Am a new user and extremely pleased with the XOOPS design and wealth of quality modules.

The one main struggle I've had though is trying to determine to what degree custom pages are possible. By custom pages, I mean pages that have both static content (copy) as well as more dynamic content (blocks) from other modules.

For example, if I wanted to create a custom page for a department, say "Development". Ideally, I'd liked to have a static intro paragraph coupled with say blocks of news, events, downloads, etc. that are specific to the Development Department on this single page.

I understand that categories are possible within the key modules (news, downloads, etc.) and that it's easy to filter out category-specific contect within a module.

My hope is that it's somehow possible to add module-specific blocks within a custom page in a way that it's seemingly possible on a main homepage (top page within the Blocks Admin).

Thanks in advance for your patience on such a general, structural question.

Have you checked out modules such as iContent? They may provide the capability you seek.

Check out the module "Edito", might be of some use.
You can find it at http://www.wolfpackclan.com/wolfactory/

Regards
Terry

...or look at alternate modules for items like News etc.

Within the Blocks Admin page, yes, you can set blocks to show only on those pages...the problem comes when you want the same blocks that you have on other pages, but with different content.

i.e.: "Top News" block on the home page, AND on the 'department' page, but with different "Top News" information.

Many of the modules available with XOOPS allow for relatively easy 'cloning', allowing you to have more than one instance of the module running in your site, allowing you to use the module variants on specific pages, with different or page specific content.

make sense?

Have read about iContent and Edito w/in the Forums. I appreciate the tips--I'll be sure to give them a try.

Thanks for the added insight into the blocks, cloning, and variable content issues, adrock. I have only a basic understanding of the poss. here, and am trying to ramp up quickly.

Have a few follow-up questions regarding the Blocks Admin:

- Is the "Add a new block" section ideally suited for chunks of static copy or is it possible to modify a module's block (that's available in the top/home page) and add it here as another block that could be used on custom pages?

- Is it through a block's "Edit" link that you would enable that block to be accessible in other modules or a custom page?

- Is it possible to modify a block's code to display a filtered or category-specific set of content? i.e.: on a 'Development' custom page, could I show a block of recent "Development" news and say a block of recent "Development" downloads (I have categories already set-up for both of these) as opposed to just showing the typical blocks that are available like "Recent News" and "Recent Downloads".

Thanks again for taking the time to respond and for your patience in dealing with a new user.

only a week later...not too bad

the blocks that you see in the blocks area of the admin section are the blocks that come with the specific modules. You can change the names of them, and alter their various preferences by clicking the 'edit' link.

The 'custom blocks' are blocks that you make. They can contain just about anything...but beware of the systems text sanitizer which will alter or disable some stuff like java scripts and complex or independent php.

You set which pages the block shows up on when in the edit area of the block.

You will also need to go to the groups section of the admin area and be sure to allow all of the needed groups access to the block as well.

the blocks page in the admin area should show you which module the block belongs to...and the information in that block is dependent on that module being there. Unless you are familiar with PHP and SQL, it is not recommended to be cloning blocks, as there are numerous places that need to be added to when doing this, and if it is calling specific data from the database, there is even more to change.

Some modules make this relatively easy...like xcgal, but most do not.

here is a wealth of info about the structure and how blocks work etc. https://xoops.org/modules/smartfaq/category.php?categoryid=14

Hopefully you are figuring things out and it is becoming more intuitive to you as you go

Happy xoopsing!