Introduction

About Joomla
Joomla is a platform based on PHP and MySQL which was
created in 2005 by a team of open source developers. It
currently has 200,000 community users and contributors.
Joomla is free to anyone who wants to download it and
use it to create a website. It is also open to anyone
who wants to create extensions and templates.
The most current version of Joomla can be downloaded
from http://www.joomla.org/download.html

There are three main free CMSs available today, and

endless other less popular ones. The most popular
Content Management Systems available are: Joomla,
Drupal and Wordpress.
The CMS of choice these days is Joomla. In 2010,
Wikipedia listed 102 free and open-source CMSes
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_
content_management_systems).

What makes Joomla so popular?

o it’s been around for a long time
o it’s free
o it has Loyal users
o Ease of use
o Minimal learning curve
o What-you-see-is-what-you-get (WYSIWYG) editing

Joomla! CMS is free web-based software which allows you

to create and manage websites. You can control:
1. Website content like text, photos, videos, etc.
2. Website appearance by utilizing templates
3. Website functionality by utilizing extensions.

There are two parts of the system: the front-end (what

the public see) and the back-end (what administrators
see).
The front-end
The front-end is what people see when they visit your
website. Normally there are standard items including a
logo, menu bar, side column and main text packaged up
in a cool design.

The back-end
The back-end is the administration area and is where
you control your website. Access is provided via a
special login page and only for users with
administrator permission.
Getting Joomla
Good news! You can get Joomla for free at
www.joomla.org.
Joomla is distributed as a compressed file, with the
file’s name reflecting the version of Joomla you’re
downloading. The version number changes often to
Reflect small upgrades. You may download Joomla Version
3.0, for example, but should you go back to download
Joomla again a month from now, the version number could
be something like 3.0.1, indicating that the software
Has been tweaked to make it even better than before.

Installing Joomla on Your Own Computer?

To get your Joomla site out in the world, you’ve got to
get it on the Internet, and that means using an ISP.
But to come up to speed on Joomla, installing the
program on your own computer often is much easier

You have two ways to install Joomla on to your local

machine: the hard way and the easy way. In the
following sections, I look at both methods — with
special emphasis on the easy one, of course.

The hard way: Installing components

The hard way to get Joomla running on your local
machine is to install the components you need, one by
one, and get them running.
✓ PHP 5.2 or later (www.php.net)
✓ MySQL 5.0.4 or later (www.mysql.com)
✓ Apache 1.3 or later (http://httpd.apache.org)

The easy way: Installing XAMPP

Most people (especially smart ones like you) find it
easier to install the Joomla environment as a single
package via XAMPP, which can be installed with minimal
effort and in just a few minutes. You can get XAMPP for
free
When you install XAMPP, it installs the Apache Web
server, PHP, and MySQL for you all in one fell swoop —
no fuss, no muss. XAMPP lays the full groundwork for
Joomla; after you install XAMPP, all you’ve got to do
is to unzip and install Joomla.
Currently, XAMPP supports these operating systems:
✓ Linux
✓ Windows
✓ Solaris
✓ Mac OS
NB: there is also WAMP(window apache mysql php) for
only windows OS and LAMP(Linux apache mysql php) for
Linux OS
XAMPP for Windows
To install XAMPP in Windows, follow these steps:
1. Download the executable installer file
installer.exe).
2. Double-click the .exe file to open the XAMPP
installer wizard
3. Click the Next button.
4. Follow the directions in the wizard to install
XAMPP, which also installs Apache, PHP, and MySQL.
5. When installation is complete, reboot your computer.

During installation, the wizard adds an icon for the

XAMPP control panel to the bar at the bottom of the
screen. Double-clicking that icon opens the control
panel, shown in Figure 2-16.

