How to access
To access the page, go to Site > Global Configuration or click the Global Configuration icon from the main control panel.
Description
The Global Configuration screen allows you to configure the Joomla! site with your personal settings.
Site
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Setting Groups
Site Settings
- Site Name. The name of the site.
- Site Offline. This setting shows when the site is offline. Only Administrators will be able to see the site when Site Offline is set to Yes. The default setting is No.
- Offline Message. The message that will be displayed on the site when the site is offline.
- Default Editor. The default editor to use when creating articles.
- Default Access Level. The default access level to the site.
- Default List Limit. The length of lists in the Control Panel for all Users. By default, this is set to 20.
- Default Feed Limit. The number of content items to be shown in the feed(s). By default, this is set to 10.
- Feed Email. Newsfeeds include the authors e-mail address. Select Author Email to use each author's email address. Select Site Email to include the 'Mail From' email address for each article.
Metadata Settings
- Site Meta Description. This is the description of the site which is indexed by search engine spiders.
- Site Meta Keywords. These keywords describe the site and are the basis for improving the ability of search engine spiders ability to index the site.
- Content Rights. Describe what rights others have to use this content.
- Show Title Meta Tag. It shows the Meta information of each article. This Meta information is used by search engine spiders when indexing the site. Each article can have its own Meta Data information (set under the Metadata Information pane when creating or editing an article).
- Show Author Meta Tag. It shows the Author Meta information for articles and is used by search engine spiders when indexing the site.
SEO Settings
SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization.
- Search Engine Friendly URLs. When set to Yes, URLs are rewritten to be more friendly for search engine spiders. For example, the URL: www.example.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=etc..., would turn into: www.example.com/alias. Most of the items created in Joomla! have an Alias box where a search engine friendly URL can be inserted. The default setting is No.
- Use Apache mod_rewrite. When set to Yes, Joomla! will use the mod_rewrite settings of Apache when creating search engine friendly URLs. Please note: it is advised that you do not modify any .htaccess file without an understanding of how it works. You must use the .htaccess file provided with Joomla! in order to use this setting. To use this file, rename the htaccess.txt file (found in the root directory) to .htaccess. By default, this setting is set to No.
- Adds Suffix to URL. When set to Yes, Joomla! will add .html to the end of the URLs. The default setting is No.
- Unicode aliases. Choose between transliteration and unicode aliases. Transliteration is default.
- Add Site Name To Page Titles. Appends the site name to all page titles. (This is what you see in your browser tab.)
Cookie Settings
- Cookie Domain. Domain to use when setting session cookies. precede with '.' to make valid for all subdomains. Example: .MyDomain.org
- Cookie Path. Path for which the cookie is valid.
System
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Setting Groups
System Settings
- Secret. This is generated when Joomla! is first installed and is not changeable. It is used internally by Joomla! for security purposes.
- Path to Log folder. The path where the logs should be stored. The Joomla! installer should automatically fill in this folder.
- Help Server. The place Joomla! looks for help information when you click the Help button (visible in many screens and options of the administration panel). By default, it uses Joomla!'s main help site.
Debug Settings
- Debug System. This will turn on the debugging system of Joomla!. When set to Yes, this tool will provide diagnostic information, language translations, and SQL errors. If any such issues or errors occur, they will be displayed at the bottom of each page, in both the front-end and back-end.
- Debug Language. This will turn on the debugging indicators (*...*) or (?...?) for the Joomla! Language files. Debug Language will work without the Debug System tool set to on. But it will not provide additional detailed references which would help in correcting any errors.
Cache Settings
- Cache Time. This setting sets the maximum length of time (in minutes) for a cache file to be stored before it is refreshed. The default setting is 15 minutes.
- Cache Handler. This setting sets how the cache operates. There is only one caching mechanism which is file-based.
Session Settings
- Session Lifetime. This setting sets how long a session should last and how long a user can remain signed in for (before logging them off for being inactive). The default setting is 15 minutes.
- Session Handler. This setting sets how the session should be handled once a user connects and logs into the site. The default setting is set to Database.
Server
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Setting Groups
Server Settings
- Path to Temp-folder. The path where files are temporarily stored. This is filled in by default when Joomla! is installed.
- GZIP Page Compression. Compressing pages typically increases your site's speed. The default setting is No.
- Error Reporting. This sets the appropriate level of reporting. The default setting is System Default.
- Force SSL. This setting forces the site access for selected areas under SSL (https). Note: you must have set already the server to use SSL. Options are:
- None. SSL is not activated
- Administrator Only. SSL is only valid for the backend.
- Entire Site. SSL is valid for the whole site (front- & backend).
Locale Settings
- Server Timezone. This tool sets the current date and time. The set time should be where the site's server is located. The default setting is (UTC 00:00) Western Europe Time, London, Lisbon, Casablanca.
FTP Settings
FTP stands for File Transfer Protocol. Most of these settings are set during the initial Joomla! installation.
- Enable FTP. This setting tells Joomla! to use it's built-in FTP function instead of the normal upload process used by PHP.
- FTP Host. The host server's URL connecting the FTP.
- FTP Port. The port where the FTP is accessed. The default setting is 21.
- FTP Username. The username that Joomla! will use when accessing the FTP server. Security recommendation: create another FTP user account to access a folder where files will be uploaded to.
