Geeklog Forums

Hi Bewee

Yes this is the correct behaviour. Clicking on a main menu item won't change the currently displayed page, it will just open the menu item. In the beginning this made sense to me, but just lately I started wondering whether it won't be confusing to the novice user as nothing seems to happen when you click on such an item (apart from the menu opening up). What do you guys think, should I change it, and if so, what behaviour do you think would make sense?

The version number might be an oversight on my part, I'll have a look at it and fix it.

Jannetta

Blockmenu is now also running on my website at http://www.jannetta.com.

Jannetta, before I forget: it's a great plug-in! It's really user-friendly and offers lots of possibilities.

Some of my friends looked at the behaviour, they we're also confused as they found out that clicking on a main item did not have much effect except for the change in the blockmenu. OK, we're just stupid Dutchmen, but the behaviour is just different from what everybody expects.

I would love to see that clicking on a main item would result in changing the page as well (linking to an URL), like the other menu plugin (which doesn't work very well with GL1.39 and Mozilla/Firefox/NS).

Next step would be to make a two-level menubar with your code, or a combination of a horizontal main-menu and vertical sub-menu.

Your plug-in is a great addition to a great CMS!

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Dutch Geeklog sites about camping/hiking:
www.kampeerzaken.nl | www.campersite.nl | www.caravans.nl | www.caravans.net

New Release: Blockmenu 1.0.3

Hi Beewee

Thanks, I'm really glad it is of use for others!

From one dumb Dutchmen to another (even if there is 300 years of genealogy in between), let's fix the problem!
You'll be glad to hear that I have just released Blockmenu 1.0.3 which now allows you to specify a URL for the main menu.

Please just be careful, I haven't tested the installation program. The upgrade part of the code does work but make sure to read the BLOCKMENU_INSTALL file. If anybody has a Geeklog installation where they can try the new installation of Blockmenu, I'll appreciate any feedback!

Last thing, please explain more about the two-level menubar that you mentioned. Where would you want to use it? In the centre block? Because in the side blocks it wouldn't make any sense - or am I missing something here?

Jannetta

Correct, I would use it as a menu bar in the header. I'm setting up a test site without your plug-in with:

- a main menubar with links to some topics, and a sub-menu bar with links to the stories. It's not for a weblog but a CMS, so there are not so many stories.

Thanks for adapting and upgrading your menu block!!! I believe this plug-in is a great additon for all of us!

I'll will install and try it tomorrow evening (it's 01.30 AM over here..)

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Dutch Geeklog sites about camping/hiking:
www.kampeerzaken.nl | www.campersite.nl | www.caravans.nl | www.caravans.net

Got mySQL error message while attempting to add the first main menu item:

Thu May 20 16:25:44 2004 - 1064: You have an error in your SQL syntax. Check the manual that corresponds to your MySQL server version for the right syntax to use near '",URL="staticpages/index.php/beeweb"' at line 1. SQL in question: INSERT INTO blockmenu_main SET bm_title="Over Beeweb",bm_order_main=1",URL="staticpages/index.php/beeweb"

I'll try it again tonigth to see if it's going better from a new install. Upgraded everything according your install file.

Greetz, beewee

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Dutch Geeklog sites about camping/hiking:
www.kampeerzaken.nl | www.campersite.nl | www.caravans.nl | www.caravans.net

Oops, that didn't work out. Installed GL again, and Blockmenu. Works fine, except for the embedded submenu, the submenu still shows in a separate block, despite the option I choose...How can I check if the installation/upgrade was OK?

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Dutch Geeklog sites about camping/hiking:
www.kampeerzaken.nl | www.campersite.nl | www.caravans.nl | www.caravans.net

I spotted an error in the mysql statement which I have fixed. I'll upload the fix and post a message here to let you know about it.

After the installation you should have four new blocks. They are phpblock_blockmain, phpblock_blockindex, phpblock_blockmain_index and phpblock_blockmenu. Their titles are:
Main Menu with submenu
Sub-menus
Main Menu with embedded sub-menu
Main Menu with indented menu

If you want to use the two block option, enable phpblock_blockmain and phpblock_blockindex (ie Main Menu with indented menu and Sub-menus). Disable the other two.

If you want the one block with the embedded sub-menu, enable phpblock_blockmain_index (ie Main Menu with embedded sub-menu). Disable the other three blocks.

If you want the menu with the collapsable sub-menu below each main menu item, enable phpblock_blockmenu (ie Main Menu with indented menu) and disable the other three blocks.

Hi folks

My apologies to everyone who discovered that adding a new menu item resulted in an SQL error and many thanks to beewee for pointing out the problem.

I have fixed it and uploaded it to sourceforge. I have also changed the version number to 1.0.3p1. The version number should now be displayed on the Blockmenu admin screen. Hopefully this will make it easier to see that you have the latest code. You only need to download Blockmenu_1.0.3b.zip as there were no changes to 1.0.3a. The file however, is still called Blockmenu_1.0.3.zip

If you have already installed 1.0.3 then you can just extract the new zip over the old code. If you are installing from scratch, then please read the readme files.

