I want to add an Articles section

[shags38]

Actually, thinking about it, it might be a handy mod to switch the chapter identifier to "string" type so it could be either a number or text, and be able to display the identifier in the TOC. That would require sanitization to keep undesirable content out of the name, and possibly some modification of the chapter handling in a number of places to deal with the possible string form. It could still be sorted, in alphanumerical order.

Glenn,

(v1.3.9h) I have had to in the past put Articles in a specific product category named Articles because of 2 things. 1. up until recently there was no way to add meta title/keywords/description to E-Z pages (that is now available) and 2. Having the articles neatly contained within a section called *Articles* was difficult to do (for me anyway) - the articles simply showed up in the E-Z pages sidebox which grew and grew and grew.

Using *documents* as the product attribute wasn't practical either. Many of us use articles for SEO ranking purposes (very cautiously now after Panda and Penguin) as well as for customer retention and even generating customers, probably two separate categories in my view - those that you want customers to read and those you want the crawlers only to see, i.e. these articles to be not easy to find, like in e-z pages at sort 11 onwards with side box configuration allowing only 10 ez pages.

Having the ability to have *Articles* in its own category in the information side box just under the categories side box with the articles listed not unlike the product category pages would be great. As I said I have them now set up as *products* and that is quite workable except it kinda looks strange with add to cart boxes (do I have to pay to read this article?? perception).... you can see it in my site in my signature

So if you can come up with a mod that would be great.

cheers,
Mike

[gjh42]

You seem not to know about some of the functionality available, and to be using some in a less than optimal manner.

You don't need to display all articles/ez-pages in the sidebox. You can display one page which introduces a general topic, and use chapters and the TOC to link all related ez-pages from that one and not from the sidebox. They can still be found by search engines following links.

If you want to use the category/product structure to deliver your articles, make the articles "document-general" type and they will have no pricing or add to cart features.

[devlin]

It appears Mike and I are in the same predicament.

I want to have a way to add articles,
have them display as a menu,
Top level will be in the side bar
ability to optimize for SE.

So, apart from EZ-Pages and Define Pages, there is now the option of using the category/product structure. Does it fit into a separate sidebox so it can be styled separately?

I think I will explore this avenue too.

[shags38]

Many thanks for your response Glenn - much appreciated.

You seem not to know about some of the functionality available, and to be using some in a less than optimal manner.

Yes - that is the case. As someone not educated or trained in web development it really is a matter of trying to comprehend what some functions actually do, particularly with certain mods/plugins. It is probably why I ask so many questions in here, it really is a steep learning curve for us "oldies" My forte is marketing, not code (unfortunately).

I will certainly change product type to document-general to be rid of the add to cart boxes. I think I will stay with listing the articles in a product category that I want customers to find easily and actually read for now and put the SEO specific ones in E-Z pages using chapters which I have done in the past but deleted them from this method. I still find that the E-Z pages box lends itself to having things like this get "lost" - articles needs to be where visitors (shoppers) will look, i.e. near or in the categories box or in a box near specials (most will not browse the "also ran" text on the home page - they tend to head for what they came to find/see so it needs to be in their face - like candy at the checkout).

Can the Blank_Sidebox plugin be used for this purpose ?? if so, how? or create a second [clone] E-Z pages box maybe and specify it for Articles only and place it just under categories box?? Food for thought.

cheers,
Mike

[shags38]

If you want to use the category/product structure to deliver your articles, make the articles "document-general" type and they will have no pricing or add to cart features.

I tried this again but it will not work - items refuse to change from product general to documents general even though after saving there is a statement at the bottom saying products restricted to document-general whilst just above in the drop down box it keeps reverting to product general. This same thing happened to me many months ago before I decided to just live with it

cheers,
Mike

[gjh42]

Can the Blank_Sidebox plugin be used for this purpose ?? if so, how? or create a second [clone] E-Z pages box maybe and specify it for Articles only and place it just under categories box??

Yes, if you want a separate sidebox near the categories sidebox (and you want the ez-pages sidebox elsewhere), you can put a link to "Articles" in a blank sidebox. This PHP code will generate a correct ez-page link:

echo '<a href="' . zen_ez_pages_link(23) . '">Articles</a>'; 

or to insert into HTML code

<a href="<?php echo zen_ez_pages_link(23);?>">Articles</a>';

where 23 is replaced by the id of the ez-page you want.