Installing the Joomla program

Now that you’ve got XAMPP up and running, you have
Apache, PHP, and MySQL. Cool. All you need to do now is
install Joomla
1. Go to www.joomla.org, and click the Download button.
2. Download the compressed .zip or .tar.gz file that’s
appropriate for your operating system.
3. Uncompress the Joomla files. Your newly installed
XAMPP directory contains a subdirectory named htdocs,
which is where you put the files you want to access
when you navigate to http://localhost in your browser.
You can copy the uncompressed Joomla files directly to
the XAMPP htdocs directory or to a subdirectory of
htdocs. If you create a subdirectory of the htdocs
directory named Joomla (that is, htdocs\joomla) and
copy the uncompressed files to that subdirectory,
Joomla will start when you navigate to
http://localhost/joomla in your browser.

4. Copy the uncompressed Joomla files to the htdocs

directory, or create a subdirectory of htdocs and then
copy the uncompressed files to that subdirectory.
5. Open your browser, and navigate to http://localhost
or http://localhost/xxxx (where xxxx is the name of the
subdirectory you created in Step 4).
The first Joomla installation page appears.

Setting up MySQL
When you install Joomla, it expects MySQL to be ready
for it to use, so in this section, you get MySQL ready
for Joomla.

1) Go to http://localhost/phpmyadmin
2) Click database tab
3) In create database field type your BD name
4) Click create bottom

Now joomla configuration is starting

Type http://localhost

Flow the instruction from the projector.

.
.
.
 Configuration Settings
Once Joomla is installed, it’s time to start adding
content and managing your site.
You will need to log into the administration of the
site. The default administration can be found at:
http://(your site and folder where Joomla is
installed)/administrator. You will need the username
and password you set up during installation to log in
and access the backend of your site.

User Manager
The user manager allows you to create new users by
clicking the “new” button and to edit existing users.
You can also use this interface to define what
permission group they belong to, which defines what
they can and can’t do on the site.
For example, “super administrators” have full control
of the site; meanwhile, registered users can access
parts of the front end of the site that require a log
in, but not much else.
 Registered – Can’t edit or publish any articles.
The user is simply a registered user of the site
with no privileges.
 Author – Can create content and determine where it
should go and some minor settings relating to their
individual articles.
 Editor – Has the same ability as the above users,
but they can also edit articles by other users.
 Publisher – Can do all of the above, plus the
ability to choose whether an article will be
published or not.

Administrator privileges
Joomla offers three default administrator groups,
which you can grant in
User Manager:
✓ Manager: User who has back-end privileges
✓ Administrator: User who has more back-end
privileges than a manager does
✓ Super User: User who has the most back-end
privileges If you installed the site, you’re the
super user — and the super user is the ruler of
everything.
Global Configuration

There are three tags under Global Configuration, and

your choices here affect the whole site. They are:
Site
You can take the site offline (so no one can see it
while you work on it). It will say the site is down for
maintenance.
You also have an option to change the site name and to
choose a default WYSIWYG editor (Watch You See Is What
You Get), which is the interface for you to create your
articles, make fonts, bold, create tables, etc. The
default is TinyMCE. You can install others if you like.
Joomla has a large selection of extensions available
for download, but more on that later.
List length determines how long the lists of articles
on the backend of your site will be by default, before
Joomla displays a "next page".

Feed length and feed email determine the length and

email for the RSS feed on your site.
Global Site Meta Description and keywords is the
description that Google and other search engines will
pick up as being the general site description and
keywords.

System
Under the system settings you will see several options
you might want to consider modifying, which control
whether users can register on your site and what kind
of privileges they can have.

Server
Most options will already be set for you during
installation. The options you must change are:
Under mail settings:
Mail from - the email you want to use when sending
messages from your Joomla site
From name:
The sender name you want the receivers to see on the
emails you send using your Joomla site.

How To Publish Content

Joomla 2.5 and before uses concept called SCAM(Section,
Category, Article and Menu) Think of a section as
being a like a drawer in a filing cabinet, a category
is the folder inside and articles as the documents
inside the folder.
But fortunately joomla 3.0 uses CAM(Category, Article
and Menu) let say that a category is the folder and
articles as the documents inside the folder.
Create content

When the content structure is ready on paper, you can

replicate it in Joomla! Let’s start with creating
categories.

