simplelayout.base 2.1.1

Introduction

SimpleLayout provides an intuitive way of adding and arranging the different elements of a page such as paragraphs, images, files and links using drag-and-drop functionality. These elements are implemented as addable and easily arrangeable “blocks”. Because of the restricted dimensions of text, images and other content elements, the general result is content with a uniform look and feel throughout the site.

How to use SimpleLayout

Check out our new video section on plone.org: http://plone.org/products/simplelayout.base/documentation

1.) Add a new Page from the “Add new” dropdown.

In this page one can now add the following page elements:

• File

• Image

• Link

• Page

• Paragraph

2.) Add a new Paragraph from the “Add new” dropdown:

• Provide a title for the new paragraph (not required) and check “Show Title” to determine whether the paragraph title will appear in the page’s body text.

• Provide body text for the paragraph.(Of course one could use this first paragraph to provide the text for the whole page, but that would defeat the purpose of having easily arrangeable “blocks” of text and other page elements)

Image tab:

• Browse for an image and provide a caption and alternative text.

• Determine whether the image is “clickable”, i.e. whether the image source can be opened in a new tab. If collective.greybox is installed, it will use greybox to show the image.

Settings tab:

• Provide keywords/tags for categorization purposes.

• Specify “Related Items”: If the “teaser” box is checked, related items of this paragraph will be displayed underneath the paragraph.

• Provide “Creators” (Persons responsible for creating the content of this item).

• Allow comments.

• Determine whether this paragraph should be included in the site navigation (by default it is not included).

When saving the paragraph, one is redirected to the edit tab of the parent page. Here one is presented with the option of editing the page as a whole, or editing one of the sub-elements of the page. The layout of the recently added paragraph can be further manipulated using the layout icons in the top panel of the that paragraph. The paragraph can also easily be deleted from here, or its order in the page changed using the “ordering” arrow icons in its top panel (will be removed, you should use the drag’n’drop funtionality).

3.) Add an Image to the page from the “Add new” dropdown:

• Browse for an image and provide alternative text. The Title is used as the image caption.

4.) Add a File to the page from the “Add new” dropdown:

• Browse for and add a file (for example a pdf). The file download link will be displayed in the page content.

5.) Add a Link to the page from the “Add new” dropdown:

• Specify an external link, which will be displayed in the page.

6.) Add another page: The parent page acts as a container in which sub pages can be added. These will appear in the site navigation.

Simplelayout provides the following features:

simplelayout.base

• Base functions

• Base layout rendering

• Base block actions

• Base viewlets - one column - two columns - two columns with one column on top - controls

• configlet - simplelayout is completely configurable TTW, including image sizes and column dimensions

• design menu - choose between the different designs/layouts

• includes block configuration adapters - all block configs such as layout, image sizes, block height etc, will be saved in an adapter (annotations) for every block

• upgrade steps

• base JS functions - align to grid (for two columns designs only) - helper functions

• New scales for atct image field (requires zope restart)

For more information check simplelayout dependencies: * simplelayout.ui.base * simplelayout.types.common * simplelayout.ui.dragndrop

FAQ

This FAQ provides some technical information/answers.

Q:

After reinstall I lose my configlet configuration?

A:

Do not reinstall simplelayout.base using QI, but rather use portal_setup import steps. Because the configlet data is stored in a local utility, in the event of a reinstallation the utility will be removed (all data is gone) and added again with default values. The following example shows how to change the sl configlet default values with setuphandlers in a policy package.

imports:

from zope.component import getUtility
from simplelayout.base.interfaces import IBlockConfig
from simplelayout.base.configlet.interfaces import ISimplelayoutConfiguration

config.py:

SL_CONFIGURATION = {'same_workflow' : True,
                    'show_design_tab' : True,
                    'small_size' : 145,
                    'middle_size' : 302,
                    'full_size' : 614,
                    'small_size_two' : 66,
                    'middle_size_two' : 145,
                    'full_size_two' : 300}

method in setuphandlers.py:

def simplelayoutConf(self):
    sl_conf = getUtility(ISimplelayoutConfiguration, name='sl-config')
    for key in SL_CONFIGURATION:
        setattr(sl_conf,key,SL_CONFIGURATION[key])

Q:

How does simplelayout know which content type is a block?

A:

Simplelayout marks blockable types with the interface ISimpleLayoutBlock

Q:

Can I use simplelayout listings on other content types?

A:

Of course, just make sure your type provides the ISimpleLayoutCapable interface and paste the following code into your template

<tal:block content="structure provider:simplelayout.base.listing" />

Make simplelayout blocks addable on your type.

Q:

Can I uninstall simplelayout.base?

A:

As many new packages based on component architecture, not yet…

Q:

How can I add a new image scale?

A:

…

Q:

How can i remove them?

A:

Navigate to portla_types/blocktype in the ZMI, select “actions” and remove the image scale from actions list.

Q:

I have a content type which I want to use it as block in simplelayout?

A:

Just register a BrowserView named block_view for the specific content type, then z3c knows what to do. Example in simplelayout.types.common:

configure.zcml:

<browser:page
  for="Products.ATContentTypes.interface.file.IATFile"
  name="block_view"
  template="file.pt"
  class=".views.FileView"
  permission="zope2.View" />

Q:

I would like to create my own design template?

A:

…

Q:

Is there a possibility for blocks to show up as a portlet?

A:

This feature is under development and will be released soon.

Q:

How do you know in multible column designs, where to show up the blocks?

A:

Blocks has two additional interfaces: a slot interface and a column interface. The slot interface tells the block where he should appear. The column interface desides the image scale.

Q:

Recalculation if all images takes a very long time?

A:

If you tick the box “Set simplelayout scales as image scales”, the recalcultation can take a very long time, because it has to calculate a lot of new scales on every image.

Q:

My images will be resized by CSS?

A:

Tick the box “Set simplelayout scales as image scales”, restart zope an “recalc images”. Don’t use atct_tool for this action, because it will ignore paragraphs.

Q:

Is it possible to use more than one block_view per type?

A:

Yes, in the 2.0 release of simplelayout.base its possible to define your own view for a blockable type, you have to customize the actions and the action-icons of your content type. the action id should look like the following example id: sl-dummyscale-dummycssklass-myview sl- = simplelayout prefix for actions dummyscale = the image scale, possible values are small, half or full dummycssklass = an additional css wrapper class myview = your view must be registered as block_view-myview

If yout don’t need a scale or additional css class, please fill in some dummy values as in the example above, Otherwise your view will have the wrong name.

TODO

• TESTS

• mess up JS

• fix block height, if moving blocks from two to one column.

• send feedback if ajax request fails

Changelog