*bump* not be a nuisance, but this is holding up a large project for me ;)

if this isn't possible, I need to switch management systems. Thanks..

I don't know of a way to do this. That's not to say that it's not possible. Anything is possible if you're willing and able to edit core files, but I don't know of an easy way to do this.

In the cvs build, i have my categories like so:

Main1
 Sub1
  SubSub1
  SubSub2
 Sub2
  SubSub1
  SubSub2
Main2
 Sub1
  SubSub1

You get the idea, and when i do a post i check one of each sub-sub categories....

Is this what you were asking?

This has actually been a frustration for me, but the other way around. My experience is when you post in a sub-cat, it'll only appear within the sub-cat and not the Main-cat. (Which is, I think, what you want).

Just give it a test and let us know.

Hope this helps.

Thanks for the replies!

Here's the test url I'm having problems with. I'm setting up a site for a woman who is constantly adding new articles and I *really* don't have time to edit hundreds of html pages. Who does, right?

So, I thought I could create a blog for her, and she could just add new articles in a sub-category.

This particular one (http://aolff.org/aolff.org/b2evolution/blogs/index.php?blog=5)
I want to have the text that's under 'Spare the Rod' appear on the main page of the Category, and ONLY that text.

Then I wanted to have the various articles (right now, a total of 7) under that as subcategories.

So the blog is 'Home' and I want certain text only in the Category 'Spare the Rod' then other text only in the subcategories (like the 'Now What' article - I don't want that appearing on my main category page.)

Does that make sense?

I'm on my first cup of coffee so this may all be gibberish.

So it should be

Home
Spare the Rod (intro text to the category)
Now What
Another Article
Another Article

Instead, what I have is
Home
Spare the Rod (intro text to the category)(AND the text to the sub-articles)
Now What
Another Article
Another Article

Thanks!

Then I wanted to have the various articles (right now, a total of 7) under that as subcategories.

Um... nope! There are only two posts in the 4 blogs you've got linked in your top-left sidebar. "Now What" is a multi-page post with 3 pages, and "Spare" is a multi-page post with 5 pages. In that blog there are only 2 categories (spare, and now - which is a sub-cat of spare) and each of those categories has only one post each.

Big difference between multi-page posts and cats/sub-cats!

BTW is there a reason there is no linkback to b2evolution? You don't need it, but then again no one *needs* to take time to answer questions either.

If you just add, below Home,

<a href="http://b2evolution.net" title=" This really great blog engine, which is free for the world to use ">b2evolution</a>

things will become much more clear. ;)

Or maybe, even, down where there's currently a restrictive copyright, you could add the courtesy backlink to the open source software.

well - there's no backlink there because the site isn't live yet :)

Once the site gets up and running, there certainly will be. I plan to place it under the copyright for the content.

That is, providing of course, that I can make it post how I need it to.

You'll notice the copyright changes from page to page right now - that's because a friend let me borrow her template.

Edited to Change:

I don't mind mucking around in the source code if I need to. Since I obviously don't know what I'm doing :D I can't possibly make it any worse, right? I'm up for hacks, workarounds, whatever you can give me.

Thanks....

Cool @ backlink, as it's a common courtesy thing.

I can see that you're fiddling with the organization, since I last looked.

You can really have whatever you want, but it's just difficult (when you're starting out) to know what the "best way" is (and how it fits into what you want to do).

Know that blog #1 is a special blog (aggregator) that will post (in chronological order) stuff from any other blog number. A lot of people put it as their front page, a way to have the "latest and greatest" from each of the blogs, shown in one place. A lot of other people (ours included), hide blog 1 from public view.

It looks like you've made "Home" a blog (#2). That seems a tad strange to me, as I generally think of home as [back to the starting point] and would make it a non-b2evo link that does just that.

Right now, your base url seems (also) a tad strange http://aolff.org/aolff.org/b2evolution/blogs/ ... not sure why you have the aolff.org in there twice but you CAN move the starting point to a more logical place (like maybe http://aolff.org/articles or something).

I tend to use index.php as my "home" starting point, as it keeps the url shorter.

First question I'd ask myself is "how is this going to fit in with the current aolff.org site? Is b2evo going to be just a link on the sidebar or is it the goal to drive the whole site?

[*Looks at aolff.org main site for the first time*]

Ahh ... looks like you're wanting b2evo to drive the whole site.

I would think, off the top of my head, that the most simple approach would be (like you're starting to do) just make categories of the menu items currently on the front page. [ home ] [ sitemap ] etc.

b2evo puts them into an alphabetical list (by default), though there are ways to change this behavior. for now, i'd just name them "a) Home" "b) Site Map", etc. to get the correct order out-of-the box and play with a fancier method, later.

