could editor be included for title of story?

Worker Joined: Jun 09, 2007 Posts: 172

I am not for sure if this should be asked here or in another area, please move this if this is wrong.

When creating a new story/article you can put in a title for that story. My question is could that be edited like the main part of the story, or is the only way to change the "size, color. ect" of this will be the the css for the theme?

Like having a wysiwyg editor for the input of the title, so you can have the same options to make changes like you would for the areas of the story.

Posted: Mon Oct 25, 2010 1:20 am

At the moment you can't do that, so you would have to do it through the theme. That is not to say that it can't be done.

Posted: Mon Oct 25, 2010 1:51 am

i am far from a programmer, but i guess i would have to find the code that sets up the wysiwyg editor for the story, and the code that sets the title box and then you would try to change the title box to work like a very small edit box and it could work? then probally rem out the line in the css so the two down conflict?

Sorry if i am thinking out loud? but before i try to take on such a undertaking, would you mind trying to see if you could do that, as with your skills, you would probally do that so much faster and save an old man alot of headaches Smile

thank you if you wouldnt mind

Posted: Mon Oct 25, 2010 5:38 am

I can tell you that it would take a lot of changes to accomplish it. There is code in place in mainfile.php to limit what can be used in the title. You would also find that using html in the title would cause unintended issues with other modules in RavenNuke like Search, Top 10, Comments, etc... The title, like most all other CMS systems is designed to be a text field as opposed to a text area that you would need to use the editor with.

Posted: Mon Oct 25, 2010 12:19 pm

wow, i didnt really consider all that it would affect.

let me ask if this would be possible without the change to a text area.....

Where the title is typed in the box, just to the right, could there be like pull down box's that would let you make changes to the display of the text, "size, bold, color, font" and that information inserted into a css with a unique name.

I dont know, i am just kinda thinking out loud. I am working with teaching a lady from church with upkeep of the site, this is something that she has asked me. She wants to be able to change the color and size of some of the titles to match with the different color of text that is used in story. (if she uses red text, to have a red title, and in the next one if she uses blue to have a blue title, maby with larger font) I see in the css a line that may change it to one value for all of them, but nothing to change for each of them. That is why i was asking if there could be something placed beside the title to make these changes for each.

hope thats not confusing....if this would be to much of a job, then i will just tell her that one is going to be it for now.

thank you for your help and responce.

Posted: Mon Oct 25, 2010 12:38 pm

I will try to have a look at it tonight or tomorrow and see what changes would be needed to allow markup in the title of the news article and report back here.

Posted: Mon Oct 25, 2010 12:41 pm

thank you very much

Posted: Wed Oct 27, 2010 5:06 am

Gator, there are way too many changes and issues with changing the core code to allow html in the title. I am now looking at a theme based work around. I will post what I find here in a day or so.

Posted: Wed Oct 27, 2010 5:54 am

Thank you.
again just thinking out loud, would it be the same to just put the css options beside the title box that would allow the changes without changing it from text to html? that is what the style sheet would do, and it shouldnt change it to a text area. Again i am just thinking out loud, you dont have to explain anyhting, i am greatfull for your help.

Posted: Wed Oct 27, 2010 7:13 am

gator81, something else to keep in mind is that the title field in the database is only 80 characters in size. As soon as you said using the "Editor" and then later "Text Area", I felt that I needed to also mention this limitation.

Posted: Wed Oct 27, 2010 2:48 pm

That would be ok, chance to change the look of the short text in the box instead of in the style sheet gives the ability to make it look better without having to edit the style sheet all the time.

Another thought that may be even easier. Is there a way to just turn off the display of the title box? I know you can leave it empty, but that would remove the searches for the title and other blocks that looks for that info and makes it harder to figure out which one you might want to edit. With just turning off the display of the title, you can still have it there for everything? Just a thought...

Posted: Thu Oct 28, 2010 4:59 pm

Provided you want all the titles to have the same appearance, you could do that easily (and safely) enough by using CSS.

Posted: Fri Oct 29, 2010 12:28 am

Guardian, thats where i am having more of the issues, to have the title they would all have to be the same size color font ect that could be setup in the css, but since the news post are in different colors some times to show different mood to the post then the title looks very out of place. So the only real way is to leave the title empty. This makes it hard to go back an edit if you have quite a few stories that you will have to go through guessing which number you need to edit.
My first thought was to ask if the title could have the wysiwyg editor, but I was told that it would mess up to many things that call on the title as a text box. Next i was asking if there could be selections on the box that would let you choose the same things that a css would use, this could give more choices without the need of someone having to edit the css.
The last thought was to have a flag of some sort that would let you put in a title, but choose not to show it so you would have a means of identity for the news story, others mods could call on the info, and you wouldnt need to setup different boxes or edit a css to make your changes.

what is the hardest for me is that i dont have the expertise to do this and some people are looking into the possible choices, so i am saying my prayers and waiting to see if its possible without to many problems.. If not then I will just accept what i cannot change and work with it the best i can Smile

Posted: Fri Oct 29, 2010 1:18 am

I understand the problem.
You don't want to be using the editor though; as others have already mentioned, if you start saving 'styling' data in the database, it will affect other modules and / or blocks that use the same data, plus the field length in the database table isn't long enough.
Design wise, it is always best to keep styling seperate from the data.
Something that might be possible, though I don't really have the time to look into it is to apply some styling programmatically - as an example, News posts can be assigned to a topic category, so in theory, it should be possible to apply a different 'style' to the title depending on what topic category the news was posted into OR even add another filed in the table to store the styling information.
Of course, everything is a trade-off; by doing it programmatically, you inherit maintenance ussies if you need to upgrade the News module or anything that affects the changes that may have been made to the core code.

Posted: Fri Oct 29, 2010 3:23 am

then there may be the 3rd option, and that could be to apply a flag for it not to show the text, but it would still be usable for the other programs, and would be easier to find for edits.
this way if someone wants to change it and use it then they continue to use the css, if not, then they can still post the title for other uses, but not display, this would make the body of the post doing a title in they way they want and continue from there.

exanple:

title ______________________ [] check box to not display title (remember the title will still be used by other blocks)

so the title could stull be input for what your doing, and can be used by the other block, and you could have it not display so you wouldnt have to worry about design then.

thanks for looking into this.