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Building Websites with Joomla! 1.5.x - Building The Site

Written by Graham Stoney

Article Index
Building Websites with Joomla! 1.5.x
Building The Site
Essential Extensions
Other Extensions
Conclusion
All Pages

Page 2 of 5

Building The Site

Being new to web content management systems, I was surprised to find that by default, building a Joomla! site involved working live on the site itself. You install the software, create the database, and then start adding content to the database via the Joomla! backend. Once the structure is set up, you can add articles via the front end too, right there on the site.

I'm used to software development using version control systems like Perforce and Subversion which allow a developer to submit a change to a bunch of files in one atomic commit; but they just don't seem to have a place in this model. If you want to modify two Joomla! articles which reference each other at the same time, you either have to do them one at a time leaving a window of inconsistency, take the site offline, or use a replicating tool. Major atomic changes to the structure of the site or multiple articles while the site is live just aren't possible. Rolling back changes is difficult or impossible. Perhaps this is just an artefact of the database model that all content management systems share. If the database gets corrupted, I've got a hunch I'm screwed. I can't just go revert to the previous changelist that I know worked sensibly. So I resort to backups using JoomlaPack and keep my fingers crossed.

I was surprised to find that Google had found my site and started indexing it before I even submitted it. I couldn't test some things, like navigating the site while not logged in, unless the site was live. I ended up with entries in Google's index before I had finalised the format of the SEF URL's I wanted to use, meaning I had to go and remove these entries manually or face visitors from Google getting 404 errors. Given the effort I was going to to get the site into Google's index, I was reluctant to remove anything; but I wanted links to my site to work.

XAMPP

Version: 1.6.8

The trouble with building on the live site is that it looks like construction zone, and that appears unprofessional to visitors who may happen on it. The solution to this problem is to use a local hosting package like XAMPP to build and install a working Joomla! Installation on your local machine, then use a solution like JoomlaPack to migrate it to the live site in one step.

When I built my second site for my new Personal Development/Life Coaching business, I used XAMPP on my Windows XP machine and it worked well with only a couple of minor issues: Configuring the Mercury Mail Transport Agent to support the PHP Mail function proved difficult, so I couldn't test site functions like the contact panel and Vemod News Mailer. I had trouble getting these things working on my live site, so it would be nice to be able to test them locally first. I haven't found an easy solution to this yet. I also found that the Spell Checker in JCE didn't work locally. And when logging into the administrator back end, XAMPP allowed me to log in using an upper-case Administrator which appeared to work at first, but caused the main administration menu to stop working. It took me quite a while to work out what was wrong, so make sure you use a lower-case administrator in the URL..

.htaccess

The htaccess file in the top-level Joomla! Directory provides configuration information to the web server, which on most hosting providers is usually some version of Apache. The file supplied with Joomla! will work unmodified, but it needs to be renamed from htaccess.txt to .htaccess after you run the installation in your web browser. It's also worth making a minor change to it to rewrite references to your site so that search engines index it consistently either with or without the www. prefix. It doesn't really matter which you choose and your site will still be accessible both ways, but if you don't force a preference by rewriting the less preferred option in your .htaccess file, search engines may end up indexing it both ways and dividing your page ranking in the process. Look for the line:

# RewriteBase /

And add these two lines if you want your site referred to as domain.com:

# Rule for duplicate content removal : www.domain.com vs domain.com
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^www.\domain\.com [NC]
RewriteRule (.*) http://domain.com/$1 [R=301,L,NC]

Or, if you want your site referred to as www.domain.com, add these lines:

# Rule for duplicate content removal : domain.com vs www.domain.com
RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^domain\.com [NC]
RewriteRule (.*) http://domain.com/$1 [R=301,L,NC]

Keeping Current

Making minor upgrades (from 1.5.X to 1.5.Y) to Joomla! is easy, since the developers release patch packages which you simply extract in the directory where you have it installed on your site. If your hosting provider gives you cPanel access, use it to extract the .tar.gz upgrade package. Don't use the .zip upgrade package with cPanel 11, because it can't overwrite existing files when extracting a .zip.

