[SOLVED] How to use mod_mainmenu_ml

san · Post by **san** » Sat Jul 22, 2006 3:33 pm

Hi,

I am a total newbie to joomla! and joomfish and now I am looking for help on how to use the mod_mainmenu_ml module. I would like to have my site showing different menu's depending on the language the user chooses and I believe mod_mainmenu_ml should be able to do exactly this. So, I installed the module and tried to make a new menu in the menu manager named 'mainmenu_nl'. It doesn't show up, though, when I change the language of my site to Dutch.
I found in a forumpost that I had to unpublish the normal mainmenu module, so I did. I do see the 'Multilingual aware main menu' in my site, but it stays the same for both English and Dutch.

Could anyone tell me what I should do after installing the module to make it work?

Thanks a lot!!

san · Post by **san** » Sun Jul 23, 2006 10:38 am

Got it working now. Don't know exactly what I did wrong the first time, but now it works perfectly!

In case there are other newbies around like me trying to do the same, here's what I did step by step:

- Install mod_mainmenu_ml.zip using Installer - Modules.

- In Modules - Site Modules unpublish all modules of type mod_mainmenu (Main Menu, Other Menu, User Menu and Top Menu) and publish the new 'Multilingual aware Main Menu' module. Also change its order from 99 into 1 to make it show up at the same position as the original main menu.

- In Menu - Menu Manager select mainmenu and click Copy. Give it a name like 'mainmenu_nl' where you replace 'nl' with the ISO language code for the language you want. Choose a new module name, for example 'Main Menu NL' (I think this name doesn't matter since you won't be using this module later on. Is this correct??).
Change the menu items of your new menu (mainmenu_nl) so you'll be able to see a different menu for your language. For example, unpublish one of the menu items or add a new menu item.

- In Modules - Site Modules make sure that the new module that was made because you made a new menu is unpublished (in my case 'Main Menu NL'). This may seem odd, but you will be using the 'Multilingual aware Main Menu' module instead.
If modules of both mod_mainmenu and mod_mainmenu_ml type are published at the same time, you will see an error in your frontend:
Fatal error: Call to undefined function mosCheckMLMenutype().

Now, it should work. When you change the language in your frontend, you should see the main menu change.
Maybe, the reason it didn't work the first time I tried, was that the mainmenu_nl had no (published, publicly accessible) menu-items. If that's the case, you won't see an empty main menu, but the default mainmenu instead.

If anyone feels that there's something clumsy or incorrect in this description, please, feel free to correct me. I'm just in the trial-and-error phase :-)

fernandoch · Post by **fernandoch** » Wed Aug 23, 2006 7:47 am

san wrote: Change the menu items of your new menu (mainmenu_nl) so you'll be able to see a different menu for your language. For example, unpublish one of the menu items or add a new menu item.

- In Modules - Site Modules make sure that the new module that was made because you made a new menu is unpublished (in my case 'Main Menu NL'). This may seem odd, but you will be using the 'Multilingual aware Main Menu' module instead.

Could you please explain a bit more these 2 parts? I am not able to make it work

How would it know to which language to translate? If I call it mainmenu_es how would it translate it to spanish? How to know it? I also tried translating it by hand but nothing ...

akede · Post by **akede** » Wed Aug 23, 2006 3:02 pm

Hi fernandoch,

Sorry to say, but if you read the manual at http://forge.joomla.org/sf/wiki/do/view ... nguageMenu you would know how to translate and how the fish knows.

Alex

fernandoch · Post by **fernandoch** » Wed Aug 23, 2006 3:03 pm

Hi akede,

I read that but it did not work for me (the menu part, not the translation, I know how to translate). This is why I asked for more help.

Thank you anyways.

san · Post by **san** » Thu Aug 24, 2006 9:21 am

Hi fernandoch,

Not sure if I can help, but I'll try...

san wrote: Change the menu items of your new menu (mainmenu_nl) so you'll be able to see a different menu for your language. For example, unpublish one of the menu items or add a new menu item.