Sub categories could be used like the menu sub-cats "Now What?", "Hebrews 12", just like they are now. Just make certain that when you make a post in "Now What", only check the "Now What" cat (button, not checkbox) and no others. Then, those article(s) in "What Now" won't show up when you click it's parent cat "Spare the Rod".

You can even add the expanding menu thing to b2evo category lists, like you have now, though it does require visitors to have javascript. (I'd advise if you do this, make sure that it defaults to a regular, fully-expanded list, if JS is turned off).

Off the top of my head though, I can say there's no reason why you can't have a b2evolution-driven site that looks EXACTLY like what you have now on aolff.org (plus extra features ... search, archive list, comments IF you want them) AND more flexibility to add new articles to-boot.

I'd do it all in one blog.

Hope this helps.

Thanks, that does help :)

Doing it all as one blog will work, although it does leave everything appearing on my main page, too, right now.

Yes, I want b2evo to drive the whole site :) And that's why I'm not as concerned about copyrights and backlinks right now, or the rest of the mangled mess it is. Once I move everything to the top of my site it will all be kosher :)

The person who lent me their skin *does* know what she's doing, so I'll run this post by her and let her help me with the bits that are still giving me trouble.

I wish, wish, wish there was some way to check *only* a sub-category to post in. Right now, Main stays checked, and then I choose the subcategory.

Anyone have a magic wand to make it be so?

On my site (1.6 in dutch - www.hungryfeelings.be) I can only cross 1 category.
in the file _admin.php I put

$allow_cross_posting = 0;

and thats it.

Even if I want to, I can not cross 2 categories at once.

reb_76,

I am very confused by your comment reb_76 wrote:

I wish, wish, wish there was some way to check *only* a sub-category to post in. Right now, Main stays checked, and then I choose the subcategory.

Let me see if I can give you an example, to illustrate.

Let's say you have a parent category called "cars" and two sub-categories under that "Ford" and "Chevy".

When you go to write a post, you need to select the category(ies) for that post. You indicate which will be the "main" (can only be one, MUST be one - but can be either a parent category or a sub-category) and which are "extra" (can be many extras).

You SHOULD be able to select "Ford" as your main and NOTHING as your extra. (This, I think, is what you want).

If a visitor were to click on the parent category "cars" on your page, the new "Ford" post, wouldn't be show up. Someone would have to click "Ford", before all the posts marked with "Ford" as "main" and [nothing] as "extra", would show up.

(If you wanted posts to be seen when you select "cars" OR "Ford", you would have needed to select "cars" as your "extra" category, when you first made the post, and "Ford" as your main category).

Am I missing something here or is this not what you want to do?

ok....this is what's happening to me.

I can make it appear in just the sub-category when I do it all as one blog.

So I have my 'Home', then I have a category 'Spare the Rod', then I have a sub-cat 'Now What."

It appears in 'Now What" AND 'Home' - the main page of my blog. That's what I'm trying to avoid. I want the text for 'Now What' to appear *only in that sub-category* and not in both the sub-category and the Main page.

I'm sorry to be so frustrating - usually I'm more articulate. But I'm speaking a whole new language here, too :D

Thanks for the patience and help...

OKAY, I *think* I understand your difficulties.

Right now at [url=http://aolff.org/aolff.org/b2evolution/blogs/index.php?blog=2]this page[/url], which is your blog 2, I see two navigational boxes on the left.

The upper one (Home/SiteMap) are called blogLists, each being a different blog (Home=2 and SiteMap=3).

Unless you plan on having multiple blogs, I'd turn those off. (Go to the back office -> Blogs Tab -> Pick Blog #2 "Home" and uncheck "Display Public Blog List"). This should get rid of those multi-blog options.

(Essentially, your HOME blog link that you just got rid of, displays ALL of the categories at one time and is equal to the "All" link in your category list). They both go to the same URL "index.php?blog=2"

NEXT, I'd elect not to have that "ALL" link in your category list (you can do this by editing the _categories.php file in your /skins/[skin your using] folder). Right near the top of the file, around line 17, you should be able to remove the "All" and just leave that variable empty (two double quotes).

NOW, I'd create a NEW category and call it "a_Home" (the a just so that it's alphabetical and first on the list ... we can work on that later, as it's a tad more involved).

In the Home category, you can post the whole "Welcome to AOLFF.org" thing. This will now be your "home" page, where you point people to when they land on the site. The URL isn't pretty, at the moment, but we can fix that later.

There's your page and menu (you can even get rid of the "Categories" heading, rename it to "menu" or just delete it alltogether.

What this does is make your HOME PAGE a "home page category" (showing the posts in one category) rather than an "entire blog" (which shows all the posts, in all the categories, all at once).

