Topics Page

The topics page is (now) a page type. So, as with any page object, it appears in the structure editor and you can set its typical page properties (like template, CSS, etc).

In additions, it has some properties of its own that allow you to define more precisely how the topics page looks.

A Topics Page has been created automatically in your site, at yourSite/topics. So you may choose to skip the next section for now.

Creating a Topics Page

To create a new Topics Page, go to the structure editor of your site: /yourSite/admin/conversations/yourSite/structure, and select the folder in which you want to create the page.

In this folder's properties editor, scroll the window all the way down, until you get the "New File Or Folder" form. Type the name you want to give to your page in "Navigation Title". Set "Page Type" to "Topics Page" and click on "Create New File".

The page will reload and show you a confirmation that the new object was created. Locate this object in the structure listing and click on it. This will open the properties editor for your topics page.

Editing Topics Page Properties

The topics page has a set of common properties (like template or magicNavbar's) that we won't cover here. It has also its own properties:

• items per page
  Enter here the maximum number of topics to display in one page.
• length of the body clip
  Define the length of the excerpt displayed for each topic.
• page template
  This is the template for the body of the page.
• item template
  This is the template for each item in the body.

Macros

Both templates are set by default, but feel free to edit them as you want. Here are the macros you can use in them:

As usual, use the form <!--#macroName-->.

• In page template:
  • topicsPageContent
    The body of the page (you must include this macro call in your template, or the page would be empty).
  • numOfFoundTopics
    Will be replaced with the total number of threads in the conversation
  • topicsPerPage
    Will be replaced with the number of topics displayed in the page (as set in "items per page").
  • topicPagesLinks
    Will be replaced with links to next/prev topic pages
• In item template:
  • topicSubject
    Will be replaced with the subject of the message, linking to the message.
  • topicThread
    Will be replaced with the subject too, but the link will point to the full thread page for this topic
  • topicAuthor
    Will be replaced with the author's name, linking to a new email for him/her
  • topicDate
    Will be replaced with the creation date of the topic
  • topicRepliesNum
    Will be replaced with the total number of messages in this topic
  • topicClip
    Will be replaced with a clip of the message's body, whose length depends on the corresponding page property.