With this I mean that if you have made your new language specific menu, in your case mainmenu_es, you should put some menu items in this menu that should only be visible when you watch your site in spanish. As long as you don't put any specific menu items in your mainmenu_es, you won't see the difference between the normal mainmenu and the mainmenu_es.

san wrote: - In Modules - Site Modules make sure that the new module that was made because you made a new menu is unpublished (in my case 'Main Menu NL'). This may seem odd, but you will be using the 'Multilingual aware Main Menu' module instead.

In the list of Site Modules, you will see menu modules of type 'mod_mainmenu' and menu modules of type 'mod_mainmenu_ml'. It is not possible to have modules of both types published at the same time. Therefore, since you want to use the multilingual menu, unpublish any modules of type 'mod_mainmenu' and publish modules of type 'mod_mainmenu_ml'.

fernandoch wrote: How would it know to which language to translate? If I call it mainmenu_es how would it translate it to spanish? How to know it? I also tried translating it by hand but nothing ...

I think the module uses the ISO language code. You can see this code when you look in Components - Joom!Fish - languages. Probably in your case you will see something like 'spanish' with ISO 'es' or something. So, when you view your website in spanish, the multilingual module will check if there is a mainmenu_es. I think... ;-)

Hope you'll get it working now!
Sandra

fernandoch · Post by **fernandoch** » Thu Aug 24, 2006 2:36 pm

san wrote: - In Menu - Menu Manager select mainmenu and click Copy. Give it a name like 'mainmenu_nl' where you replace 'nl' with the ISO language code for the language you want. Choose a new module name, for example 'Main Menu NL' (I think this name doesn't matter since you won't be using this module later on. Is this correct??).
Change the menu items of your new menu (mainmenu_nl) so you'll be able to see a different menu for your language. For example, unpublish one of the menu items or add a new menu item.

When you do this, in Site Modules, for Main Menu NL the module used is mod_mainmenu and not mod_mainmenu_ml I am getting confused ...

There is no way to create a new menu of type mod_mainmenu_ml.

san · Post by **san** » Fri Aug 25, 2006 7:57 am

fernandoch wrote: When you do this, in Site Modules, for Main Menu NL the module used is mod_mainmenu and not mod_mainmenu_ml I am getting confused ...

There is no way to create a new menu of type mod_mainmenu_ml.

I agree, it was confusing for me as well. You will have to unpublish this module 'Main Menu NL' which is of type mod_mainmenu. It will not be used.
So, first you create a menu (Main Menu NL for example). This results in a new module (Main Menu NL) of type mod_mainmenu. And this new module will not be used, only the menu will be used. So, you will have to unpublish this new module. That is quite confusing...
You will still have one module of type mod_mainmenu_ml and just make sure it is published. The module itself will check if there is a menu with the name 'mainmenu_es' (or 'mainmenu_nl' in my case).

Keep trying, I think you're almost there... :-)

fernandoch · Post by **fernandoch** » Fri Aug 25, 2006 8:01 am

Hi san,

So I should create many menus of type mod_mainmenu?

For example in menu manager:

mainmenu_es
mainmenu_fr
mainmenu_ar

All of type mod_mainmenu. Then go to site modules and unpublish all of them and just leave the mod_mainmenu_ml published? And it will know which one to get? Very confusing!

san · Post by **san** » Fri Aug 25, 2006 8:12 am

Yes, that's what I did and it works. Did you try already?

fernandoch · Post by **fernandoch** » Fri Aug 25, 2006 11:11 am

Yes I tried it with no success.

Can you check the files attached to see if something is wrong.

Top Menu, which is not shown in the picture is also unpublished.

san · Post by **san** » Fri Aug 25, 2006 11:36 am

I don't see anything strange. What happens when you browse your site? Do you use the language selector to switch languages? Does the normal translation work (apart from this menu issue), so do you see your content in the language you select?

fernandoch · Post by **fernandoch** » Fri Aug 25, 2006 11:39 am

Yes everything changes, but the menu stays the original one

Other parts get translated perfectly.

