Site Modules: Articles - Newsflash

Description

The Article Newsflash module type will display a fixed number of Articles from a specific Category or a set of Categories.

How to Access

• Select System → Manage Panel → Site Modules from the Administrator menu. Then...
  • To create a new module: select the New button from the Toolbar. Then...
    • Select the required module type.
  • To edit an existing module:
    • Find the module in the list of installed modules and select the title link in the Title column.

Screenshot

Form Fields

• Title: Module must have a title

Module Tab

Left Panel

• Category: Select Articles from a specific Category or a set of Categories. If no selection will show all categories as default.
• Show Images: (Yes/No). Display Article images.
• Show Article title: (Yes/No). Show/hide Article title.
• Linked Titles: (Use Global/No/Yes). Link the Article titles to Articles.
• Header Level: (h1/h2/h3/h4/h5). Select the desired HTML header level for the Article titles.
• Show last separator: (Yes/No). Show separator after last Article.
• 'Read more...' Link: (Show/Hide). If set to Show, the 'Read more...' link will show if Main text has been provided for an Article.
• Number of Articles: The number of Articles to display within this module.
• Featured Articles: (Show/Hide/Only show Featured Articles). Show/Hide Articles designated as Featured.
• Order Results: (Published Date/Created Date/Ordering/Random). Select the order in which you want query results presented.
• Direction: (Descending/Ascending). The order the result will be displayed.

Right Panel

• Title. The title of the module. This is also the title displayed for the module depending on the Show Title Form Field

• Show Title. (Show/Hide) Choose whether to show or hide the modules title in the front end. The title will be the one in the Form Field above.

• Position. Choose the module position you wish this module to be displayed in. A custom module position can be entered for use with the load position plugin or the position button can be pressed to select a module position from the template.

• Status. The published status of the item.

• Access. The viewing Access Level for this item.

• Module Ordering. This shows a drop down of every module in the position that the current module is in. This is the order that the modules will display in when displayed on in the front end as well as in the Modules page.

• Start Publishing. Date and time to start publishing. Use this field if you want to enter content ahead of time and then have it published automatically at a future time.

• Finish Publishing. Date and time to finish publishing. Use this field if you want to have content automatically changed to Unpublished state at a future time (for example, when it is no longer applicable).

• Language. Item language.

• Note. This is normally for the site administrator's use (for example, to document information about this item) and does not show in the Frontend of the site.

Menu Assignment Tab

• Module Assignment. Select On All Pages, No Pages, Only on the pages selected or On all pages except those selected from the List.

• Menu Selection. If the latter two options are selected a list will show all of the menu items. This allows you to assign modules to some but not all pages, and by selecting the menu links that you want the module associated with you can customize on what pages modules appear/don't appear. See How do you assign a module to specific pages? for more information.

Advanced Tab

• Layout. If you have defined one or more alternative layouts for a module either in the template or Joomla! Core, you can select the layout to use for this module.
• Module Class. A suffix applied to the CSS class of the Module. This allows you to create customized CSS styles that will apply just to this module. You would then modify the "user.css" file of your template to apply styling to this new class. Enter this parameter with a leading space to create a new CSS class for this module. Enter the parameter without a leading space to change the CSS class name for this module.
• Automatio Title. Yes/No.
• Caching. Use Global/No Caching. Whether or not to cache the content of this Module. A setting of "Use Global" will use the Cache Settings from the Global Configuration screen.
• Cache Time. The number of seconds for which to cache the item locally. It can safely be left at the default.
• Module Tag. The HTML tag for the module to be placed in. By default this is a div tag but other HTML5 elements can also be used.
• Bootstrap Size. (Values 0 to 12) This allows you to choose the width of the module via the span element built into bootstrap.
• Header Tag. The HTML tag to use for the modules header or title. This can be an h1, h2, h3, h4, h5, h6 or a p tag. Note that you must use a module style (chrome) of html5 or add your custom module styles in <mytemplate>/html/modules.php.
• Header Class. Here you can add optional CSS classes to add to the modules header or title element.
• Module Style. You can use this option to override the templates style for its position.

Permission Tabs

To change the permissions, do the following.

• Select the Group by clicking its title located on right.
• Find the desired Action. Possible Actions are:
  • Delete. Users can delete the module.
  • Edit. Users can edit the module.
  • Edit State. User can change the published state and related information for the module.
• Select the desired permission for the action you wish to change. Possible settings are:
  • Inherited. Inherited for users in this Group from the Global Configuration, Article Manager Options, or Category permissions.
  • Allowed. Allowed for users in this Group. Note that, if this action is Denied at one of the higher levels, the Allowed permission here will not take effect. A Denied setting cannot be overridden.
  • Denied. Denied for users in this Group.
• Select Save in the Toolbar. When the screen refreshes, the Calculated Setting column will show the effective permission for this Group and Action.

Toolbar

At the top of the page you will see the toolbar shown in the Screenshot above. The functions are:

• Save. Saves the item and stays in the current screen.

• Save & Close. Saves the item and closes the current screen.

• Save & New. Saves the item and keeps the editing screen open and ready to create another item.

• Save as Copy. Saves your changes to a copy of the current item. Does not affect the current item. This toolbar icon is not shown if you are creating a new item.

• Close. Closes the current screen and returns to the previous screen without saving any modifications you may have made. This toolbar icon is not shown if you are creating a new item.

• Help. Opens this help screen.

Front End Screenshot

Example Front End Site images are generic images using Joomla! core installation supplied free Front End Templates. The actual view can depend on the installed custom template used and the template's style for those views on a Joomla! website.

Articles Newsflash module shown:

The Module Type name for this Module is "mod_articles_newsflash". It is related to the content component.