VirtueMart Forum
VirtueMart 1.1.x [ Old version - no longer supported ] => Themes & Layout Problems and Customization VM 1.1 => Topic started by: macallf on March 02, 2009, 16:44:38 pm
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I'm working on a user manual for VM's template system and I want to know what you think and if I should continue.
Obviously this won't be finished overnight but the attached pdf should give you an idea of what I'm working on and the layout.
It's not a guide to writing html, css or php. It also won't help with general Joomla templates.
But it will indicate which templates are used by each page, which fields are available, which file creates the page. For the more complex pages I will also detail the sub templates and which fields are used there.
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Well I've just done a bit of an update which should give a better idea of the overall look of the pdf.
As I have said this is by no means finished and is still work in progress.
I have deliberately not made the information to detailed. Most people do not need to know what each line in a template does. But an explanation on how the fields are referenced and a description of each field used is more appropriate.
Some of the required php in each file is given and a mention of what it does. For most all you need to do is to ensure that these lines are within your template files in the correct places.
Comments would be appreciated as to layout, content etc.
[attachment cleanup by admin]
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Hi Mark
This is a great idea, I really struggle with the flypages
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This is exactly what I have been looking for. I am new to web development after a 16 year hiatus from systems development. I am trying to get in to the freelance business and have someone with an established business who is helping me out--and he wants me to become his Virtuemart guru. The learning curve is steep, since I am still learning html, css, php as I go. Browsing through the forums is helpful, but this manual is exactly what I need to learn quickly. thanks for taking the time to do it.
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Many thanks! This guide is awesome!
B.
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Mark, does it mean that you are back? ;)
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For the moment, yes!
The guide will get updated as and when time permits. But I have had some bug fixes and improvements to be implemented as well.
I just hope the guide helps people to work on their themes.
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Thanks and congrat for this great guide! It helps a lot! ;)
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Great work! I was hoping it would help but it seems that the file locations in VM 1.1.3 seem to have changed from that listed in your manual.
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no, they are correct
I state that i will use your-site/components/com_virtuemart/themes/default
then each template is from that position e.g. ../templates/browse/includes/browse_listtable.tpl.php
which would mean a complete path of your-site/components/com_virtuemart/themes/default/templates/browse/includes/browse_listtable.tpl.php
and these are the correct paths. But I am not going to duplicate the full path to each template.
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Sorry my apologies - you're correct.
Crappy windoze search is at fault once again.
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Nice work Mark!
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Excellent work! without this kind of documentation I'd have to go elsewhere for an shopping cart solution but VM is the best!
Keep up the good work we all appreciate your valiant efforts.
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I think you help out many people with this, great work!
Thumbs up!
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Thank you! :)
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This sounds just like what I'm looking for....but when I click the attachment link in the above post, I get a "404 - Attachment Not Found" error.
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Thank you, very, very useful :-)
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Please continue this project!! I have spent two full days trying to understand VM templates and themes!!
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Definitely a worthwhile project - please keep it up.
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Thanks, this is what I have been looking for.
It will realistically save me days of looking through the Forum.
Jeff
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Thanks, this will literally save me days. Much better than hunting through the forum.
jeff
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This is a very nice effort and great help.
Still a bit technical in terms of flow - but there are references throughout that I believe will help even a non-programmer/coder type like me find things a little easier.
If there is to be a future/improved edition - might I suggest more screenshots of both actual code examples and results that can be achieved? This would also make a great screencast and/or video tutorial series.
TOM
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Thank your for this guide Macallf. This will come in handy for me! Keep up the great work.
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Nice work.
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Good work Mike, I found a couple of answers here that did not appear on the first 20 pages of this forum...
Ed
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Macallf, this is exactly what is needed by us new users and I think you have pitched it at just the right level. I was expecting to discover how the templating system worked by becoming a 'detetctive' sniffing out clues and testing theories as I have had to do for many years with other projects, but this provides just the information that is needed.
An excellent foundation - please keep building!
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To all who modify or create templates: if you are not using the FIREBUG plugin in Firefox, then take the time to download it now and check it out. There is no faster way to find exactly which CSS tags you need to modify, or to deduce which HTML templates you need to locate and edit. Combined with Mike's guide to templates it is a winning combination. (Please only download from the firefox website for security reasons)
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I couldn't agree more, also try the web developer toolbar too.
But I do wish you'd stop calling me Mike!! :o
The name is Mark and it's clear in my sig! ;)
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this is good material for newbie, in the page 9, havent got any pictures :(
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Mark, here is a very useful guide. See if it helps your efforts and keep up the good work!
http://www.themeswiki.org/Customizing_VirtueMart
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Great work :) very thanks
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Bravooooooo! I can only encourage you to do this. Wish you all the luch and patience of the world.
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Thanks man this is what i'm looking for!!
Keep the good work
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I couldn't agree more, also try the web developer toolbar too.
But I do wish you'd stop calling me Mike!! :o
The name is Mark and it's clear in my sig! ;)
oops... guess I was reading too many different posts :-) I'll check out that toolbar too. Thanks again!
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Mark, thanks so much for ALL of your work! Customizing themes is the most time-consuming part of installing VM, for me and this really helps clarify things.
