More Pre Sales Questions

I'm starting a new thread for my pre sales questions and I will add to it as questions come up.

First off;

Can the "Listing View" be edited other than photo orientation in the admin panel?

Can "City", "State" and "Country" and "Expiration" be removed and "Contact The Owner" changed to "Contact <Company Name>"? Would this be a template edit or a "core file"?

Also, what is required to add Visual Confirmation to the contact form?

Thanks,

Ken

[Blair +]

Hi Ken-

Strictly speaking, from admin you only have the two choices. However, you can edit these layouts to your liking by modifying the template files.

You can remove everything you listed within administration except changing "Contact the Owner. To change "Contact the Owner" to "Contact <Company Name>" (where each listing's company appears individually), you would have to make a template file edit.

When the "Contact the Owner" form is submitted, the visitor is forwarded to a page that says "Your email has been sent! Thank you for contacting the owner" if the email is successful. You can modify the wording of this page. So, just to be clear, when a contact form is submitted, there is confirmation.

Thanks-

Blair,

Thanks, I can edit templates, no problem.

Another question, I need to find out what parameters are editable from admin? This is disabled in the demo and the manual isn't specific. Seems it could have been shown but disabled in the demo.

Also, I'd like to be able to show "Featured Listings" at the top of every page except maybe the listing detail page, what would be involved in being able to do this?

I have more than one domain to use this script on so I'm trying to find out basically whether I need the standard or dev editions for each.

Still wondering about visual confirmation.

Thanks,

Ken

[Lhotch +]

The featured listings shown on the bottom of the sites home page is generated via a smarty function which is called via the template so you could add the same function call to any other template youd like.

Originally Posted by Lhotch

The featured listings shown on the bottom of the sites home page is generated via a smarty function which is called via the template so you could add the same function call to any other template youd like.

Can I reposition it on any given page?

Also a big "Duh", what I meant above about editable parameters was specifically about "templates". I've got a good idea about what other parameters are editable via admin but template editing is disabled in the demo.

Oh, and visual security confirmation?

Ken

[Lhotch +]

Originally Posted by Ken

Can I reposition it on any given page?

To a large degree, yes. What I mean by that is any given page is typically generated by multiple templates, one for the header, nav and footer and the other for the body fo the page your viewing. You can position the smarty function to display new or feature listings in any one of thoe body templates and have it appear above or under what that template displays.

On some templates you may even be able to stick it in the middle of whats generated if you want but that gets a little more questionable.

Originally Posted by Ken

Also a big "Duh", what I meant above about editable parameters was specifically about "templates". I've got a good idea about what other parameters are editable via admin but template editing is disabled in the demo.

Oh, and visual security confirmation?

Ken

The "edit template" function in admin just opens up the template in an html editor in your web browser. The template are nothing more than html pages with smarty variables placed within them where content is generated by the underlying scripts.

Take a look at the tutorial in this thread for a good overview on modifying the templates.

Template design tutorial!

Not sure what you mean by visual security confirmation, are you talking about captcha for registering and sending e-mails? If so that can be turnd on and off via admin.

Originally Posted by Lhotch

To a large degree, yes. What I mean by that is any given page is typically generated by multiple templates, one for the header, nav and footer and the other for the body fo the page your viewing. You can position the smarty function to display new or feature listings in any one of thoe body templates and have it appear above or under what that template displays..

The "smarty function" appears to be very intelligent design, is this sort of thing pretty much exclusive to 68c?

The "edit template" function in admin just opens up the template in an html editor in your web browser. The template are nothing more than html pages with smarty variables placed within them where content is generated by the underlying scripts.

This seems to make more sense from a flexibility point of view. I've seen many board scripts that have the edit function in admin, but it's usually fill in the blank or drop down, not raw code, which is better for casual users/admins but much less flexible.

Not sure what you mean by visual security confirmation, are you talking about captcha for registering and sending e-mails? If so that can be turnd on and off via admin.

I looked again and only saw this option for registration. Do you have to be registered to contact an owner? I want basically anyone to be able to use the contact form, but I'd like to limit this ability to anyhuman as opposed to anybot.

Thanks for the input.

Ken

[Lhotch +]

Originally Posted by Ken

The "smarty function" appears to be very intelligent design, is this sort of thing pretty much exclusive to 68c?



This seems to make more sense from a flexibility point of view. I've seen many board scripts that have the edit function in admin, but it's usually fill in the blank or drop down, not raw code, which is better for casual users/admins but much less flexible.

A smarty function is actually a php script that combines the logic of php and html for the presentation and is called, usua;ly from a single line, within a template and in turn generates output that is placed inside the template. Its commonly used by many scripts that utilize the smarty templates.

Most of the fields people see etc can be turned on and off via form fields in admin but to make more extreme layout changes etc, the templates need to be changed.

Originally Posted by Ken

I looked again and only saw this option for registration. Do you have to be registered to contact an owner? I want basically anyone to be able to use the contact form, but I'd like to limit this ability to anyhuman as opposed to anybot.

Thanks for the input.

Ken

You can set in admin what fields are seen by various user levels as well as contact the ad owner. So you can require that in order to contact ad owner you need to register.

Originally Posted by Lhotch

You can set in admin what fields are seen by various user levels as well as contact the ad owner. So you can require that in order to contact ad owner you need to register.

I'd prefer to have as few stumbling blocks to a sales contact as possible. But there are compromises I guess. Requiring registration is one way to discourage improper use of the contact form but, I know how I feel when I'm required to register just to get more information or make contact.

Ken

I do not want a prospect to have to register on the site to send a "contact the seller" mail.

Can captcha be enabled for non registered users to use the "contact the seller" form?

Ken