If anyone would like to be my official tester, please let me know. I'll add your name to the sourceforge project and you will have the priviledge of discovering my bugs before anyone else. If you would like to volunteer, please send me your email address through sourceforge.

Jannetta

Thanks, Jannetta, for all your efforts.

I'll think about your 'testing' inquiry.

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Dutch Geeklog sites about camping/hiking:
www.kampeerzaken.nl | www.campersite.nl | www.caravans.nl | www.caravans.net

Just installed the new version of menublock. It seems promising, but I got this sql error when trying to add main menu item #2

Works fine over here! But installed/upgraded it again to get it working.

Thnx Jannetta, great job! Will send you some URL's with working examples soon!

Found something out too: you can make static links in a horizontal menubar (in the header template) to the main menu-items, disable the main menu and only enable the submenu, which changes according the results of the static links.

And: with Blockmenu you can easily use lots of searchengine-friendly static pages, and GL is becoming a real CMS instead of a blog (oops, sorry, there's nothing wrong with a blog!). Also easy when you need a site with bilangual content.

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Dutch Geeklog sites about camping/hiking:
www.kampeerzaken.nl | www.campersite.nl | www.caravans.nl | www.caravans.net

Hi TeppoM

Were you doing a new installation or an upgrade? I can't seem to reproduce the error. The SQL statement that failed is the one that is trying to get the menu items from the database in order to draw the menu. It is not part of the admin function for adding menu items. Can you perhaps give a bit more detail of the procedure you were following when this happened?

It doesn't seem to work with static pages for the main-items, but that is no problem for me. Have you ever thought of the possibility of sub-submenu items?

Like:

_Geeklog
___Plugins
______Blockmenu

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Dutch Geeklog sites about camping/hiking:
www.kampeerzaken.nl | www.campersite.nl | www.caravans.nl | www.caravans.net

Oops, why didn't I try IE earlier? While logging I got an MySQL error as well:



It did not show when I was not logged in. But I'm using HTML area 2 for my static pages, so I had to use IE for this.
The error disappeared when I disabled the blockmenu.

Nor errors found with Mozilla/Firefox/Netscape, only with IE (6)

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Dutch Geeklog sites about camping/hiking:
www.kampeerzaken.nl | www.campersite.nl | www.caravans.nl | www.caravans.net

Hi Beewee

It should work with static pages. That is actually what it is was written for. You have to get the link correct though. Only use the relative URL, ie something like:
staticpages/index.php?page=12345678

Have a look at my home page at http://www.jannetta.com. Almost all the menu items, including the main menu item Kids, are linked to static pages.

I have thought of sub-submenus, but because the blocks on the left (or right) have limited size, I dismissed the idea again. I basically didn't want to allow the guys at work to go crazy on sub-sub type menus and then end up having to argue the point they are destroying layouts and defeating the purpose trying to minimise the number of clicks before getting to an item.

It would also mean a rewrite, because for such a menu I would rather use a recursive structure and one database table in stead of they way I structured Blockmenu.

It might be something I'll do in future though, even if it is just for fun. I could limit the depth of the menu in the code or in a config file. However, right now I don't have the time for that.

I use only Opera and IE at the moment and I still can't reproduce the error. The error however, does not have anything to the browser. The error is caused by the SQL statement that reads the menu items from the database. Where it says "WHERE bm_onswitch=" it is looking for the main menu item that is suppose to be active and for which the sub-menu item must be displayed. Because there is no value for bm_onswitch, you get an SQL syntax error, the menu can't be printed on the screen and basically the whole Geeklog will stop working. If you disable the menu, Geeklog will work again because the syntax error never occurs.

Do you perhaps have blockmenu= in one of your URLs? If you do and you don't specify a valid blockmenu you should get this error. blockmenu must have a value. It specifies the main menu item that is active and for which the sub-menu items must be displayed. You shouldn't really have to specify blockmenu in your URLs though. You can do it if you want to control the Blockmenu from a link within a page, but otherwise it shouldn't be neccessary. I'm going to build some error handling into Blockmenu to prevent this error from occuring in the next release.

I wish I could refer you to our college's new web site because there I could point you to various examples. Unfortunately the site is not available yet.

Anyway I hope some of what I have said is of some help.

Hi Guys

I think I just reproduced the error! I'll be back soon with a solution!

Found the error! It was all my fault, there was a bug, but I didn't notice it because, of the three options of Blockmenus that you can have it was on the two that I wasn't using on my homepage.

Plenty apologies! I'm uploading the patch now to sourceforge. You only need to download Blockmenu_1.0.3b.zip. Just extract it over the existing files. After installation the Blockmenu Admin heading should be Blockmenu version 1.0.3p2.