You'll have three custom issues you'll probably want to deal with:

1) Ordering your menu the way you want (without the a, b, c to force the correct alphabetical order)
2) a nicer front page url (can use htaccess for this)
3) Styling the menu

Hope this helps. (This is how I'd handle it, at first blush). If anyone else has ideas, feel free to chime in. ;)

AHA! EUREKA! and all the other things one shouts when they see light at the end of the tunnel :)

That does make sense, and I'm attempting to sort it out now.

What I'm seeing on line 17 is this
if(!isset($cat_all)) $cat_all = /* TRANS: All categories, skin's categories list */ T_('All'); // Set to empty to hide

When I try to follow your instructions (as I understand them, bearing in mind I'm utterly unfamiliar with PHP!!) I see this:
if(!isset($cat_all)) $cat_all = /* TRANS: All categories, skin's categories list */ T_(""); // Set to empty to hide
However, that make no difference on my category list - the 'All' is still there. Am I doing it wrong?
I admit that as a distinct possibility ;)

also - when I look at my main_php file, this is what I see under categories.
<?php // -------------------------- CATEGORIES INCLUDED HERE -----------------------------
// Call the Categories plugin:
$Plugins->call_by_code( 'evo_Cats', array( // Add parameters below:
) );
// -------------------------------- END OF CATEGORIES ---------------------------------- ?>

ummm....like I said, I know almost nothing about php. But does that actually call the _category.php file?

me again - I dug around and found the plugin that it calls.

but I can't make it edit out the 'All' portion. :(

I know I'm doing something wrong, but I've no idea what!!

reb_76,

Sorry, that's my fault. I assumed that you were using an earlier version, but you're really using version 1.6 alpha. I see that now.

OKAY ... the goal is the same, but the method is a tad different. (The category list was made to be a "plugin", for version 1.6, which makes it a lot easier for users to add/delete/modify).

Forget my earlier instructions and do this instead:

Open the _main.php file and go to the code you posted last (CATEGORIES INCLUDED HERE). You'll want to add a few keys to the "Add parameters below:" part ...

<?php // -------------------------- CATEGORIES INCLUDED HERE ----------------------------- 
// Call the Categories plugin: 
$Plugins->call_by_code( 'evo_Cats', array( // Add parameters below: 
'title' => '',
'option_all' => '',
) ); 
// -------------------------------- END OF CATEGORIES ---------------------------------- ?> 

By setting 'title" and 'option_all' to be two single quotes, you're overriding the default, which is '<h3>'.T_('Categories').'</h3>' and T_('All'), respectively.

The T_() function is a translation function, which means that "All" is translated into the various languages, and the function that allows b2evo to be multilingual. ;)

If you want to see ALL the settings you can change for this plugin, open up the /plugins/_categories.plugin.php file and near the top, is a list of the settable keys and what their defaults are. ;)

Sorry about the confusion. (This new version you're working on, 1.6 is a major leap ahead in programming. It's written to be object-oriented, allows plugins and really is a brand new, more powerful engine for b2evolution.) It's also significantly different than earlier versions and makes supporting it here in the forums more difficult, as it becomes important to know exactly WHICH version of b2evo people are using.

This should solve the problem and get you back on track.

Cheers.

what - you mean I should have let you know exactly what I was running? :O I'm sorry - I honestly forgot I was running that version.

I had the latest stable release, and my friend told me that I really, really wanted to use 1.6 instead. So I am...but I got confused. :(

Ok...off to try the other way 'round :)

Thanks again for the help...

Ok, you're a genius :D Amazing what you can do with the proper info, eh?

Thanks!

Ok...now onto another question - can I make the sub-cats visible only on the page of the Category?

So instead of seeing 'Now What' , etc on every page, you'd only see it if you clicked on the Category 'Spare the Rod?

Or am I asking for the moon again? ;)

Are you talking about a collapsing menu? Where you have this list in the sidebar:

CATEGORIES:
Parent Cat #1
Parent Cat #2
Parent Cat #3

Then when you click "Parent Cat #1", the list expands to show the sub-cats?

CATEGORIES:
Parent Cat #1
- sub-cat a
- sub-cat b
- sub-cat c
Parent Cat #2
Parent Cat #3

Kinda like your main page is now?

I'm going to be out of pocket today, so don't think I've abandoned you. ;)

Thanks - and yes, that's exactly what I'm looking for. So I'll wait patiently until you come back and we can fix it.

In the meantime, I'm going to work on transferring the articles on over and I'll move it to the front of my site (http:aolff.org)

Then, if you still have time and patience, we can work on prettying up menus and such.

I do so appreciate it :D

Is there a way to do the same with Version 1.8.2 of B2Evo?
I also want to display only the posts of one category if I go on the blog and want useres to see other posts of other categories by clicking on the category.