- FTP Password. The password that Joomla! will use when accessing the FTP server. Security recommendation: create another FTP user account to access the folder where files will be uploaded to.
- FTP Root. The root directory where files should be uploaded to.
Database Settings
These settings are set during the initial setup of Joomla! It is advised to leave these settings the way they are, unless you have a good understanding of how databases work.
- Database Type. The type of databased to be used. The default setting is mysql, but this can be changed during the initial setup of Joomla!.
- Host. The hostname where the database is located. It is typically set to localhost for most servers. It is possible for the hostname to be located on a different server all together.
- Database Username. The username to access the database.
- Database Name. The name of the database.
- Database Prefix. The prefix used before the actual table's name. This allows you to have multiple Joomla! installations in the same database. The default setting is jos_, but this can be changed during initial setup of Joomla!.
Mail Settings
The mail settings are set during the initial setup of Joomla!. These settings can be changed whenever needed.
- Mailer. This setting sets which mailer to use to deliver emails from the site. The default setting is PHP Mail Function. This can be changed during the initial setup of Joomla!.
- From E-mail. The email address used by Joomla! to send site email.
- From Name. The name Joomla! will use when sending site emails. By default, Joomla! uses the site name during the initial setup.
- Sendmail Path. The path where the Sendmail program is located. This is typically filled in by Joomla! during the initial setup. This path is only used if Mailer is set to Sendmail.
- SMTP Authentication. If the SMTP server requires authentication to send mail, set this to Yes. Otherwise leave it at No. This is only used if Mailer is set to Sendmail.
- SMTP Security. Select the security modle your SMTP server uses - Default is None. Options are SSL and TTL.
- SMTP Port. Most unsecure servers use port 25 and most secure servers use port 465.
- SMTP Username. The username to use for access to the SMTP host. This is only used if Mailer is set to Sendmail.
- SMTP Password. The password to use for access to the SMTP host. This is only used if Mailer is set to Sendmail.
- SMTP Host. The SMTP address to use when sending mail. This is only used if Mailer is set to Sendmail.
Permissions
Permissions are new to Joomla! 1.6 Joomla! version 1.6 will install with the same familiar back-end permissions as that of version 1.5. However, with 1.6, you can easily change these to suit the needs of your site.
The permissions for each action are inherited from the level above in the permission hierarchy and from a group's parent group. Let's see how this works. The top level for this is the entire site. This is set up in the Site->Global Configuration->Permissions, as shown below.
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You work on one Group at a time by opening the slider for that group. You change the permissions in the Select New Settings drop-down list boxes.
The options for each value are Inherited, Allowed, or Denied. The Calculated Setting column shows you the setting in effect. It is either Not Allowed (the default), Allowed, or Denied.
Note that the Calculated Setting column is not updated until you press the Save button in the toolbar. To check that the settings are what you want, press the Save button and check the Calculated Settings column.
Setting Groups
The first thing to notice are the nine Actions: Site Login, Admin Login, Super Admin, Access Component, Create, Delete, Edit, Edit State. and Edit Own. These are the actions that a use can perform on an object in Joomla. The specific meaning of each action depends on the context. For the Global Configuration screen, they are defined as follows:
- Site Login
- Login to the front end of the site
- Admin Login
- Login to the back end of the site
- Super Admin
- Grants the user "super user" status. Users with this permission can do anything on the site. Only users with this permission can change Global Configuration settings (this screen). These permissions cannot be restricted. It is important to understand that, if a user is a member of a Super Admin group, any other permissions assigned to this user are irrelevant. The user can do anything action on the site. However, Access Levels can still be assigned to control what this group sees on the site. (Obviously, a Super Admin user can change Access Levels if they want to, so Access Levels do not totally restrict what a Super Admin user can see.)
- Access Component
- Open the component manger screens (User Manager, Menu Manager, Article Manager, and so on)
- Create
- Create new objects (for example, users, menu items, articles, weblinks, and so on)
- Delete
- Delete existing objects
- Edit
- Edit existing objects
- Edit State
- Change object state (Publish, Unpublish, Archive, and Trash)
There are two very important points to understand from this screen. The first is to see how the permissions can be inherited from the parent Group. The second is to see how you can control the default permissions by Group and by Action.
This provides a lot of flexibility. For example, if you wanted Shop Suppliers to be able to have the ability to login to the back end, you could just change their Admin Login value to "Allowed". If you wanted to not allow members of Administrator group to delete objects or change their state, you would change their permissions in these columns to Inherited (or Denied).
It is also important to understand that the ability to have child groups is completely optional. It allows you to save some time when setting up new groups. However, if you like, you can set up all groups to have Public as the parent and not inherit any permissions from a parent group.
For more information, please refer to:
Toolbar
At the top right you will see the toolbar:
The functions are:
- Save. Saves the item and stays in the edit screen.
- Save & Close. Saves the item and closes the edit screen.
- Cancel. Closes the Options window without applying changes.
- Help. Opens this Help Screen.
Quick Tips
- Most, if not all, of these settings can be set once and then left alone.
- If major modifications need to be made, then consider taking the site offline to test it and to make sure everything is in working order.
- The settings are saved in '<Joomla! root>/configuration.php'. You have to either activate the FTP-layer or make the 'configuration.php' file writable to save your changes.