Beware that if your hosting provider installs Joomla! via Fantastico, you're likely to need to install a patch package to bring it up to the latest version. Fantastico can do this for you if you wait long enough, but the extra time lag involved means that you'll always be out-of-date and your site vulnerable to hacking if you use Fantastico to do the upgrade. Believe it or not, as soon as a security vulnerability is announced in a package like Joomla!, a bunch of hackers develop an exploit for it and their script kiddy buddies start taking out sites that haven't upgraded yet. If only they could use their powers for good instead of evil. The price of security is eternal vigilance, and that means staying up-to-date; which is why the Drupal people explicitly warn against Fantastico.

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319 Votes

29 Comments

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annich makes this comment

2009-03-28 14:49:48

I absolutely agreed that it is crazy not to be able to put a story under more than one category. I also think it is crazy to stop lists at 50. I have many times more content than this on my site and can't find a way to make it easily available to subscribers.
I have yet to work out how to make the archive work properly.
Joomla is OK as far as it goes, but it has massive limitations.
annich makes this comment

2009-03-28 14:52:16

I absolutely agree that it is crazy to only be able to put storie in one category, and it is equally stupid to stop lists at 50. Joomla has massive limitations.
Carolien makes this comment

2009-03-31 09:46:06

Vemod News Mailer extension isn't in the JED anymore. The link is broken.
Graham Stoney makes this comment

2009-04-02 04:12:31

The author of Vemod has discontinued support for it, and handed the baton to another group. It does appear to have disappeared from the JED, but it's still available from his home site.
pydiraju makes this comment

2009-04-29 05:25:18

i am doing one website using joomla. i have to provide in one page some details of each option, so i have to use multi read more options in my article. how is it possiable.
sandy makes this comment

2009-05-09 19:10:52

Very nice and informative.
Cheers,
Sandy
Denise makes this comment

2009-05-13 15:12:19

Thank you for this article. It is very helpful.
Dr.Bestt makes this comment

2009-05-21 21:14:44

Tremendous article.
this would really help that novice Joomla user.
best wishes.
Ron Strauss makes this comment

2009-05-29 19:25:14

Thank you for the overview upside / downside.
Roland makes this comment

2009-06-08 14:12:15

Thanks for writing this short overview. I have started using Joomla. The reason for me was that it offers so much options i cant find in any other cms.
Rufus Quail makes this comment

2009-06-09 21:23:21

I'm a tech idiot, so reading this was a big help. I'll refer back to it when I start building my site. Thanks.
Greg makes this comment

2009-06-11 19:56:03

Thanks! The more I learn about Joomla... the more I like it.
Biffburton makes this comment

2009-06-13 22:37:20

Liked the article and thanks for taking the time. I am very new, yet have spent weeks and weeks, sometimes 10 hours a day learning Joomla! and am amazed at the limitations.

I am unable to understand why, with so many 000s of people working on it, it is still so complicated - everywhere I go on the forums people are saying they spent 3 hours, 4/5 hours trying to get soemething to work - crazy! but understandable - Dreamweaver is a breeze by comparison.

Even a Guru has declared something he thought was not visible was in fact on his front page - what chance the new guy!

On with the struggle and hope somebody makes a button to do the job - why can't a similar arrangement to Dreamweaver be done.