I find I'm installing a lot of Virtuemart systems lately, so I'm drafting a base theme that strips all inline styles and break tags from the default theme templates, replacing them with classes and/or ids that can be better controlled from the stylesheet. I think that's going to cut down on a lot of style issues, for me, anyway.
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This is an excellent information and I am looking for the complete guide. Hope you finished it by this time. I definitely look forward for more such useful information.
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awesome!
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muchas gracias for the guide.. im learning it now.. :)
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This is very helpful! I've been looking for this type of information.
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Hi
Very nice guide! Short and sweet and to the point! One thing I am missing, as in all documentation I have found so far on VM, is something regarding fonts. I am not a very professional programmer, but I have been around since we made webpages in HTML on Notepad, and fonts have always been a pain in the ... to handle. Now, with WYSIWIG formatting it is pretty nice. On VM, however, the formatting you can do in the WYSIWIG editor is not that much. So to get the formatting correct, and in tune with the template you are using on Joomla, there is evidently some hacking needed. My guess is that this is pretty easy, but the file structure and the relationship between the different CSS and PHP files in Joomla and VM makes it complex to understand when you come in from the outside.
If you could add just a short paragraph about this in the guide, it would be sweet! After searching the forum for several days, I see that a lot of newbies and a few veterans run into trouble when it comes to formatting fonts, and many of these questions remain unanswered in the forum.
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Someone thinks about translation?
sorry, I am don´t speaky english very well
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Well I've just done a bit of an update which should give a better idea of the overall look of the pdf.
Comments would be appreciated as to layout, content etc.
Hi Mark
It's great that you're doing this, but I'm still having trouble finding the file I need to change. All I want to do is change the text displayed on the "Thank you" page that is displayed after a purchase is made. At the moment it says "thank you for your Paypal payment" even though I have a Moneybookers option installed as well.
Please could you direct me to where this text can be found so that I can change it to something that would apply to either payment option?
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I think this guide is great! Since you are so familiar with VM and its templating system could you answer something for me?
Why aren't all of the same fields available for all of the templates? ???
I have experience with php and usually can sort out files in order to get the display the way I want, but for others it is so crazy that all the available variables are different.
The template system should have a clear standard set of field variables that can be applied to any template. ;) Is there any plans for future development of this feature in VM?
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thx !
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Hi Mark,
In this manual you can add all things we neeed to know customising your modification for product type flypage and product type values in browse pages.
Thanks a million,
Danny
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Many many thanks Mark!
With this guide i done 1 day work in 15 mins. Keep it UP!
:D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D :D
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This is a great guide and it has helped tremendously for the shop, flypage etc.
I am currently working on the checkout process, registration page and cart.
Are you planning to include this into your guide as well? Can you shed some light one where I could change the layout of the registration page?
Thx
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The Registration Page is a little different in that it doesn't use a template file. Some of the display is controlled by the script:
administrator/components/com_virtuemart/html/checkout_register_form.php
Within that script, most of the page is outputted via this statement:
ps_userfield::listUserFields( $fields, $skip_fields );
"ps_userfield" is a core class file located at:
administrator/components/com_virtuemart/classes/ps_userfield.php
You can control how this core class outputs fields by going to:
Admin->Configuration->Manage User Fields
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Thanks Mark for a great guide.
I just stumbled across this whilst trying to solve an issue I am having with additional <br> added to vmMainPage, trying to find which file this is called from, will be starting a new thread for support.
Have been playing with VM for over a month now and struggled on certain aspects, even using the developers manual.
There are refernces to content to/from the dev manual, not sure which came first, but this should certainly be added to it.
It may also be worth including that the debug option can be turned on within VirtueMart > Admin > Configuration > Global Tab > Core Settings > Debug
Ones this is turned on, handy little information icons appear next to each element within VM that show where it is generetad and at the bottom of the page is an additional table containing further information.
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Cheers this is great thanks, for the hard work you have put into this manual
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Hey, I haven't read your manual yet, but I'm sure that it's a valuable resource that I will use quite a bit. Thanks for your effort!
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thanks a lot.
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GOOD JOB!!!!!!!!!! Thanks!
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Great work Mark!!
Keep it coming
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Thank You so much I wish i found this sooner it would have saved me so much time!
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Thanks the guide is very helpful. :)
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Hi
This is a Great layout guide! this has been include on the virtuemart wiki yet.
The joomla! wiki cover joomla development topics
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joomla (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joomla)
The virtuemart wiki has no development info
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VirtueMart (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VirtueMart)
and the virtuemart manual
http://virtuemart.net/documentation/User_Manual/index.html (http://virtuemart.net/documentation/User_Manual/index.html)
will only be update when some pay $1500 for a revision,
last update was 2 years ago in 2008
Think about how much easier it would be to share this info and for people to to be able to update if it was on a wiki.
How to make a wiki article for virtuemart
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Writing_your_first_article (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Writing_your_first_article)
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So where can one download this manual? A lot on this thread but I couldn't find your download Mark... any help on that? Or maybe it is still in progress? Thank you!!!
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it's attached to the second post on page 1 of this thread.
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Thank you idgafra!!!!
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Thanks. It's indeed useful.
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Id like to see it so I can hopefull figure out how to setup themes in virtuemart
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restequi : it's attached to the second post on page 1 of this thread.
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Is this user guide completed? .