XOOPS 2.0.15
PHP 4.4.4
News 1.44

For some reason, News only shows a single news item in the block. I've selected for 5 news items to display on the top page, but it only shows a single item.

If I select the Topics to the only topic I have, then it will show the other articles, but by default, the Topics choice is blank (no 'default' topic, I only have 1 news topic created).

Is there a way to have News display, automatically, the last 5 news items, in the top page (or in this case, the News module is set to be the default top page)?

Ideas on this would be much appreciated.

I have the same configuration, but not the same problem.

Make sure your link is to the index page of the news module
/modules/news/

not some interior page like
modules/news/article.php?storyid=3

Also, which block exactly are you setting the preferences for?

In the Module Config options - which controls the content of the index page of the news module, there is only the "number of news items to display" - but no topic selectors.

Perhaps you are adjusting the options for one of the module's block - (which must be turned on manually to appear) and those options only affect those particular blocks - not the index page

Try going to your XOOPS control panel home.
Then use the News module "Preferences" and set the number of items there.

See if that works.

Hi Andy,

The only News block that I have activated is 'Recent News', which gives a short single-line link to each of the news items. It does.

In System -> Preferences, the News module is set to be on the Top page, so the basic news display block should appear (and does) appear when someone first enters the site, and when the News module is selected.

The link to the News module goes to "modules/news", no specific item or topic specified. At the top of the basic News display is a topic category drop-down menu (with no default topic automatically selected), a number of news items to display drop-down menu (default is 5), and a "GO" button.

When I actually select the topic category, it then displays the news items for that category, so I think the problem must be that there's nothing in the default category when the module loads.

Soundx like you are on the right track.

If you still need help, PM or email me your site URL and XOOPS admin access and I'll look around.

Cheers,

If this is a configuration issue, it's one that exists on all four of the sites I maintain, on 2 different hosts. It also seems to be the case on some of the other XOOPS sites I checked out earlier today, but I don't know if those webmasters noticed it or not.

The topic selection and number of news items displays is set in the News module preferences, when I turn it off the selector box goes away, but it doesn't fix the problem. I changed over to the "Topics View" in the New Module settings, and this seems to force whatever topics have news in them, to display the latest news item, and the last few recent items beneath it as links. "Topics View" looks like it's working exactly as it should, so I can go with that for now. I think it's only the "Classic View" that's buggy.

I'm not a php coder other than by guesswork and luck, so hacking the module to fix this would be more than my php skills are up to. Looking over the index.php file, however, what I do notice is that there's a '$storytopic' variable which is set to 0, and some code that calls for the 'topic_id'. I think that's where the problem is, the default 'topic_id' needs to be set to 1 in order to call the first topic automatically. Just a best guess though.

The only workaround I can think of is to replace the "Main Menu" block with a custom block called "Main", and manually input the desired options. That way I can force the News module to go to the first topic with a links like this;



This works for calls to the News module, but since my site is set up to use the News module as the startup page (System -> Preferences), a necessity to make the theme operate correctly, the initial display of the website to arriving visitors only displays a single, old news item. They have to select the "Home" or "News" option somewhere in the site, to see the correct news display.

If you (or anyone) has an idea to fix the "Classic View" in News 1.44 with, I'd really appreciate it.