Looking forward to getting enthusiastic about it all - but when!
Ray L makes this comment

2009-06-15 20:11:25

Thank you, thank you, thank you, for your article. I need to publish a simple ecommerce website quickly. I can go back and make it more complicated later. It appears that Joomla is not my solution. Joomla now seems to be hyped by a tech-rich community. Nothing against them, but Joomla is not really for beginners. The 1.5 Quickstart pdf is confusing. I can see now that it makes assumptions about my level of knowledge. I have been trying to understand the hierachy of Joomla, and your explanation of the limitation of 2 levels, was enlightening. I am not a novice, but I was hoping a CMS would allow me to get my site up quickly. Not so. We need more articles like this one, that point out the limitations of products.
Ray L makes this comment

2009-06-15 20:16:04

P.S. I am still going to come back to Joomla and learn it, as it still sounds promising, but there really is quite a learning curve to it. If only there was a mini-Joomla, or a Joomla, Jr., or a Joomla Lite, with more basic website building tools, that would let a beginner get a website going quicker, but also encourage him to grow into Joomla the Big.
Ali makes this comment

2009-06-26 18:18:06

its a great site to see
backlinks makes this comment

2009-07-01 02:31:06

Hi there,
I have stoped by first time this site and it is really good and informative. joomla.org seem to be very user friendly. I am planning to update some of my websites. here I found lot of templates available. and that sound good for me.
thanks a lot for sharing this useful info with us
Tee makes this comment

2009-07-07 04:28:11

Hello, I'm new to Joomla anyone know a good calendar to install? I installed the Google calendar but it doesn't have text wrap so my words are cut off and any good flash that I can put on my header of my website?
Dhamphy makes this comment

2009-07-16 18:53:25

Thanks for this, I will be using Joomla for my next project..
Dhamphy's Online Journal
george makes this comment

2009-07-21 13:03:01

i see a lot of people use joomla and get a lot of things for free,
please can anyone give me a hint on how to get a free easy to use web design templates.

i am a total novice on this.
thanks
george [nigeria]
Jon makes this comment

2009-08-13 15:40:31

yates

Ei..Thanks you, for your article. I need to publish a simple ecommerce website quickly.
Deki makes this comment

2009-08-19 19:12:18

Thanks to this article, my client has chose Joomla CMS for his site!

Thank you Graham!
maialen makes this comment

2009-08-19 21:37:41

Nice article! Thank you!
Yacht makes this comment

2009-08-25 20:55:39

Thanks for this post and this information but a think Joomla it has massive limitations.
John Pitchers makes this comment

2009-08-28 14:09:57

Great article!

A lot of the commentators here are quite vocal about Joomla's limitations. Joomla has definitely got some limitations but so have all the other top CMS's like Wordpress, Drupal, Expression Engine, etc.

Web development is a profession. If you have no or little experience developing a site, you will find it difficult and get frustrated by these "limitations".

I just completed a 900 page Joomla website with unlimited depth of categories, access control restricting editing rights of admins to specified categories, multiple newsletter lists, event calendars and full SEF URL's.

The entire site is updated, including events and sending newsletters via the front end. Approximately 20 people across Australia manage content for their particular area and only two people in the organisation have back end access.

The company invested 6 figures in the development of the site which included a lengthy internal assessment of the best CMS to fit their needs. Joomla won despite it's "limitations".

Joomla is a world class product and it's getting better with every release.
Ben Clayton makes this comment

2009-10-01 14:02:45

Excellent article - thanks so much. I'm new to Joomla, and will be setting up a Joomla site for a small company in the next few weeks, and will definitely be following your advice.

Cheers!
ottoteller makes this comment

2009-10-09 15:39:47

Kudos!!!
As someone who has also learned Joomla the hard way, I wish to thank the author for a well written and extremely informative article. Joomla has a few limitations, to be sure, but for the price, it sure is hard to beat. I really like it, and like its backend and easy edit nature. Even an intelligent novice with minimal html skills can be instructed to maintain a site once it is up.
Milica makes this comment

2009-10-18 15:59:19

I cant find out how to make my site here...if anyone want to help me, my e-mail is lenja_baba@yahoo.com so e-mail me.

Thanks, Milica, Serbia
AS makes this comment

2009-10-19 21:23:19

for basic tutorials, go to siteground.com. They have the best and most compreshensive tutorials on basic stuff

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