Categories
1. Go to “Content” => “Category Manager” and click on
“Add New Category”
2. Next, insert the category title “About” and click
the “Save & Close” button on the toolbar.

After saving, you can see your new category “About”

appears in the Category Manager. When the categories are
ready, it’s time to create articles.

Articles

Let’s add a new article in the category “About”.

1. Go to “Content” => “Article Manager” and click
“Add New Article”
2. Next, you need to configure three parameters:
Title: Input “About my site”.

Category: Select category “About” from the list.

Article text: Input the article’s content.

3. If you want an article to be shown up on the front

page, please find the “Featured” parameter and set
it to “Yes”. This will make this article appear on
the front-page of the website.
 4. When you are finished, click the button “Save &
Close” on the toolbar to save your newly-created
article.

Now, you have a new article in the Article Manager

Now that you have completed the content creating
process, there is one final thing to do: create menu
items with links to these articles.
Menus

In Joomla! a menu is a collection of links to certain

elements like articles. In the back-end all menus are
located in the section “Menus”. By default, Joomla! is
preinstalled with a menu called “Main Menu”.

Let’s add new menu items to the menu “Main Menu”.

1. Click on the “Main Menu” in the “Menus” drop-down
menu.
2. Next, click the button “New” to create a new menu
item.
3. Next, click the button “Select” to choose the menu
item type.
4. As a result, a pop-up screen is displayed. There
are many different elements you can create a link
to, such as “Contacts”, “Articles”, “Smart
Search”, “Newfeeds” and so on. In this case you
need to create a link to an article, so click on
“Single Article”.
5. Next, you need to fill the parameter “Menu Title”,
for example “About my site”.
6. Next, you have to choose the article you want to
display. On the right of the screen, click the
button “Select” to select an article.
7. A pop-up screen will be displayed. Select the
article “About my site”.
 8. Click “Save & New” to create two more menu links
to the other two articles.
Add internal links

It’s very common to need to create internal links

between articles. These links are not only useful for
your users to browse content, but also good for Search
Engine Optimization (SEO). Let’s see how to create
internal links within an article.

1. Open the article you want to add internal links to

2. Select the text you want to be linked (called the
anchor text)

3. Click the “Article” button below the article editor

4. Now you will see a pop-up window with the list of
all your articles. Find the article you want to link,
then click on its title.
Add external links

In the previous section, you learnt how to create

internal links, i.e. those which link to articles on
your own website. In this section, you will find out
how to create external links to any page on the
Internet.

1. Select the text which you want to apply a link to

and then click the icon “Insert/edit link”. A pop-up
window will be shown as below

2. Input the following values to the 4 parameters in

this screen:
Link URL The destination address (i.e. the url) of
where you want the link to go to
 Target There are two options for you to choose: “Open
link in the same window” or “Open link in a new window”
(When you leave it “Not set”, the link will open in the
same window)
Title Short text describing the link

Class As a Joomla! newbie, for now just set it to

“Not set” (the two other options are “Caption” and
“System Page break”)
3. Click the “Insert” button to insert this link. After
that, you can see that your text is linked to the
external website.

Add “Page Break” and “Read More”

In cases of long articles, you may want to divide the

article into small, separate sections. With Joomla! you
have two options to help your visitors read longer
articles.
1. Page Break This element divides one article into
separate pages such as Page 1, Page 2, Page 3, etc.
Page breaks are ideal for very long articles.
2. Read More This element divides a full single article
into a teaser text and the rest of the article. If you
want to read the rest of the article, you have to click
on the“Read More” link.

Now, we will learn how to work with each one.

Add a “Page Break”

1. Place the text cursor in your article, in the

position where you want to split the article.
2. Click on the “Page Break” button below the article
editor.
Add a “Read More” link

Adding a “Read More” link is a similar process to

adding a page break.

