Thread: Creating a custom Page

Hi everyone.

I am needing to learn how to create custom pages for my dolphin site.

I have different music genres/styles for each mp3 that is uploaded and i want every music genre/style to have its own 'home page'. I do not want to use the admin's page builder as it doesn't reach the requirements that I need for this to work. If anyone has any help or maybe a copy of the unofficial dolphin manual (for mod trade) then that will be create!

Thanks a lot guys.

Pedro

We don't usually use the Page Editor - it is too limited as often you want to do even more on a page, and it is best to have a dedicated .php page, and in some cases, template and css, for this. Also, there are issues with the Dolphin page editor, in regards to html parsing and so on - which is not an issue using a page generated as described below.

Copy a simple page (like contact.php) to, for example, newpagename.php

If you need a custom template page, then

edit newpagename.php, change the value for below, to perhaps
$_page['name_index'] = 500;


and copy /public_html/templates/tmpl_uni/default.html to /public_html/templates/tmpl_uni/page_500.html, for example.

If you change the value of $_page['name_index'] and dont create the new template, when the system can not find it, it will just use default.html

If you need a custom css, you would do the same with
$_page['css_name'] = 'sample.css';
and copy / edit / use, for example
newpagename.css

In the sample.php page, you will see how it requires new lang string entries for
$_page['header'] = _t( "_SAMPLE_H" );
$_page['header_text'] = _t( "_SAMPLE_H1" );
return DesignBoxContent( _t( "_SAMPLE_H1" ), _t( "_SAMPLE" ),

And put these in the lang database, using the admin panel lang editor

Smoge

thanks a lot smoge.. That has made things a little more clearer in mind. Sorry to hastle you more,, then why do we use inc.php files (and inc/classes) files. I know they play a big part in it all.

Well - in this way - you end up with a "dedicated page" for your new page - you can do with it what you want... and if additional functions are needed, you can add the related include files to the require_once statements.

Is there other ways to do it? Perhaps - but this way is clean and direct.

Smoge

Thanks Smoge. Great help. Things are a bit more clearer now. My final question.

For my page_(number) what would need to be in it (for a standard page)?

Thanks,

Pedro

PS how do i prevent this from appearing (and replace it with my content) __page_main_code__

Originally Posted by peterWAKA

For my page_(number) what would need to be in it (for a standard page)?

You can give it any unused number... currently, Dolphin default pages use lower numbers... so we usually use 500, 501, 502... or even 800,801, and so on.

I have not tried it - but one of my coders says you can use a name also... something like

page_test123 and have a page_test123.html

You can try it - it maybe less confusing when you are re-visiting your code later.

Smoge

I'm begining to make a little progress now. Not as easy as it seems. If anyone has any tips please let me know.

How do I get rid of "__page_main_code__" and add blocks?

To add blocks, you need to make sure the code that supports those blocks are available to the php file (via require_once) , the proper SQL statements and so on are there, and place the tags in your template to call the blocks.

Start with something simple, like

function getBlockCode_News
in addition to
news.inc.php

Smoge

Ok 2 things.

Firstly I found a good page on the BoonEx site:
GenDolFAQs - Dolphin - Trac

which gives a bit of help for those who wish to start their own page.

Secondly, Thanks for all your help so far Smoge, but I'v another question.
I want to save all my content on my database and let the script refer to that certain record on my database.

How do I do this. I tried to look at other pages for some ideas but I'm gettng no where.

Cheers
Pedro