[ic] Lay Out Editor

Curt Hauge chc@mninter.net
Sun, 22 Apr 2001 13:52:24 -0500


Quoting Dan Johnson

>How can I get the categories listed as links in the left panel?  Is the
>purpose of the LayOut Editor?  I cannot find any documentation on it.
> Thanks.
>
>Dan Johnson

Hi Dan,

Sorry for the delay, but I had to research this myself again. It also took
me a little figuring because I couldn't find documentation. It is a little
cumbersome to add product one at a time through the admin, but it works and
will suffice for most small to medium clients. This is not a complete
tutorial, just a guide to getting products listed on the left side. I will
add this note to the Interchange Database reference guide 2.3. I went
through this step-by-step, so I hope I didn't leave anything out.

1) In Admin UI go to Items > Add Items and add new items, including
categories for each item. You will have to put some thought into your
'Areas' and 'Categories' selections to avoid a long list of products on the
left side. What you really want is a short list of clickable 'categories'
within each 'area' which take you to the results.html page for actual
product listing. Trial and error is the key here =). Click OK to save
changes.

2) Go to Design in Administration and click on the 'plus sign' in
'Area--section' to add an area. Enter a name for this area and do not use
commas (,). If this area is to be shown on all pages, enter 'all' (without
quotes) in the empty box underneath the name you just added. Skipping this
step will prevent your new 'area' from showing up in the left side. Select
'Left' from the Page area drop-down. If you want this area to be clickable,
select the Link type from the drop-down. Note the construct something demo
'areas' are all set to 'No link', although they could link to another page
as well. Click 'Change area' to save changes.

3) Click on this new area above in the Area --section. Now click the 'plus
sign' under 'Contains'. This allows you to add the product category to the
category database AND to the 'area' section. Under category properties enter
the exact name of the category used for the new products you added in step
1.  Set 'Link type' to simple search. Set 'field=column pairs' to
'category=name_of_this_category'. Click 'Change category'.

4) That's it! You should now be able to view your new products on the left
side.

Good luck!

Curt Hauge