1. Place the text cursor in the position within the

article where you want it split into the introduction
and main content parts.
2. Click on the “Read More” button under article
editor.
Choose a Joomla! template

Template resources

The quickest and easiest way to enhance the design of

your website is to use an existing Joomla! template.
There are many available on the Internet.
Free templates resources

The Joomla! community creates thousands of free

templates for you to choose from. Check following
websites:

http://www.joomla24.com/

http://www.joomlaos.de/

http://www.bestofjoomla.com

Commercial templates resources

If you have enough budget to purchase a template, then

we strongly recommend you take a look at following
template providers.
 http://www.joomlart.com

http://www.rockettheme.com

http://www.joomlashine.com/

http://www.yootheme.com

http://www.gavick.com

Criteria for choosing the right template

There are a lot of Joomla! templates to choose from.

Here are some criteria that can help you choose the
right template.
Compatibility

Which Joomla! version does it support? You need to

choose a template which supports Joomla! Version you
are running
Commercial or Non-commercial

Do you want to have a high-quality template and support

or are you on tight budget and therefore need to go
with a free template? Normally, commercial templates
are more flexible, have higher quality, more
comprehensive documentation and better support than
non-commercial.
Documentation

How well-documented is it? Does the documentation help

you understand all the template features? Does it show
you ways to customize the template?
Support
Is there ongoing support for the template? What ways
can you get support? – via forum, ticket support system
etc.? How long will it take to get answers? 12 hours,
24 hours or several days?
Design

Does it match the look and feel that you want for your
site? If it is similar to your desired design, you
won’t have to spend much time customizing it.
Otherwise, is it easy to customize it as you want?
Features

Professional templates provide many features whereas a

lot of free templates provide limited features.

If you are an individual or an ordinary user, a free

template may be a suitable choice. However, if you are
creating a business website, it’s definitely worth
spending a few dollars on a commercial template from a
professional provider. Don’t think you are wasting
money, Aside from higher quality design and code; you
also get good documentation and support. The time you
save will be more than worth the money spent.

Install a Joomla! template

After you have selected an appropriate Joomla!

template, it’s time to install it.
1. Go to “Extensions” => “Extension Manager”

3. Click the “Browse” button, find the template file

you have downloaded, and then click on the button
“Upload & Install”. After that, you get a
 notification which informs you that the template
has been installed successfully.
4. 3. Now that you have your new template installed,
it’s time to apply it to your site. Go to
“Extensions” => “Template Manager”
5. 4. Select the check box next to your new Joomla!
template, then from the top left menu, click on
the icon “Make Default” and it will set the
selected template to be the default design for
your Joomla! website.
Create multiple template styles to be assigned to
multiple menu items

You can use different templates on different pages on

your website

For example, you have a website using the template

Protostar, but you want another page to use the
template Beez3. You can do it easily by following the
instructions below: In this case, we create a new menu
item in the top menu and call it Beez3.
To do this, go to Menus -> Main Menu -> Add New Menu.
You can select any menu item type you want. For
example, we will choose menu item type: Single article,
set the menu title to “Beez3”, and select the article
“Getting Started”. Then save the menu.
Then you go to Extensions -> Template Manager -> Beez3.
In the section “Menus assignment”, choose the menu item
Beez3.
Extensions

Extensions are specially written software to be plugged

into Joomla! in order to extend website functionality.
For example, if you want to have a photo slideshow,
video gallery or an advanced contact form, then you
will need to install extensions for those purposes.

By default Joomla! is shipped with several extensions

covering basic needs. If you want more, there are
thousands of additional Joomla! extensions available
from the Joomla! Extension Directory. This is the
official directory of Joomla! extensions maintained by
the Joomla! core team.

There are 5 basic types of extensions: components,

modules, plug-ins, templates and languages. Each of
these extensions handles specific functionality.
Components

A component is the most complex type of extension. It

can be seen as an application that performs certain
tasks and displays specific content on your site. As
mentioned before a video gallery is an example of a
component. It could also be a shopping cart, booking
system, forum and more.

The content produced by a component is displayed in the

main content area. All components are located in the
section “Components”.

Modules
Modules have similar roles as components but on a
smaller scale. They perform simple tasks and display
content as small blocks on a page.

