How the header is built #

The header of a Fit & Healthy page passes through two worlds: the layout (stored in the database, edited in the Layouts editor) and the templates (files in a design extension). This page follows one request from one to the other. File paths are relative to the installation root.

Contents #

1. The chain at a glance
2. The layout side
3. The template side
4. Pages without a layout
5. What each part lets you change

The chain at a glance #

The layout side #

Header / Footer is a shared layout (layout type layout_2) with five zones: header, post_header, main, pre_footer and footer. On the Fit & Healthy site its zones hold:

Selecting the header block shows its properties. The Content tab has only the block label; the Design tab shows the Template name (header, the parameter block_name), which the block also shows on itself, "Template block: header".

Eighteen other layouts of the site link their header and footer zones to this layout, which is why one header serves the whole site. The block definition is in extension/explayouts/settings/explayouts.ini.append.php:

[BlockDefinition_tpl_block]
Name=Template block
Handler=expLayoutsTplBlockHandler
ViewTypes[]=tpl_block
Category=placeholders

Its handler, expLayoutsTplBlockHandler, has one parameter, block_name ("Template name").

The template side #

The media design renders each zone with explayouts/zone.tpl, which includes explayouts/block/block.tpl for every top-level block. block.tpl wraps the block in <div class="ngl-block ngl-<definition> ..."> and includes design:explayouts/block/<definition>.tpl, here explayouts/block/tpl_block.tpl:

{def $tpl_tpl = tpl_block_template($block.id)}
{if $tpl_tpl|ne('')}
{include uri=concat('design:', $tpl_tpl) module_result=$module_result}
{/if}

tpl_block_template() (method tplBlockTemplate() of sevenxthemesmediaoperators.php) answers in three steps:

1. A fixed map of the block IDs the theme ships with: block 13 is pagelayout/header.tpl, block 477 pagelayout/breadcrumbs.tpl, block 14 pagelayout/footer.tpl (and some content parts).
2. Otherwise by place: a root block in zone header is pagelayout/header.tpl, a block in a column of zone header is pagelayout/breadcrumbs.tpl, a root block in zone footer is pagelayout/footer.tpl.
3. Otherwise by the block's own block_name: explayouts/tpl_block/<block_name>.tpl, when a design has that file.

pagelayout/header.tpl is the <header class="site-header">. It includes content/parts/site_logo.tpl and four parts from pagelayout/header/: main_menu.tpl, search_box.tpl, user_menu.tpl and language_selector.tpl.

main_menu.tpl reads the list and renders one <li> per node that exists:

{def $mm_ids = ezini('SiteInfo','MainMenuID','menu.ini')|unique}
...
{foreach $mm_ids as $mm_index => $mm_id}
    {set $mm_node = fetch('content','node',hash('node_id',$mm_id))}
    ...
    {if is_object($mm_node)}
    <li id="menu-item-main_menu-location-id-{$mm_display_id}" ...>
        <a href={$mm_node.url_alias|ezurl}>{$mm_node.name|wash}</a>
    </li>
    {/if}
{/foreach}

What follows from it:

• The item text is the node's name, the link its URL alias. Rename the page and the item follows.
• A list entry whose node cannot be fetched (deleted, for example) is skipped, not shown empty. The fetch does not check the visitor's read access: a listed page the visitor may not read is still shown as an item.
• The current page's ancestors get the class active.
• NexusMainMenuID[] gives the id and data-location-id attributes of the first items the IDs of the reference site the theme was ported from. It does not change what is shown; an item without a partner there uses its own node ID.

The compiled form of main_menu.tpl holds the values of ezini(). That is why a changed list needs the template cache cleared (Caches after a change).

Pages without a layout #

A page that gets no layout (or a layout without blocks) uses the plain page layout of the design: pagelayout.tpl includes pagelayout/header.tpl directly. Same template, same menu, so the menu is identical with and without layouts.

What each part lets you change #

Related pages #

• Add a header menu item
• How the footer is built
• Shared layouts and zone linking
• Two ways to build
• Free documentation: this page is free to copy, translate and improve under the GNU FDL 1.3.