Dividing content

Hey everybody.

I am leading a technical development in a school project where we are using MODx CMS as a solution for medium sized businesses instead of a commercial solution.

I am new to the syntax being used and the terminology but I did manage to modify an excisting template to MODx. The results can be seen here: http:/www.hnefill.com.

The reason I finally decided to post here is that I ran into a problem in my school project. I need to be able to add content so that it will
go in two collumns. If I use the content variable it places it only in that column and if I place it in the other column as well I get the same content in both columns. Is there anybody here who can guide me to a better solution. Either by expanding the content in two columns or by addng content on more than one place in the document.

Hope someone here can guide me.

/Johnny

Johnny,

You could use Ditto and for and use the alternate classes with floats.

Or take a look at discussions like this one... http://modxcms.com/forums/index.php?topic=4276.0

If you want the text to dynamically split into columns you could use a technique i read about in A List Apart a year or so ago. I haven’t actually tested it myself, so I don’t know how well it works... It uses a CSS3-rule and for those that don’t support columns in CSS3 (most browsers) it emulates the effect with JavaScript.

A List Apart article: http://alistapart.com/articles/css3multicolumn
Testpage: http://www.csscripting.com/css-multi-column/

Thank you all for a swift reply. I agree that using CSS3 and javascript is a risky solution since IE7 doesn’t support it yet. I did try it and my conclusion is that at this point it’s better to use an alternative if possible. I, however, do love the fact that Firefox (and browsers based on that engine such as Flock, which is my browser of choice) support this feature and it works beautifully.

The project that I mentioned can be seen here. At the moment I am hosting it on one of my own domains but in the near future it will be moved to our clients domain. Feel free to take a lookand comment on what we have made so far. All input is appreciated and will be of great usage for us in our report.

I noticed that ganeshXL came with a interesting solution to my column adventures.

Just use a TV with input type richt-text, and put that TV block wherever you want in your template(s).

e.g.
[*column2*]

Could someone maybe clarify a bit as to how I would create such a template variable ?

Kind regards,

/Johnny

Template variables (TV) are simply extra content areas which can be modified on a page by page basis or use a standard default you set. Really cool stuff, also have a look at the wiki for more in depth....

Go to the manager, choose Manage Resources

go to the Template Variables tab

choose New Template Variable, give it a name and then choose what type of content.... for now choose textarea

in the default content box, add whatever you want to appear in the template (content wise)

scroll down and make sure the template is checked which you want to use this TV with

after clicking save , go to the template you just checked and edit it and add your TV call (enclose the name you entered like this: [*Name of TV*] ) into the template where you want that content to appear

from now on, any document you create that uses the template will have an extra content area which can be left with the default content you provided, or can be modified on a page by page basis. TV’s are your friend

please see the wiki and also the online docs for a better overview but this should get you going...

or you could use a two column template from cssdrive or cssplay...