betweenbrain™ | Notes [not quite a blog]

Joomla, Say Goodbye to Conditional Comments

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Last Updated on Monday, 12 September 2011 20:18

A simple and effective way to handle to the various quirks between the different versions of Internet Explorer is the use of conditional comments to load specific stylesheets, declarations, or even classes. For example, HTML5 Boilerplate addresses this by implementing Paul Irish's Conditional stylesheets vs CSS hacks? Answer: Neither!:

<!--[if lt IE 7]> <html class="no-js ie6 oldie" lang="en"> <![endif]-->
<!--[if IE 7]>    <html class="no-js ie7 oldie" lang="en"> <![endif]-->
<!--[if IE 8]>    <html class="no-js ie8 oldie" lang="en"> <![endif]-->
<!--[if gt IE 8]><!--> <html class="no-js" lang="en"> <!--<![endif]-->

However, conditional comments add extra code to your document and are limited to only Internet Explorer.

Joomla to the rescue!

Since Joomla! 1.5, JBrowser has existed to help us identity the client's browser by examining the HTTP_USER_AGENT. By leveraging JBrowser, we can not only eliminate the use conditional statements in templates, but also expand browser specific rules beyond IE and do this server-side.

Recursively remove sub-directories matching wildcard via Linux terminal

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Last Updated on Sunday, 11 September 2011 17:28

~$ sudo find path/to/the/parent/directory -iname "*.foo" -exec rm -R {} \;

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Requiring terms and conditions

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Last Updated on Monday, 12 September 2011 20:19

Requiring new users, that are registering on your website, to accept a Terms and Conditions agreement can be accomplished through the use of a simple Joomla! template override. This override, in fact, only requires adding the following line of code to the com_users/register override:

<input class="inputbox required" id="terms" type="checkbox" value="yes" name="terms" />
<label id="tos" for="terms"><?php echo JText::_( 'I accept the' ); ?>
<a class="modal" href="/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=13&tmpl=component&Itemid=6" rel="{handler: 'iframe', size: {x: 640, y: 480}}">Terms and Conditions</a>*

This line of code has a few aspects worth mentioning:

Joomla! Day New England 2011

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Last Updated on Tuesday, 05 April 2011 09:26

One of the amazing aspects of the Joomla! project is that it brings together like-minded people from across the world and unite us as members of an online community, sharing a common goal. This community is the power behind Joomla and is what makes it the best CMS. As a member of the online Joomla community, it's easy to forget the power of personal contact and face-to-face meetings.

Which came first, the template or the component?

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Last Updated on Monday, 12 September 2011 20:19

A case for using unique CSS classes for components

Not too long after I released the Construct template framework, I received a report of some strange behavior when it was being used along side of a very popular, and widely used Joomla extension. This particular extension uses the following CSS, which is applied to empty divs:


	.clr {clear:both;height:0;line-height:0;border:none;float:none;background:none;padding:0;margin:0;}

In my framework, I use the following CSS, which I apply to various page elements that also contain content:


	.clr {clear:both;}

In this situation, the CSS from this extension was causing all of the template's page elements, that had a class of clr, to basically disappear. So, how do we handle a situation like this? Which should take precedence, the template or the component? In this case, I was basically forced to rework my framework as this extension was applying styles to a very broad and generic CSS class. If this extension had used a unique class applied to it's outer most element, they could have isolated their styling of generic classes to just the extension.

A few notes on the new Joomla development development strategy

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Last Updated on Wednesday, 26 January 2011 08:00

Quite a few Joomla users have a number of questions about the new development strategy for Joomla. Following are a few notes that will hopefully clarify a few of those questions and put your concerns at ease. There are more details on the new development strategy at http://developer.joomla.org/strategy.html

Upgrading a site with Akeeba Backup

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Last Updated on Sunday, 11 September 2011 18:43

From https://www.akeebabackup.com/support/forum/topic/27039-extracting-over-an-existing-install/41747.html#p41747

Take care of the files' ownership. Ideally, use the FTP mode in all cases - unless you're using a server running on suPHP or mod_itk.

If you remove files from your dev site, e.g. delete a component, take a backup and try to restore it the files you deleted on the dev site will NOT be deleted on the live site. This is by design. The pitfall here is that you might end up with stale files which, if found vulnerable to a direct access attack, can -theoretically- compromise the security of your site.

Take site offline in Global Configuration

If using Admin Tools Pro, enable "emergency offline mode"

Extract the development site Akeeba archive over live site

Perform your normal kickstart installation

Put the site online in Admin Tools Pro and Global Configuration.

Edit .htaccess as needed.

Rejoice!

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Roll Your Own Joomla!™ Distributions

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Last Updated on Thursday, 13 January 2011 11:04

Are you a Joomla site builder and tired of installing the same mix of extensions over and over again? Do you make the same security and performance enhancements on every site? Wouldn't it be great to be able to do it once, and only once, for every Joomla site you build in the future? (I know this is sounding like an infomercial) In this article, you'll learn a cool technique for easily doing this with Akeeba Backup Pro. But wait, there's more...

Chilean Joomla Rocks!

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Last Updated on Wednesday, 05 January 2011 20:00

In light of the upcoming Joomla! Day Chile, I'd like to propose a slight variation of Ryan Ozimek's traditional "Joomla Rocks!" keynote:

Chi, Chi, Chi! le, le ,le! Viva Chile!
Joo, Joo, Joo! mla, mla, mla! Viva Joomla!