In my previous article, I have discussed about  Polls components menu Day – 18 Today am going to write about the next component menu “Web Links”. Under Web Link there are two sub items – Web Links , Web Link Category Manager. Let’s start with the Web Links.

What is Web Link Manager?

The Web Links Manager allows you to add links to other web sites at your Joomla web site. You can add links to these sites by creating Web Link layouts in the Menu Item Manager – New/Edit.

How to Access

Select Components → Web Links → Links from the drop-down menu on the back-end of your Joomla! installation. Or select the ‘Links’ link from the Web Links Category Manager.

Column Headers

• #. An indexing number automatically assigned by Joomla! for ease of reference.

• Checkbox. Check this box to select one or more items. To select all items, check the box in the column heading. After one or more boxes are checked, click a toolbar button to take an action on the selected item or items. Many toolbar actions, such as Publish and Unpublish, can work with multiple items. Others, such as Edit, only work on one item at a time. If multiple items are checked and you press Edit, the first item will be opened for editing.

• Title. Web Link Title. Click on the Title to open the Web Link for editing.

• Published. Whether the item has been published or not. You can change the Published state by clicking on the icon in this column.

• Order. The order to display items. If the list is sorted by this column, you can change the order by clicking the arrows or by entering the sequential order and clicking ‘Save Order’. Note that the display order on a page is set in the Parameters – Advanced section for each Menu Item. If that order is set to use something other than ‘Order’ (for example, ‘Title – Alphabetical’), then the order value in this screen will be ignored. If the Menu Item Order parameter is set to use ‘Order’, then the items will display on the page based on the order in this screen.

• Category. The Category this Web Link belongs to. Clicking on the Category title opens the Category for editing. See Web Links Category Manager – Edit.

• Hits. The number of hits for this Web Link. A hit is the number of times a page has been viewed.

• ID. The ID number. This is a unique identification number for this item assigned automatically by Joomla!. It is used to identify the item internally, for example in internal links. You can not change this number.

• Display #. The number of items to display on one page. If there are more items than this number, you can use the page navigation buttons (Start, Prev, Next, End, and page numbers) to navigate between pages. Note that if you have a large number of items, it may be helpful to use the Filter options, located above the column headings, to limit which items display (where applicable).

Toolbar

At the top right you will see the toolbar:

• Publish. To publish one or more items, select them and click on this button.

• Unpublish. To unpublish one or more items, select them and click on this button.

• Delete. To delete one or more items, select them and click this button. The selected items will be deleted. Note: only empty items can be deleted.

• Edit. Select one item and click on this button to open it in edit mode. If you have more than one item selected (where applicable), the first item will be opened. You can also open an item for editing by clicking on its Title or Name.

• New. Click on this button to create a new item. You will enter the New page for this item.

• Parameters. Click this button to open the Global Configuration window. This window allows you to set default parameters for this type of item. See Global Configuration.

• Help. Opens this Help Screen.

Global Configuration

Click the Parameters button to open the Web links Global Configuration window as shown below. These parameters are the default values for Web Links. These setting can be overridden with settings in the Menu Item Manager – New/Edit / Parameters – Component for Web Links screen.

• Save. Press Save to save your settings.

• Cancel. Press Cancel to cancel your changes.

• Description. Show or Hide the Web Links Introduction below.

• Web Links Introduction. Optional text to display above the first Category on the Web Link Category List Layout.

• Hits. Whether to Hide or Show the number of hits for each Web Link.

• Link Descriptions. Hide or Show the Link Description for each Web Link.

• Other Categories. Show also other categories. Note: there must be at least one item assigned in the other category/categories to show it!

• Table Headings. Hide or Show column headings above the fields for the item.

• Target. How to open the link. Options are:
  • Parent Window with Browser Navigation. Open the link in the current browser window, allowing Back and Forward navigation.
  • New Window with Browser Navigation. Open the link in a new browser window, allowing Back and Forward navigation.
  • New Window without Browser Navigation. Open link in a new browser window, not allowing Back and Forward navigation.

• Icon. The Icon to be displayed to the left of the Web Links URL. Select an image file from the drop-down list box. The images are listed from the ‘images/M_images’ folder.

List Filters

Filter by Partial Title

You can filter the list of items by typing in part of the Title or the ID number. Or you can select a combination of Category and Published State.

• Filter. In the upper left corner just above the column headings is a Filter field and two buttons, as shown above in figure.
• If you have a large number of items on the list, you can use this filter to find the desired item(s) quickly. Enter either part of the title or an ID number and press ‘Go’ to display the matching items. You can enter in whole words or part of a word. For example, “ooml” will match all titles with the word “Joomla!” in them.

Filter by Category and Published State

In the upper right area, above the column headings, are 2 drop-down list boxes as shown above in figure.

The selections may be combined. Only items matching both selections will display in the list.

• Select Category. Use the drop-down list box to select the desired Category. Only items in this Category will display.

• Select State. Use the drop-down list box to select the published state: Published or Unpublished. For Articles, you may also select Archived.

Quick Tips

• You need to add at least one Category for Web Links before you can add your first Web Link. Categories are added using the Web Link Category Manager.