Examples of modules are a search box, login form, menu,

footer copyright information, etc. In many cases
modules are working in conjunction with components to
present content. For example, a shopping cart component
is used to manage products and a module is used to show
hot products. All modules are managed via “Extensions”
=> “Module Manager”.

Templates

The Template controls the graphical presentation of

your website. It determines the layout, colors, type-
faces, graphics and other aspects of design that make
your site unique.

In general, a template consists of three elements:

Static graphic elements, like background images,

design decoration, logotype, etc.

The main content area presenting data generated by

components.

Multiple module positions to show content presented

by modules, in specific locations.
you can control templates via “Extensions” => “Template
Manager”.

By default, Joomla! 3.x comes with two front-end

templates: “Protostar” and “Beez3”. But there are
thousands of both free and commercial templates
available, so you can definitely choose the best one
for your needs. Check out this list of top 10 Joomla!
3.0 templates for users.
Plug-ins

Plug-ins are designed to display content inside

components and modules. Plug-ins can also perform tasks
at certain points during website loading. You can think
about plug-ins as a more versatile way to interact with
the system. Examples of plug-ins you might see are the
voting functionality and the “Read more…” button in
articles. All plug-ins are managed via “Extensions” =>
“Plug-in Manager”.

What is a Joomla! module and position?

As mentioned before, a module performs simple tasks and

displays content as small blocks positioned around the
page. Each module is located in a specific position,
e.g. module “Main menu” is placed in position “left”.
Each position is designed to occupy a place in a page’s
layout, i.e. position “left” is placed on the left side
of main content. Each template can have many different
positions occupying various places on the page.

Here is another way to think about this concept.

Imagine your webpage as a wall. On that wall, there are
several pin boards (module positions) hanged in various
places. In each pin board, there are several stick
notes (modules) pinned. So at the end you have the wall
full of stick notes (modules) arranged in pin boards
(positions) hanging on the wall. How can I see the
module positions available in a template?

It’s hard to see all the module positions available in

a template by just looking at the webpage. Luckily,
Joomla! provides a tool for users to see an outline of
all positions. Here is how to use it:
1. Go to “Extensions” => “Template Manager”.

2. In Template Manager, click the icon “Options” on the

toolbar.
3. Next, set the parameter “Preview Module Positions”
to “Enabled” and click “Save & Close”.

4. Now, click on the tab “Template” Tab.

5. In this pop-up screen, all installed templates are

shown, so scroll down to the template Beez3 and click
Preview to see the module positions of this template.

6. A new page will be opened in a new tab; this page

shows all module positions of the template, like the
figure below.
Add a new module

Now, let’s see how you add a new module.

1. Go to “Extensions” => “Module Manager”, then click
the “New” button on the toolbar.

2. In a pop-up window, choose the module you want to

add. For example, let’s add a “Login” module to allow
users to login to the website
3. Now you need to enter information for the new
module. Don’t forget to choose the position where you
want to place the module
4. Finally, click on the “Save & Close” button to
complete the process. Let’s see how it looks from the
front-end!
Media Manager

The media manager is your tool to organizing your

images. One important thing to know about the media
manager is where to put your files. By default, it
comes with a few images (such as fruit and food). Those
images can be accessed from the articles interface to
be added to the articles, but only the folders and
images placed inside the “Stories” folder can be
accessed that way.

Joomla Security Administration

For most people, security is one of the least
interesting aspects of managing a web site. For this
reason, many hobbyist web site administrators either
ignore it completely or put only the most minimal
protections in place. Paying such scant attention to
security is a mistake. An unrefined security policy can
make a site more vulnerable to breach and eliminates
the possibility of safely working with outside
volunteers, contributors, or moderators.

Securing your Joomla site is not a complicated process,

so if you follow the simple guidelines provided in this
chapter, you will not only have more confidence that
your site won’t be penetrated and defaced, you’ll also
be able to easily set up the proper limits for user
accounts so you can allow others to contribute to your
site without the risk of content loss or site failure.

