Thread

I know. I know. This is probably the oldest fire-starter around these parts but a search through the forums really didn’t end up yielding any red meat. So here is my take on when to use the structure module vs using native EE channel+category approach. This is all probably based on a novice’s misunderstanding but I am trying to gain insight here - so bear with me folks.

To me both approaches have their own unique applications for unique business and content requirements. The choice I make seems to be related to the kind of site I am building. By the latter, I mean the content architecture and strategy I am recommending on the website I am building. Yeah - I am a content guy first and a web developer second.

So Structure seems to be useful when there aren’t too many categories involved and a page based hierarchical approach seems to be the ideal way to present a tree-like view to the client and user. For a typical corporate website with discreet service listings, I think I would best go with structure. This is when I am sure that the no of pages are limited and ideally in the range of 50-75. If the number exceeded this limit, I feel it would make diminishing visible sense to view a vertical structure and find the right child page to which to add a new page.

The native approach seems to be more powerful and adaptable to media, magazine, product related web portals where there can be more than 8000 entries residing in each channel and the site adds fifty entries a week. I also prefer to look at content as not being contained in a page but being available on-demand as a source when called upon by a template (a stiff nod to @Boyink in that direction). A movie magazine site would have more of entries rather than pages.

One more thing I would like to point out: right now it seems more natural to establish relationships between channels rather than between pages. One movie entry can be reused as a review, piece of a dvd store description or a wiki entry. Can you say the same about pages? I really don’t know and would like to be enlightened.

So now I would really like to know how wrong I am and how right I am as a novice. I am building out two separate websites from each of the above mentioned categories. Would love to hear about your experiences. Please share your stories.

I really think it’s a case of looking at the content requirements then deciding whether Structure will fit, or not as the case may be.

Ya blue. I agree. So that’s what my post was about: analyzing content requirements. But different people do it differently. I think it was you who once explained EE as a lego game where you put together things using movable pieces. For a newbie like me there are too many moving pieces and I am trying to figure out what works best to make a certain kind of website.

Ah Lego 😊

You’re right in saying that Structure might not be ideal for managing 1000’s of entries, though there’s no reason why you couldn’t use it for managing smaller sections of a site that just had general “pages, eg an “about” section.

As you’re new to EE I suggest the way forward would be to do as much as you can without any 3rd party addons, just using native EE functionality. Then if you need to do something specific that can’t be done “out of the box” that is usually the time to start looking for addons. Consider that at least 1/3 of the EE sites I build use no 3rd party addons (well except for Imgsizer plugin, but that’s all).

Absolutely! I have put myself on an add-ons diet 😊
Though I am facing a peculiar dilemma with my current project and would like your advice:
I am currently charged with upgrading my client’s current website and being told by the SEO agency that in no way shape or form should the URLs change.

Now I know this makes things especially painful for me and so I turned to the structure module. Alas there too I am stuck:

I am needed to build this kind of heirarchy:

Services
  - service name one
  - Service name two etc.

As you can see these are parent and child pages. But the SEO agency says the urls have to be:

http://www.sitename.com/services
http://www.sitename.com/service-name-one
http://www.sitename.com/services-name-two

AND NOT
http://www.sitename.com/services/service-name-one
http://www.sitename.com/services/service-name-two

Now I was under the impression (perhaps mistaken) that I could have any kind of segments I want on my site with structure and I don’t have to respect any strict segmentation. Was I wrong? How do I get the urls I want?

So now I am thinking of using the pages module along with Nav-ee. Do you think this will work, blue?

You can do that without any addons 😊

You’ll have a template group that you mark as the “Deafult group”, in there you have an index template. All you need to do is run a couple of conditionals in that template to pump out whatever you want, based on whether segment_1 of the url is present or not, eg:

{if segment_1 == ""}
Home page content (segment 1 is blank)
{/if}

{if segment_1 != ""}
{exp:channel:entries channel="services" limit="1"}
<h1>{title}</h1>
Page content (segment 1 is not blank)
{/exp:channel:entries}
{/if}

Bloody SEO companies 😉

Oh SHIT! I tried that before but never thought it would take me all the way. Goddamn gotta get those 65 bucks back from Travis 😊
Thanks so much Blue for lighting that one up for me.

Don’t knock that Structure licence, there’s always a chance you’ll need it on another project 😊

Ya - I think I am going to hold on to it. But was I right about Structure respecting strict urls?
Also I am going to run into trouble while creating a menu for the services section. Will need your help again there I think but right now I am off to brave it alone. Thanks blue.