copyeditor: Darren Meiss
Production Editor: Becky Winter
Compositor: Danielle Foster
Indexer: Jack Lewis
Cover compositor: Alan Clements
Cover Design: RHDG / Riezebos Holzbaur Design Group, Peachpit Press
Interior Design: Peachpit Press
Logo Design: MINE www.minesf.com Notice of Rights All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form by any meanselectronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwisewithout the prior written permission of the publisher. For information on obtaining permission for reprints and excerpts, contact . Notice of Liability The information in this book is distributed on an As Is basis, without warranty. While every precaution has been taken in preparation of this book, neither the authors nor Peachpit shall have any liability to any person or entity with respect to any loss or damage caused or alleged to be caused directly or indirectly by the instructions contained in this book or by the computer software and hardware products described in it. Trademarks Visual QuickStart Guide is a registered trademark of Peachpit Press, a division of Pearson Education.

Other trademarks are the property of their respective owners. Many of the designations used by manufacturers and sellers to distinguish their products are claimed as trademarks. Where those designations appear in this book, and Peachpit was aware of the trademark claim, the designations appear as requested by the owner of the trademark. All other product names and services identified throughout the book are used in an editorial fashion only and for the benefit of such companies with no intention of infringement of the trademark. No such use, or the use of any trade name, is intended to convey endorsement or other affiliation with this book. ISBN 13: 978-0-321-77298-5
ISBN-10: 0-321-77298-9 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 Printed and bound in the United States of America

This book is dedicated to all the open source developers and Joomla community.

Without you this book would not be possible.

When we first conceived of this book, we knew it would be a challenge to cover everything we wanted to cover yet keep the book from becoming too technical or overwhelming. As always it took many people to get this book into your hands, and we would like to extend our thanks to all. First, thanks to our editors, Nancy, Bob, and Darren. Nancy who patiently pushed us to stay on schedule. To Bob for helping us to better explain the more obscure and vague concepts, and to Darren for having such a keen eye.

To Danielle for laying out the book so splendidly and putting up with our constant changes. We would like to extend a very special thank you to our friend and instructor David McFarland for those simple words that started it all, You should look into Joomla! And finally to all of our friends and family who always believed we could do it.

Over the last decade, the web has seen monumental changes. Today, everyone has a web presence and, to some extent, everyone is a web designer. Social web sites and new media have changed the way we use the web and interact with each other; and also how we locate, consume, and share information. As the web became more accessible, the ability to create a web site needed to become more accessible for users.

In 2005, free, open source content management systems such as Joomla, Drupal, and WordPress made creating, updating, and maintaining a web site as easy as using a word processor. Today, with a web browser, a domain name, a web server, and the latest version of Joomla, you can have your own dynamic, socially integrated web presence. You can offer services, write a blog, sell products, or create a stunning portfolio in as little as a few days with little or no web design, development, or coding skills. This book is your complete start-to-finish guide on installing, using, extending, and maintaining a fully functional Joomla web site.

A content management system (CMS) is a web-based application that manages your content by storing it in a database and then displaying that content using a template. A CMS provides a graphical user interface (GUI) that you use to input your web site content and create links; the system then writes the code needed to display that content as a web page.

When using a CMS, you do not need to be a web coder or designer to create a fully functional and interactive web sitethe system handles this for you. All content management systems contain core management functions: a menu system to create links, default templates to present your content, editors to create that content, and small functions such as search engine optimization (SEO) options, user registration, and so on. To add functionality that is not included in the core CMS, you can acquire free or commercial third-party extensions. Joomla has one of the largest communities of extension developers on the market today. For example, if you needed interactive forms to collect user information, you could do a web search for forms for Joomla and find numerous extension options to enable form creation using Joomla. These extensions provide an interface for you to enter information and then generate the form for your web site.

The extension developers have written the code for you; you simply enter the information to create a fully functional form in minutes.

This book is for creative professionals, covering the spectrum from web designers and developers to small and medium businesses and sole proprietorships. Even large corporations have implemented Joomla web sites. It is not necessary to know HTML, CSS, PHP, or JavaScript, or to understand databases to create a complete Joomla web site. You can complete this book and have a fully functional web site at the end. If you are a web developer or designer with coding skills, this book walks you through all the features Joomla has to offer, including creating custom templates.

As always, a good understanding of web site usability and design is extremely helpful.

This is the second edition of the Joomla Visual QuickStart series. Our first edition taught how to use Joomla versions 1.5.0 through 1.5.x. Joomla 1.5.x will be supported by the Joomla development team through April 2012. In January 2011, Joomla 1.6.x was released for use on live production sites. At the time of its release, the Joomla development team decided to implement short-term releases (STS) and long-term releases (LTS).

We will not detail the particulars of these release cycles here. For information on the new Joomla release cycles and what each new version means, go to www.joomla.org. This book was written using the newest Joomla 1.6 release. However, a new releasewhether a STS or LTSmight contain minor or major changes and added features. To that end, we have written and constructed this book to be as useful as possible for Joomla versions 1.6.x and above.

You will find this books companion web site at www.writingyourdreams.com. Next page