Show robots in ACP article - menu - category items and add filter batch function

[7EIRISH]

Hello,

I guess this is more of a feature request. Would be nice to add the robots status in the article, menu, category lists as well as function in filter and batch options within the ACP.

As it is when adding new sections to an existing site or when starting a new site, having to go through the many items individually takes time to check for the robots status. If the status was displayed in lists at least one would be able to know which item needs addressed, without having to click through each item.

If having large numbers of items needing changes to robots then the filter options and batch would aid in getting this done fairly quick. The batch already has the option to change permissions, why not add robots.

There are plenty of situations when the global setting is not enough if having fairly new items or updating many old items when content builds and wanting different settings throughout a site.

Cheers!

[AMurray]

"robots status"

[toivo]

"ACP"? Is that an extension? Link, please!

[sozzled]

We've written before and (no doubt) we'll have to repeat ourselves again.

Various "settings" (or options) are handled in the following increasing order of priority:

1) Global settings.
2) Content settings (e.g. categories first then articles)
3) Menu item settings

The same thing applies to "robots".

1) The global settings are defined in J! 4.x at System » Global Configuration » Metadata » Robots
2) Content settings: these settings are defined on the Publishing tab for categories and articles.
3) Menu item settings: these settings are controlled with the Metadata tab

In other words, these settings can be assigned in several places. I am a believer in set and forget; once I set something I am unlikely to change it and, even if I was tempted to do so, these things don't weigh heavily on my mind. If people really want to mess around with different settings for different menus, articles and categories, there is a price to pay.

Perhaps it would be a nice feature to extend the ability of some "batch" operation when working with articles but it may be possible—if you're clever enough and have the patience—to write a custom PHP script. That's what I would do. You could pay someone to write such a script for you; it's unlikely anyone would be changing these things very often.

@toivo: I think ACP is the OP's unusual acronym for Access Control Panel. I admit that I spent about 10 minutes trying to understand this, too.

[7EIRISH]

We've written before and (no doubt) we'll have to repeat ourselves again.

Various "settings" (or options) are handled in the following increasing order of priority:

1) Global settings.
2) Content settings (e.g. categories first then articles)
3) Menu item settings

The same thing applies to "robots".

1) The global settings are defined in J! 4.x at System » Global Configuration » Metadata » Robots
2) Content settings: these settings are defined on the Publishing tab for categories and articles.
3) Menu item settings: these settings are controlled with the Metadata tab

In other words, these settings can be assigned in several places. I am a believer in set and forget; once I set something I am unlikely to change it and, even if I was tempted to do so, these things don't weigh heavily on my mind. If people really want to mess around with different settings for different menus, articles and categories, there is a price to pay.

Perhaps it would be a nice feature to extend the ability of some "batch" operation when working with articles but it may be possible—if you're clever enough and have the patience—to write a custom PHP script. That's what I would do. You could pay someone to write such a script for you; it's unlikely anyone would be changing these things very often.

@toivo: I think ACP is the OP's unusual acronym for Access Control Panel. I admit that I spent about 10 minutes trying to understand this, too.

No kidding, and that's not what I'm asking. If having a hundred items to change the setting each one has to be set individually requiring admin to have to click on each one, check and edit the setting then save/close and search for the next by opening every item. This has nothing to do with the hierarchy. please...

[sozzled]

This has everything to do with the hierarchy. What metadata settings have you used for each of the following

1) Global settings
2) Content settings
3) Menu item settings.

Take your time. I have all week.

[7EIRISH]

"ACP"? Is that an extension? Link, please!

ADMIN CONTROL PANEL

[7EIRISH]

This has everything to do with the hierarchy. What metadata settings have you used for each of the following

1) Global settings
2) Content settings
3) Menu item settings.

Take your time. I have all week.

Global settings are index follow - set it once and forget it.
Content uses global - set it once and forget it
menu item settings - used to control which robots to override - of a few hundred some are nofollow/noindex due to no content/article input, only static custom modules/links to other related content while empty. Some noindex/follow due to having content that is there then removed when expired until enough user input keeps this section active with current content and new.

Once again what you are so proud to argue has nothing to do with my post. I want to see the setting/parameter in the item lists (same as status/title/menu/home/id columns) headers which cannot be seen unless opening every item to check the robots setting. The procedure you speak of also has not one thing to do with filtering options and bulk/batch editing the robots setting.

[sozzled]

I'm not paying attention to personal characterisations; I'm trying to help you.

It's good that you're using fairly standard values for the global and content settings.

I think there are ways of tweaking the menu items settings reasonably simply. As far as embedded links within content may be concerned, that's a whole new ballgame. There's an old adage in systems analysis that goes like this: "When you put a dollar value on all the available options, the solution becomes immediately obvious."

It should be possible to change the menu item settings with SQL; after all, the settings are stored in the _menu table (in the params column) and, if you wrote a PHP script to explode the values, find out what was used for the robots one, change it, rejoin the string and store the amended value back in the menu items(s) then the problem would probably be solvable. How long would it take to write such a custom PHP script? How long is a piece of string, eh? How much would it cost to do this? How much is it worth to you?

I don't have a ready-made solution. I'm just theorising on how I might go about it if it was a matter of concern to me.

However, the problem is complicated by several orders of magnitude if there are embedded links contained within site content and that could be a pretty big deal. As I wrote above, if people want to fiddle around with things on an item-by-item basis, there is a cost in doing this.

[7EIRISH]

That's not what I'm asking and never had there been mention of embedded links. I am asking only about items. Its not a matter of knowing how to edit or change the robots setting in its default method of using the CMS. Since using this CMS since mambo I already know how to edit menu items and change settings. Please read the original post in its entirety. Its not a question of how to edit settings, its about features to edit settings more efficiently.

In the OP, the very first paragraph:

I guess this is more of a feature request. Would be nice to add the robots status in the article, menu, category lists as well as function in filter and batch options within the ACP.

...to be able to edit this setting in bulk or view without having to open every item to simply check the robots setting.

robots.png

The database is out of the question as I would have to go through every menu item to see which ones need changed before writing the many queries to make the alterations to the database table. If doing so I would just edit the item when having each one open, the database makes no sense.

The goal and question asked, once again, is to be able to view the robots setting value/parameter in lists as other parameters are shown and edit the robots in bulk the same as being able to batch settings for permissions and moving items to different locations. Sorry, there is no other way to explain this very simple request for a feature.

[sozzled]

This is a simple request for a complicated solution, in my opinion.

You would need to create some kind custom view or override to achieve what you're looking for. Good luck.

[7EIRISH]

That's it.

So after all of that garbage you posted, and stating,

I'm not paying attention to personal characterisations; I'm trying to help you.

when your very first reply was not only completely off base, but some sort of dig on how:

'We've written before and (no doubt) we'll have to repeat ourselves again.

implying the setup was incorrect and this post had everything to do with how to set robots settings according to your writings. You were wrong.

I just hope someone on the team sees the request and the potential value in time savings for users. Hopefully the post hasn't been tainted too badly with irrelevant replies for the right person to pass it along.

Cheers!

[ceford]

As a stop-gap you could use phpMyAdmin to search for 'robots' - in many cases you can see the setting immediately. You could refine the search to find 'robots' with a particular setting. You might even compose a query to change all the settings to what you want.

[herb200mph]

Unbelievable!