Foreword
This is written for those will little to no computer experience and want to manage (as publisher) of their own site created by someone else. Also, since this article is a bit on the long side, let's use an index:Intro to Joomla! Management
Articles
Navigating the Articles Manager
Create an Article
Other Sources (that might be of help)
Intro to Joomla! Management
Joomla! is, by definition, content management system that builds web pages. If you have never heard of that mumbo-jumbo, great; it will actually make it easier for you to learn how to use it. It differs wildly from traditional web design which can make it very simple for a non-techie to manage the content of their own siteWhen I talk about content, I mean everything that you want to say to your customer. So that includes any text, pictures, videos, links to affiliates, ways to contact you, and so on. Now that does not mean that I plan on leaving you in the dark to fend for yourself, but there are certain aspects that you will be able to manage in no time at all.
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Articles
Think of your website as a newspaper. In a newspaper, all the blocks of text are called articles right? Or full page advertisements, but that is another tutorial. So when you are looking at your site, every block of text (usually in its own square) is an article. You can have many articles on a page, or just one. The page that you see when you open your site is called the front page. Simple name? Yes, but still keeps in line with the news paper analogy.Articles would be something you would use to communicate events to your reader. That could be time that you are not taking clients. “We will have our doors closed from 20 Dec – 3 Jan in preparation for Christmas and the New Year.” Or you could be announcing a special event that you are professionally affiliated with. Keep in mind that everyone, not just people you know, will be able to see what you post. There are ways to only allow certain people to see some information (logins) which will be covered later.
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Navigating the Articles Manager
Now down to the meat of working with an article. Fist off you need to be logged into the backend/administrative section of your Joomla! site. If you do not know how to do this, contact your webmaster or site admin for the link and your username/password. You will be faced with the main dashboard in which you will want to click on the Article Manager.
All these buttons will only work on those articles that you have selected. You can select as many or as few articles as you want.
- Unarchive - recover something from the archives
- Archive - think of this as long-term storage. Mostly technical, it is like putting your article in a notebook, in a crate, in the basement. It is still there, it is just not readily available. Only really of use if you have some old content that you know you will not need for a long time, but would still be good to keep around.
- Publish – Just like the newspaper, this means that the article you have created is ready for other people to see or to be published.
- Unpublish – unlike a real newspaper, you can remove an article even after it has been shown to the world. You may unpublish articles for many reasons to include things that you did not want released in the first place (and did by accident) or events that have long since passed and your customers no longer need to be aware of.
- Move - Used to change the section and category of an article. Kind of like moving an article about a downtown parade from the local entertainment section to the front page of the newspaper.
- Copy - Just like your computer, you want to copy this article. You might use this to start off with an article that was used to announce an event last year and you want to re-post it with different dates and some more information. It can save you a ton of typing sometimes.
- Trash - Delete an article that you will never need again. There is no undo from this so be careful!
- Edit - Change the article.
- New* - Create a new article
- Parameters – change configuration settings. As a publisher, you will not have to change this too often if ever.
- Help* - might give you some useful advice from the people who made Joomla! Good place to start with help on this page.
Outlined in Blue: This is where all the articles that you (or others) have created for your site. This will navigate a little like your email.
- # - just a number to help keep things straight.
- The BOX – the checkbox to select an article
- Title – a hyperlinked title of your article. Click this and you open the article in edit mode. This is the fast way to open an article for you to read/edit.
- Published – If this is a green check, somebody will be able to see it on the site.
- Front Page – indicates if this article is one of the first things that people see when they visit your site.
- Order – up and down arrows to arrange your articles on their respective pages. The textbox will let you just type the order. Both options complete the same task. One may be quicker for you than the other.
- Access Level – is this open for the public to see or will your visitors need to log in first?
- Section – The section that this article is a part of
- Category – The Category that this article is a part of under a given section
- Author – Who wrote this article
- Date – When it was written
- Hits – The number of times it has been viewed
- ID – Used only for the database to keep track of things.
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Create an Article
To create a new article, click the new button at the top-right of the Article Manager page. This is the simplest part and is much like creating an email.- Create a title. This is what will be shown at the top of your article and should summarize what you are writing about in 5 words or less.
- Skip the alias. You could fill this in, but for beginners, the auto-generated on the that the site creates should work fine.
- What section does this belong to? Think entertainment, sports, local events and other general categories.
- Publish. Do you want to publish now or later?
- Front Page. Do you want this to be the first thing that your customers want to see?
- Category. Think Basketball, Football and Soccer
- Now the actual article!
There are parameters on the right side that you can go through if you would like although the default options would work well for most people.
Once you are done, click the Save button and you are done.
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