Do you have a link to check your site to see how it should work? Maybe I could get an idea ...

san · Post by **san** » Fri Aug 25, 2006 11:47 am

fernandoch wrote: Do you have a link to check your site to see how it should work? Maybe I could get an idea ...

No, it's not online yet, sorry.

The only thing left I can think of is that you could check if your mainmenu_fr has indeed menuitems that are published and publicly accessible (from your screenshot I see that it contains 13 menuitems), and also that they are different from the menuitems you have in the normal mainmenu (or else you won't see any difference). That was my problem when it didn't work in my case. I had a mainmenu_nl but with no menuitems in it. Then, instead of showing an empty menu, it showed the default mainmenu.

If this also is not the problem in your case, I really wouldn't know why it doesn't work. Could anyone else help??

fernandoch · Post by **fernandoch** » Fri Aug 25, 2006 11:52 am

All the links are publicly accessible

and with some differences from each other ...

I guess I will have to translate the menus as I translate any other page ...

Thank you anyways.

san · Post by **san** » Fri Aug 25, 2006 12:00 pm

So, when you switch languages with the language selector, let's say from english to french, do you see exactly the same menu items whether you choose english or french? Or do you see the menu items that belong to the mainmenu_fr (although in english)?

fernandoch · Post by **fernandoch** » Fri Aug 25, 2006 12:06 pm

When I switch languages nothing changes in the menus.

I see the items in the menu as mainmenu all the time. mainmenu_fr and mainmenu_es never show up ...

fernandoch · Post by **fernandoch** » Fri Aug 25, 2006 12:25 pm

Well it works!

I tried it locally and it did not work. Then I tried it online and it worked ... Strange, very strange ...

fernandoch · Post by **fernandoch** » Fri Aug 25, 2006 12:39 pm

I think I know what was the problem ...

Locally I installed the bundle Joomla and Fish together from http://forge.joomla.org/sf/projects/joomfish at the top right --> which leads to problems with the mod_mainmenu_ml (it just does not work)

In my live site I installed first Joomla then the Fish, each one apart and the mod_mainmenu_ml worked perfectly ... This might be the cause ...

I can even publish mod_mainmenu modules with no problems at all.

Thank you San for everything.

Jmx · Post by **Jmx** » Fri Oct 27, 2006 2:42 pm

Awsome.. this works so good

Since we unpublished the usual mainmenu we don't get any title from it, the only title we can use is from mainmenu_ml but that's in one language all the time.
Anyone got a solution to get the menu title in the right language?

san · Post by **san** » Sat Oct 28, 2006 8:48 am

Hi Jmx,

Did you try to translate the module? I translated it with JoomFish. Filter the list of content elements to show only modules. Now you should see the module corresponding to the mainmenu_ml and you can translate its title.

Hope this helps!

Good luck,
Sandra

Jmx · Post by **Jmx** » Wed Nov 01, 2006 12:47 pm

Thank you san

I didn't think of that, now it works perfect.

Kotiniemi · Post by **Kotiniemi** » Sun Sep 16, 2007 5:55 pm

I didn't find this thread originally but someone else pointed me here. Thanks for the advise, I wish the official guide had a step by step explanation as written by san!

Now I'm off to spread the help to someone unfamiliar with the workings of mod_mainmenu_ml (as I was earlier).

: Niko

rwt · Post by **rwt** » Sun Jan 13, 2008 3:27 pm

There is something I don't quite get... what menu name do I choose in the Multilingual aware Main Menu??
'Cause I've got two Menus....
mainmenu is the english one
mainmenu_fr the french one

And if I select either of them, it doesn't change when I change the frontend language!

DottieZ · Post by **DottieZ** » Tue Oct 30, 2012 11:46 am

Hello! Thanks for your tutorial on how to use mod_mainmenu_ml

I've got however two problems. I did everything according to these posts, the mutlingual menu shows up, but when I change the language, the position configuration doesn't change (default is en, I created es and removed some of the poistions, but they still keep appearing). What should I do to fix this? I left some of the positions in the es menu, so it is not the "empty menu" problem...

The other thing is that me multilingual menu lost its template formatting. It's just "bare links". Can I do anything about it?

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