In this chapter, you’ll learn how to:

• Set up user group restrictions properly so
adding new users with proper permissions is a fast and
easy process.

• Control access to site content to allow some

content to only be viewable to particular types of
users.

• Configure access groups to allow for safe

contribution for others without risk to your core site
content or reputation.

• Organize your server structure and configuration to

minimize site vulnerabilities that might be exploited
by hackers.

In this chapter, we’ll examine all of the advanced

aspects of administrative and security configuration
for the Joomla system. Then we’ll review the more
universal security concepts and how they apply to the
needs of a Joomla site.

Implementing Site Security and Server Security

For a Joomla administrator, there are two primary areas

of security configuration that must be managed: site
security and server security. Site security relates to
the security settings that are chosen inside the Joomla
CMS. Server security relates to setup and configuration
of the server that is hosting the Joomla site to make
sure the server is secure from attack.

We'll begin with the recommended setup for the Joomla

site security, since these selections provide a good
starting point. Site security tends to be less
technical than server security because all of the
security configuration takes place through the Joomla
Administrator interface.

Setting up Site Security

Before you begin setting up your security

configuration, it is important to understand the
fundamental security model used by Joomla. Like the
Linux operating system, Joomla security uses an
additive security model instead of a subtractive
security model. In an additive model, the top level of
the security hierarchy provides almost no access rights
and each hierarchical level adds additional rights.
The additive model is counter-intuitive to most people
because it means, in essence, that a parent has fewer
access rights than a child. You can see the additive
structure of the Joomla security setup clearly in the
User Manager for Groups as shown in Figure 7-1. The
Public group—which is the root node of the permissions
tree—is the group with the fewest permissions and it
sits at the top of the hierarchy. In the Registered
group branch, the Author child group has more
permissions than a simple registered account, an
Editor group has more permissions again, and the

Publisher group has even more.

Note ■under the subtractive security model, the top
level of the hierarchy has privileges to everything and
then individual groups add restrictions down the tree.
that makes the Super administrator the top of the
hierarchy and progressive restrictions are added until
an account such as Guest has the fewest privileges. the
subtractive model is less secure than additive, but it
is generally easier to understand and implement so it
remains a popular security strategy for smaller
applications.
Creating a Sample Group with the Joomla User Manager

In the Joomla Administrator interface, the User Manager

allows the definition of user access settings, groups,
and access levels.
The most effective procedure I’ve seen for the setup of
professional-grade security (and the one most security
experts recommend) is that the structure of the
security system be done in the following order:

1. Define groups: Create groups first—before

individual user accounts—for all the classes of users
that are expected to use the site.

2. Create necessary access levels: In Joomla,

restrictions to various objects (menus, articles, and
so forth) are stored as access levels.

3. Assign access levels to groups: Restrictions are

placed on each of the created groups to provide exactly
the access level the users of the groups need to
complete their tasks.

4. Assign users to groups: Users are assigned to the

appropriate groups and inherit the permissions
specified for that group.

5. Assign overrides to particular users: Finally, if

special access options are needed for a user, apply
those changes to the individual user.
A good place to begin when defining a new group in the
additive model is to grant the group simple login
privileges.
1. Open the Global Configuration manager from the
System menu of the Administrator interface.

2. Click on the Permissions tab and you should see

the groups in tabs down the left side of the pane.

3. Click on the "Co-brand A" link to display the

permissions for the group.

4. Select the Allowed option for the settings of

Site Login (that’s front-end login permission) and
Admin Login (that’s the back-end or Administrator
interface login permission),

Limiting the Actions of a Group

After you’ve created user groups that can perform

certain types of actions, you may also wish to limit
them to the areas of the site where they can make these
modifications. Setting up Access Levels provides
exactly this type of control. The available Joomla core
actions are:

• Site Login, Admin Login

• Offline Access

• Super Admin
• Access Administration Interface—Whether the
Administrator component for the item is available to
the group

• Create

• Delete

• Edit

• Edit State

• Edit Own

You can configure these levels for:

• Global configuration

• Components

• Categories/Items