Since Joomla 3.1, you can use tags to organize content. The new Tags component in Joomla offers your site visitors new ways to find exactly the content they're interested in. Moreover, through Tags menu links ans Tags modules, you can control exactly what tagged contents you want to display and how you want to display it.

1. ERIC TIGGELER | DUTCH JOOMLA! DAYS 2013

2. Eric Tiggeler
• Copywriter
• Books on writing
• Books on Joomla 1.5,
1.6, 1.7, 2.5, 3.0 …

3. NEW IN
JOOMLA
3.1: TAGS

4. TAGS
1. Waarom do you need tags?
2. Joomla Tags Tutorial
3. Creating and assigning tags
4. What does the site visitor see?
5. Menu links pointing to tags
6. Tag modules
7. Tags in Joomla: the verdict

5. 1 WHY DO
YOU NEED
TAGS?

6. Tags solve a problem
you didn’t know
you had.

7. Joomla 1.5 : The bad old days
 Fixed structure: Section, Category, Article
 Imposed limitations on the ways you could
organize site contents
Section Recipies
Category Lunch Dinner
Article Recipe 1 Recipe 2 Recipe 1 Recipe 2

8. Joomla 1.6: nested categories
 The biggest yay! moment in recent Joomla!
history
 No more limitations on organizing content

9. Using nested categories
 An example: organizing recipies
 Something you couldn‟t achieve with 1.5:
Main level category Recipies
Category level 2 Lunch Dinner
Category level 3 Fast Vegetarian Meat
Articles Recipe1 Recipe 2 Recipe 3 Recipe1 Recipe 2

10. However …
 Each article can be assigned to only one
category
 Recipes site: you have to create multiple
categories for “vegetarian” recipes
Main level category Recipies
Category level 2 Lunch Dinner
Category level 3 Fast Vegetarian Meat Vegetarian
Articles Recipe 1 Recipe 2 Recipe 3 Recipe 1 Recipe 2

11. The problem with categories
 Sometimes properties (such as “vegetarian”) fit
in more than one category
 Sometimes it‟s hard to keep the site structure
simple and logical
 -- hard to classify content for content managers
 -- hard to find content for site visitors

12. That‟s the problem which is
solved by using

13. What can you do with tags?
 As used in other CMSes:
a label assigned to content
 The difference with categories: you‟re not
restricted to a fixed tree structure
 Any article can have as many tags as you like
 Easier to classify and navigate content

14. A promising new feature
 An additional system to organize content:
Tag: „Vegetarian‟
Top level category Recipes
Category level 2 Lunch Dinner
Recipe Recipe Recipe Recipe Recipe
Articles 1 2 3 1 2

15. 2 JOOMLA
TAGS
TUTORIAL

16. Let‟s try out Tags in a test site
 Install Joomla 3.1 or higher
 The final release will be available on
joomla.org
 The current beta release is found on
http://joomlacode.org/gf/project/joomla/frs/

17. Installing Joomla 3.1
 Let‟s create a „Recipe Repository‟

18. Joomla has been installed
 The output: a new, empty site

19. Optionally: changing color and logo
 Now we‟ve got a site we can fill with content

20. Adding content in three steps
 In Joomla, you‟ll usually follow these three
steps:
1 Create categories
2 Create articles
3 Add menu links

21. Step 1: creating categories
 In this example:
1 top level category, 3 subcategories
 Recipes
 Breakfast
 Lunch
 Dinner

22. Step 2: creating articles
 Add a few articles (recipes) to each of the
three categories: Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
 Create a couple of „Special‟ articles

23. Step 3: creating menu links
 Three menu links of the Category Blog type:
 Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner

24. The outcome: a website!
homepage

25. The outcome: a website!
category blog page

26. Is that all there is? Not any more
 Up to version 3.0:
 1. categories
 2. articles (+ Special articles)
 3. menu links
 In Joomla 3.1+:
 4. creating and assigning tags

27. 3 CREATING
AND
ASSIGNING
TAGS

28. Using the Tags Component
 Components > Tags

29. Creating our first tag
 For our recipes repository:
 Tags > New > „Vegetarian‟

30. The tag has been added
 The list of tags appears in the Tags component
screen

31. Assigning tags to articles
 Open an article
 Details > Tags
 Type until the tag
has been found
 Autocomplete - Enter!

32. Multiple tags per article
 You can add as many tags to an article as you
like

33. A shortcut to creating tags
 Make a tag straight from the article screen
 Enter the new tag text in the Tags field
 Enter, Save, done!

34. 4 WHAT
DOES THE
VISITOR
SEE?

35. This is what tags look like on the
front end
 Tag labels appear:
 Inteasers of Special articles
 Above the full article text

36. This is what tags look like on the
front end
 Click on the tag „Vegetarian‟
 The output: a simple list of titles

37. Improving the tags page
 Components > Tags > Options
 Show tag name: Show
 Tag Image: Show
 Tag Description: Show

38. Showing article teasers
 Components
> Tags > Options
 Item Images:
Show
 Item description:
Show

39. Is this all? No!
 You can display “tag results” in three different
ways:
1 Automatically: through the tag hyperlink
 2 Through menu links to tag pages
 3 Through two new modules

40. 5 USING
TAG
MENULINKS

41. Menu links pointing to tag pages
 Menu > Main Menu > New
 Three new Menu Item Types

42. Menu links pointing to tag pages
 Menu > Main Menu > New
 Three new Menu Item Types
 Tagged Items
 Compact list of tagged items
 List of all tags

43. Menu links pointing to tag pages
 Let‟s create a Tagged Items menu link

44. What‟s the output of the new
Menu Item Types?
 As an example: Tagged items

45. Customizing the menu link
 You can change the Tagged Items
page lay-out through the Menu Item Options
settings

46. Including multiple tags
 The Tagged Items menu link can also point to
combinations of tags

47. Combining multiple tags
 „Vegetarian‟ + „Pasta‟ =

48. 6 TAG
MODULES

49. Displaying tags in a module
 Apart from the new Menu Item Types for tags
there are also two new modules for tags:

50. Using the Popular Tags module
 Module Manager > New > Popular Tags

51. The output of Popular Tags
 This is what the module output looks like:

52. Similar Tags module
 It doesn‟t display similar tags …
 … but it does display links to articles that have
one or more tags in common with the current
article
 Can be useful to direct visitors to related
content (from „Pasta‟ naar „Pasta‟,
„Vegetarian‟)

53. Similar Tags module
 This is what the output of the Similar Tags
module looks like

54. 7 TAGS:
THE
VERDICT

55. Hoe good are Tags in Joomla?
 To say it‟s a great new feature would be an
understatement …
 It‟s great, it‟s chill, it‟s dope, it‟s fresh!
 It‟s a combination of a component, Menu Item
Types and modules
 Even nested tags are possible
 You can also tag the output of other
components, such as Contacts
 Great for SEO (the findability of your content
increases)

56. Hoe can you use them?
You can make it as simple or complex as you want
As an addition to categories
 Categories for the main „sections‟
 Tags for specific article properties
As an alternative for categories
 A full-blown, flexible system to organize content …
 You could even stop using categories

57. The art of tagging
 Help your visitor to easily find content: use the
words that your site visitor would use when
searching the site
 Don‟t add too many tags per article
 Don‟t use different tags pointing to the same
content
 Don‟t use general („gerechten‟)
 Avoid „tag stuffing‟

58. ENJOY!

59. TAGS IN JOOMLA
Eric Tiggeler
www.joomm.net