Perch CMS Tutes

Freeway
1

I know there are a few video tutorials on the Perch site, but the more advanced apps are difficult to understand.

Has anyone integrated the Perch Blog with Freeway? And if you have, do you have a demo, walkthrough, tutorial (no matter how basic or advanced) that I could follow.

Perch looks like a great cms that is customisable and expandable, but it’s a little tricky for non-coders to understand.

Any pointers with the blog side of things would be well appreciated.

I have it installed here, but finding it difficult to style / adapt

http://www.newyoubootcamp.com/demo/blog.html

Nathan

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2

Further to this, I believe Todd has had Perch working successfully. If that’s correct - did you manage to install and get the blog working in FW Todd?

Nathan

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3

Further to this, I believe Todd has had Perch working successfully. If that’s correct - did you manage to install and get the blog working in FW Todd?

Hi Nathan,

I’ve used Perch for a few sites and while I’ve always installed the Blog app I haven’t needed to use that feature until now; a job I’m currently working on will need it very soon. Although I’m using tools other than FW I will try to help if possible. What are you having trouble with?

Todd

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4

Hi Todd,

Thanks for your reply.

My main issue is making sure I have implemented it correctly for FW as opposed to another web app.

  1. I have installed the blog app correctly
  2. Within FW I have added the runtime.php code to the /head as there are other CMS managed areas on the page too
  3. Within FW I have created an expandable div (as my footer sits at the bottom) and then with HTML Markup I have added the following from the Perch installation page:
<?php perch_blog_recent_posts(10); ?>
  1. Once uploaded I have previewed the page - then gone into the CMS admin > Apps > Blog and created an entry
    http://dev.newyoubootcamp.co.uk/blog.html

That is as far as I have got…

I would like to be able to style the blog (I assume this is done within the templates)
Also, when I you click on an entry, it goes through a new page with no site structure, and when you click on any of the archive links at the bottom of that page, it goes to my 404 page.

Aside from the styling issue, I just don’t think I have gone the correct route with integrating it with FW - I feel I need to add different mark up instead of just the <?php perch_blog_recent_posts(10); ?>

Thanks,
Nathan

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5

When you downloaded the Blog app there was an example folder named “blog”. Inside that were 4 php files and a stylesheet. I think the problem is that the app is wired to look for “post.php”, “archive.php” etc. So you either have to modify those example pages to suit your styling or create your own pages with those names (and put them in the “blog” folder with the index page) then copy the Perch blog tags from those example files and put them in your version.

Todd

On Oct 26, 2011, at 3:19 AM, BigG wrote:

he fo

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6

Aha

That makes much more sense than the way I was going about it - doh!

Thanks Todd for pointing me in the right direction I will give it a go and report back.

Regards
Nathan

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7

That makes much more sense than the way I was going about it - doh! Thanks Todd for pointing me in the right direction I will give it a go and report back.

You’re welcome.

Glad to hear you’re giving Perch a try.

Todd

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8

Being trying this all morning, I think it’s a bit beyond me - Just cannot figure out the styling / linking etc. Too many things to change… FW page, CSS files, Perch Templates etc.

I add a new item and when viewed in a browser, when I click on the article it opens a blank page. Will have to start again from scratch.

Would be something I’d actually pay to see on video - shame Perch have videos for other things but not the blog. Maybe it’s something that is too tricky to embed into an FW page.

Nathan

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9

Perch support is very responsive so don’t overlook that resource, they’ve walked me through several technical issues.

Is it possible you missed copying a Perch tag to your FW page? Without seeing the files it’s hard to know where the problem lies so I’m not sure what other suggestions I can make.

Todd

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10

Thanks Todd

I’m going to give it another go over the next couple of days and try to sort out the process to work to so I don’t get muddled.

Regards
Nathan

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11

I’m going to give it another go over the next couple of days and try to sort out the process to work to so I don’t get muddled.

I can’t promise anything but if you want to send me a stripped-down copy of the FW file I can see if I can sort it out. Contact me off-list if you’re interested.

Todd

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12

That would be great - I will give it a go with a stripped down version.

Many thanks Todd

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13

Yeeha… finally got it working.

It wasn’t that difficult actually, after I read the documentation correctly.

All I have left to do is to be able to change the spacing before and after the elements in the blog posts. i.e. after the head I would like to increase the spacing before the image.

My page is here:

Where would I change that spacing - I cannot see it anywhere in the markup, template or css file but it must be there somewhere.

I have just pasted the code from the demo file supplied.

Thanks
Nathan

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14

Looks like these headers have the following

class=“entry-title”

So if you create a style in FW with a space after attribute to suit that should do the trick for you.

