New to Joomla

Once you have a Joomla site running, sooner or later you may want to use javascript, and if you are a more advanced user that's likely to mean jQuery too.

This tutorial is about using javascript of jQuery with Joomla, showing exactly what you need and how to set it up so that it works.

Overview of using javascript with Joomla

Joomla stores the articles that will be published on your website in a database. When Joomla stores the pages it expects text and images, not javascript or html. If you try to put javascript directly onto the page like this . . .

what you you will see on the web page is . . .

So it's obvious that is not going to work. The javascript is being interpreted as plain text instead of being executed by the browser. What we need is a way to insert the javascript directly into the page.

One way to work around this is to use a plain text editor in Joomla, or to click the [show/hide] link above the editor icons, which toggles the visual editor off and shows the actual code . . .

this does work around the difficulty, and so the browser does execute the javascript, in this case showing an alert.

That's one way, but it's not very convenient.

DISCLAIMER: This information is provided free of charge as is, New to Joomla accepts no responsibility for anything that happens to any site as a result of using it. If you do use it, back up any file or information BEFORE you change it so that you can revert to the saved copy if things don't go as expected.

This tutorial shows you how to remove the Joomla free software line and link that appears in the footer of each Joomla page. Sometimes it is not appropriate to have this link showing, at New to Joomla we're proud of the fact that our site is built with Joomla, but there are times when it's appropriate to remove the link. You may need to repeat this change if you update Joomla!

Here's how . . .

Here is what the Joomla link looks like

There are two lines at the bottom of each page, the copyright notice incorporating the name of the site and the following line that says 'Joomla! is Free Software released under the GNU/GPL License'. It's that second line that we are going to remove.

These two lines are generated by the Joomla footer module, if you simplyturn off the footer by using the administrator controls then the copyright notice will disappear too. We're going to keep that and just remove the second line.

There are many ways to change the file,  we're going to look at two ways, the first, edit the footer using cpanel - a control panel supplied by many web hosting providers the second is to download the file to your local computer, edit it and upload the revised file. For users of some ftp clients, such as Cyberduck there is a third way by directly editing the files on the server.

Using cpanel control panel to edit the Joomla footer

Go to your cpanel control panel and log in using your username and password

From the cpanel screen, select the File Manager

You will be presented with a list of files in your web server directory, the File Manager allows you to navigate through the directories and work directly on the files. Be careful because you can mess up the site very easily, the File Manager is for experienced and competent users.

To navigate into a folder click the icon, to select a folder or file click on the name. You will need to start by clicking the www icon to open the directory, if your Joomla installation is at the top level you should see another list of files similar to the one shown below. If your Joomla installation is in a different directory you will have to navigate to the appropriate place.

The languages directory is the one we need. The full path to the file needed is:

/www/language/en-GB/en-GB.mod_footer.ini

If you are using a different language then you will need to select the appropriate file.

The next screenshot shows parts of what you will see in cpanel.

When you click Edit File in cpanel you should see the file contents like this . . .

# $Id: en-GB.mod_footer.ini 10498 2008-07-04 00:05:36Z ian $
# Joomla! Project
# Copyright (C) 2005 - 2008 Open Source Matters. All rights reserved.
# License http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.html GNU/GPL, see LICENSE.php
# Note : All ini files need to be saved as UTF-8 - No BOM
# Note : %date% will be auto replaced by current year !Don't translate

FOOTER=Footer
FOOTER_LINE1=Copyright © %date% %sitename%. All Rights Reserved.
FOOTER_LINE2=<a href="http://www.joomla.org">Joomla!</a> is Free Software released under the <a href="http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.html">GNU/GPL License.</a>
MOD_FOOTER=<em>mod_footer</em>
THIS MODULE SHOWS THE JOOMLA! COPYRIGHT INFORMATION=This module shows the Joomla! copyright information.

The two lines of the footer text are the aptly-named FOOTER_LINE1 and FOOTER_LINE2

Line 1 is fine, the site name and copyright notice, line 2 is what we want to alter. Note that there are NO quotes around the text.

If you just want to remove the second line, simply remove the html so the line looks like this . . .

FOOTER_LINE2=
MOD_FOOTER=<em>mod_footer</em>
THIS MODULE SHOWS THE JOOMLA! COPYRIGHT INFORMATION=This module shows the Joomla! copyright information.

Do NOT change anything else.

Save the file and check the result on your site. If it's not right go back and make a correction and try again.

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Download the file to your local computer and edit it, then upload it

This method is suitable if you are confident using ftp and editing.

Using your favourite ftp program, log into your site and locate the file . . .

/www/language/en-GB/en-GB.mod_footer.ini

depending on your server you may need a slightly different path, for example . . .

/public_html/language/en-GB/en-GB.mod_footer.ini

Download the file to an appropriate location of your local computer, then open it with your favourite text editor. Do not use a complex word processor because they insert too many special characters, instead use an editor that will work well with basic text files, that means something like notepad++ on a pc or Smultron on a Mac. Both are excellent editors designed for use by 'coders'.

Here's the file contents . . .

# $Id: en-GB.mod_footer.ini 10498 2008-07-04 00:05:36Z ian $
# Joomla! Project
# Copyright (C) 2005 - 2008 Open Source Matters. All rights reserved.
# License http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.html GNU/GPL, see LICENSE.php
# Note : All ini files need to be saved as UTF-8 - No BOM
# Note : %date% will be auto replaced by current year !Don't translate

FOOTER=Footer
FOOTER_LINE1=Copyright &#169; %date% %sitename%. All Rights Reserved.
FOOTER_LINE2=<a href="http://www.joomla.org">Joomla!</a> is Free Software released under the <a href="http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.html">GNU/GPL License.</a>
MOD_FOOTER=<em>mod_footer</em>
THIS MODULE SHOWS THE JOOMLA! COPYRIGHT INFORMATION=This module shows the Joomla! copyright information.

FOOTER_LINE1 outputs the copyright notice

FOOTER_LINE2 outputs the 'Free software' line, if you simply want to remove it, just delete the part that is highlighted in red. Note that there are NO quotes. Don't change anything else.

If you want to include other text or links make the appropriate changes.

Finally upload the file back to the server and test the site to make sure it works as expected.

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