How would an experienced user approach this? (Manage multiple content areas)

xEdit looks awesome. I haven’t seen anything like that for modx so far.

@zombo

If you want to be able to have multiple areas to edit besides the [*content*] just create as many TV’s as you need under it. You will limit your editor to as many as you put in, I don’t know a way of letting them add whatever they want where ever.

you could do something like this:

<div>[*content*]</div> this is just the regular content area that would be text
<div>[*image1*]</div> create tv’s for this and the following ones.
<div>[*content2*]</div>
<div>[*image2*]</div>
<div>[*content3*]</div>
<div>[*image3*]</div>

etc....

If an entry has text, then an image, then more text and that’s it, you would leave the tv’s after content, image1 and content2 blank.

You would set this all up on a resource/page for each entry.

I think what is confusing you about Ditto is that it only calls content from another page onto the one where ditto is called. To edit the content collected by ditto, you have to do it on the page where the content is coming from, NOT on the page that has the ditto call. (dunno if I am clear with that)

Ignore Jot for now maybe, in general it’s just for commenting on blog posts.

Quick Manager just allows you to get to the resource edit page in a popup from the front end of the site. So there’s not much to understand there, it just makes it simpler for a user/editor to not have to deal with modx backend. You can use the WebLogin snippet to give access to editing through the front end without even entering the back end.

Managermanager lets you control which fields appear in the resource editing page. For example, if you do not want an editor to be able to change the template that a resource uses, you can make it invisible to that user. You set up rules for what each user/group can or cannot see. Maybe you want to hold off on using this until you get a grasp of the other stuff first.

Hey Zombo!

Custom TVs seems to be helpful but we’re using revolution. So this project is interessting for getting an idea about how we could do this on ourselfs. Nevertheless I’ll keep you on track, too.

I’m realy suprised that there are not more people requiring this feature...

I just found an other interessting post which might be helpful:

http://modxcms.com/forums/index.php/topic,54939.0/topicseen.html

Well, I’ve spent the last couple days trying some ideas to work but haven’t found a solution. I’m also surprised this functionality is not there to be used in a simple way. To me it’s such a common way to display web content! Makes me wonder how should I design my sites in order to not have this problem, or how people actually do it.

Even though xEdit looks like the thing, and maybe even the custom TVs from Maple Design could be helpful, their installation/usage is far from documented and I feel like it’d be overkill to try and comprehend how they work and adapt them to this particular use. I think I’d spent far less time teaching the editor how to edit the content, even in pure HTML. Don’t get me wrong, all the work those individuals are making is incredible, I really value that. It’s just way too difficult for a non-coder to bear with.

@markoj, thanks again for the help, I actually do know how Ditto works, read everything I found about it and successfully tested it. I’m not getting confused by how it works, it just doesn’t fit what I’m looking for, it’s not flexible at all in this case. The TVs thing is not flexible either for the editor.

Thinking about the way I built this site with the 960 grid system, it’s true that it’s a bit of a PIA to lay out some content due to all the divs and multiple classes. But I wonder, if I wrote all the css by myself and set the containers in a way that the actual [*content*] of a resource was just paragraphs, lists and whatnot (which would be a challenge by itself), what happens when an editor wants to add any content that differs from the standard cases? Maybe with a special class or parameter? I read about making CKeditor work with a custom css but wasn’t able to make it work. It all seems like workarounds, hacks, counter-intuitive methods.

Not trying to criticize Modx at all, I’m just frustrated for not being able to do a somewhat simple thing in a simple way. I loved Modx ever since I made my first template, but I’ve been stuck with this for a week now. Makes me wonder how would I face the true obstacles that will likely appear along the way. Makes me wonder if I didn’t choose the right cms for me, which would suck since I like many of the features Modx has and its community is awesome. Apart from the fact that I’ve put lots of hours in learning it.

Thanks for the ideas though, everyone.