David

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15

Thanks David - just to let you know, once I’d removed the css link from /head, renamed the styles in the Perch templates from “entry-title” to “entrytitle” as FW does like creating ‘-’ in styles, then it was easy to create and manage all the Blog styles from within FW.

So, thank you for pointing me in the right direction.

Regards
Nathan

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16

Hi Nathan
I’ve checked your site which looks v good and I’m convinced you’ve done what I’m about to attempt myself.

I have created a website and to-date have been using blogspot for my blog as it allows you to copy the page code onto its servers so that it kinda still looks like your own website. But it’s not perfect and the time has come to bring the blog onto my own web server.

I’m considering using perch to do this and wondered if you wouldn’t mind giving me a quick heads up on the workflow system used to achieve this. I’ve designed my site with FreewayPro.
Your help would be hugely appreciated.

Many thanks
Jamie

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17

You buy the licence from Perch and they give you a licence key. You then download the software and follow their easy to use installation instructions.

You then log back in on their site and download the apps (Blog, Twitter, FoxyCart etc.) you install them all in the same way… but uploading the download the apps folder on the server and copying a piece of code (they show you) into the apps config file.

When you login to the CMS (normally http://www.yourwebsite.com/perch/) you will see tabs at the top to click through to the app itself.

Out of the box, there are templates you can use to make sure it’s working how it should be. Then, what I do is create the 3 template pages in Freeway (index.php, archive.php and post.php) in the same style as the rest of my site. I then open up the template files I been using to test it (the ones they supply) and copy the <div /div> code and paste that into my freeway pages as markup.

I do that on all 3 pages (bear in mind that all perch pages need a line of code in the /head to tell the CMS it’s Perch driven page - they give you this piece of code in the instructions too).

Different apps and different functions you need do mean you have to go into it a bit further by editing templates / css files etc. and that is the only area I’ve had issues with - mainly as I’m not a coder, just getting used to it.

That’s about it for the whole CMS really.

The support team at Perch and FoxyCart are brilliant - they respond almost immediately and point you in the right direction. It’s pretty satisfying when you get it all working and all from within one CMS login area.

Areas I have using Perch:
Footer
Promotions
Special Offers
Testimonials
Results
Forms
Twitter Feeds
Blog (main pages, plus pulling latest 3 headlines into other areas of the site)

On other sites I have installed the events diary, advertising space and FoxyCart commerce system too.

I highly recommend it. It’s open up a whole different world by doing it yourself rather than employing a developer.

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18

Nathan, great looking website. Nicely done. May I ask why you chose Perch, instead of WebYep, Pulse, or something else. I need to pick a CMS for a new client and I’m trying to decide on which one to go with.

I realize that they’re all different, but I’d rather learn one and get really good at it than switch back and forth, even if the CMS solution is initially a little overkill for my needs.

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19

Nathan, great looking website. Nicely done. May I ask why you chose Perch, instead of WebYep, Pulse, or something else. I need to pick a CMS for a new client and I’m trying to decide on which one to go with.

I realize that they’re all different, but I’d rather learn one and get really good at it than switch back and forth, even if the CMS solution is initially a little overkill for my needs.

While Nathan formulates his response I’ll say that as someone who has used Perch a number of times myself it strikes a very nice balance of being easy to setup on a static site (not unlike WebYep or Pulse) yet unusually powerful in accomplishing fairly complex functions. The catch (if that’s the right word) is that you need to take time to learn some basic code syntax to really get the most out of it, but it’s not anything a non-coder can’t get their head around with a little effort. But if you’re looking for point-n-click simplicity you’ll be disappointed. As a designer you don’t feel like you’re doing hand-to-hand combat with it which can be the case with some CMS. Plus, I like the fact it uses a MySQL database. It’s a great app for a wide variety of sites.

Todd

Portfolio: http://www.xiiro.com
Twitter: @ImXiiro
LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/xiiro
Skype: toddbrilliant

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20

Todd is correct - you do have to get your hands a little dirty, but it’s great it being hosted on your own server and using MySQL.

With Perch you can push it a lot further than WebYep and Pulse, but it’s all down to what you need. WebYep is fine for simple updates to the site, but if you’re looking for more, then Pulse is the next step and I think Perch is another step further on.

The developers of Perch are http://www.edgeofmyseat.com/

Take a look at this site for others driven with Perch:
http://www.poweredbyperch.com/
http://www.poweredbyperch.com/showcase/new-you-boot-camp
Mine is on the bottom - it’s a great place to showcase your Perch sites.

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