Thread

Hi,

I was wondering if EE would be suitable for a site such as the following:
https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B1SXycn_0wClOTZuVEFXenItclE

The first row of pages (Artist section) is probably easy enough, but the 2nd row (Exhibitions section) is perhaps not as simple as it looks:

There are three content types

Exhibitions
Artists
Works

Works belong to Artists, and Artists belong to Exhibitions. Artists need to have multiple Exhibition parents.

Where it is tricky is that each Exhibition has a different subset of Artists, and each Artist within that Exhibition has a different subset of works, e.g.:

Exhibition 1
- Artist 1
—- Artist 1: Work 1
—- Artist 1: Work 2
- Artist 2
—- Artist 2: Work 1
—- Artist 2: Work 3
- Artist 4
—- Artist 4: Work 3
—- Artist 4: Work 6

Exhibition 2
- Artist 1
—- Artist 1: Work 1
—- Artist 1: Work 4
- Artist 2
—- Artist 2: Work 3
—- Artist 2: Work 4
- Artist 5
—- Artist 5: Work 2
—- Artist 5: Work 7

I envisage appending URL parameters such as ‘?exhibition-id=1’ to links, and then filtering the next page by that parameter e.g. ‘show artists and images where exhibition-id=1’.

I might need to
- Filter by multiple parameters
- Filter by different parameters for different items on the page (Artist Name, Work Image etc).
- Group the output, e.g. displaying groups of images under an Artist heading.

It doesn’t have to use URL parameters, that justs help me picture it in my head.
My questions are:

- Can EE do this?
- Can it do it without any PHP coding?
- Can it do it without me spending hours abusing tags trying to get it to do something it wasn’t designed for?

I do have an old trial version of EE installed somewhere - is v2 significantly different and can I try it out?

Thanks!

Hi Finn,

Thank you for your questions and interest in ExpressionEngine!

There are several approaches you could take to do this in EE.

One way would be to have your artists as Member/Authors and the works stored as channel entries. Then your Exhibitors could be be categories.

Filtering in the URL wouldn’t work quite as you describe, but the end result would be the same.

Another option would be to use a multi-relationship add-on like Playa to tie everything together.
ExpressionEngine 2 is a bit different if you would email us at .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) we can qualify you for an evaluation license!

Please let me know if you have any other questions!

Thank you Dan,

I’ll give your first option a go and see how it works out.

😉  Glad Dan was able to give you some suggestions.  Nailing down the architecture will be key with this one.  If you need help once you get into the details, just let us know!

Hi Robin,

😉  Nailing down the architecture will be key with this one.

I’m quite sure you’re right, having tried and failed to do it already with another cms…

😉If you need help once you get into the details, just let us know!

Thank you!

Yep- it’s a difficult one to start out with.  And the first one’s always the hardest.  I’d play around with it and realize there are multiple approaches and some will just ‘feel’ more right to you than others.  For me- I see Authors and Art as channels- linked by relationships.  And then Exhibits are categories.  But yea… a lot of ways to go at it!

Yep- it’s a difficult one to start out with.  And the first one’s always the hardest.  I’d play around with it and realize there are multiple approaches and some will just ‘feel’ more right to you than others.  For me- I see Authors and Art as channels- linked by relationships.  And then Exhibits are categories.  But yea… a lot of ways to go at it!

I’ll do as you say and have a go at it. My instinct tells me that I’ll end up using Playa, but I should try and do it without at first so that I can get to grips with the basics. I’ve already noticed the built in relationships function is a bit basic. I must say I’ll be impressed if Playa isn’t necessary.

Playa is super handy.  But yes- I think you’re better of starting without it.  Get the basics down and then see if you need it.  I don’t think I would, but there really is a lot of variability in how you could tackle this.  Let us know how it goes!