General developer forum

Hi moodle-community,
I recently finished my first project on setting up a moodle platform for an enterprise-client. I'd like to share my hacks for that 1.9.4 moodle with you.

Part I - Vertical navigation bar

If you are like me, you want to see the source code first and then read the explanations. Et voilà:

Version 1 (for pages that already use the regular layout with three big coloumns):
//Arvid Hack very first column to have navigation
// print_container_start();
echo '<!-- Navigation Column -->
<td id="navcol">
<table id="navtable"><tbody>
<tr><td id="navcell">
<a href="'.$CFG->wwwroot.'"><img width="56" height="56" border="0" src="'. $CFG->wwwroot .'/pix/n/a.gif" title="a: Home"/><br/>Home</a>
</td></tr>
<tr><td id="navcell">
<a href="'.$CFG->wwwroot.'/course/view.php?id='.$course->id.'"><img width="56" height="56" border="0" src="'. $CFG->wwwroot .'/pix/n/b.gif" title="b: Current course"/><br/>Course</a>
</td></tr>
<tr><td id="navcell">
<a href="externallink1.php"><img width="56" height="56" border="0" src="'. $CFG->wwwroot .'/pix/n/c.gif" title="c: to contac"/><br/>Contact</a>
</td></tr>
<tr><td id="navcell">
<a href="'.$CFG->wwwroot.'/imprint.php"><img width="56" height="56" border="0" src="'. $CFG->wwwroot .'/pix/n/d.gif" title="d: imprint"/><br/>Imprint</a>
</td></tr>
</tbody>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</td>';

Version 2 (For pages without the three-columns lay-out, that's typically where no blocks can be used)

echo '<table id="layout-table"><tbody><tr>
<td id="navcol">
<table id="navtable"><tbody>
<tr><td id="navcell">
<a href="'.$CFG->wwwroot.'"><img width="56" height="56" border="0" src="'. $CFG->wwwroot .'/pix/n/a.gif" title="a: Home"/><br/>Home</a>
</td></tr>
<tr><td id="navcell">
<a href="'.$CFG->wwwroot.'/course/view.php?id='.$course->id.'"><img width="56" height="56" border="0" src="'. $CFG->wwwroot .'/pix/n/b.gif" title="b: Current course"/><br/>Course</a>
</td></tr>
<tr><td id="navcell">
<a href="externallink1.php"><img width="56" height="56" border="0" src="'. $CFG->wwwroot .'/pix/n/c.gif" title="c: to contac"/><br/>Contact</a>
</td></tr>
<tr><td id="navcell">
<a href="'.$CFG->wwwroot.'/imprint.php"><img width="56" height="56" border="0" src="'. $CFG->wwwroot .'/pix/n/d.gif" title="d: imprint"/><br/>Imprint</a>
</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
</td>
<td id="middle-column">';
… original source code continues before closing the table with:
echo '</tr></tbody></table>';


A high priority demand of the enterprise was to have a vertical navigation bar, that always looks the same. They consider this a) more beautiful b) more intuitive and thus user-friendly, and c) their website has a vertical navigation and consistency is important. Elements of this vertical navigation are "Home", "Course" (obviously has no meaning on the start-page, there it redirects to "Home" as well), "Contact", and "Imprint". Although the horizontal, native moodle-navigation bar is a little bit counter-intuitive (personal opinion) we kept it for several reasons.

The vertical navigation is seen on all pages except the start-page. The hacks need to be inserted it into the courseview as well as all views of all used modules (file-download, wiki, quiz, lesson):

* homepagename/moodle/course/format/topics/format.php, line 74 above /// The left column ..., Version 1 (this means, the bar will only appear if the topics-format is used in the course. If you use other or several course-formats, change the according files as well)

* homepagename/moodle/mod/lesson/viewstart.html line 13 above <!-- First Column -->, Version 1 with added php-tags, i.e. <?php "Code Version 1" ?>

* homepagename/moodle/mod/quiz/view.php line 72 above print_container_start, Version 1

* homepagename/moodle/mod/quiz/attempt.php, line 432 above // Print the quiz name heading and tabs for teacher, etc. Closing the table at new line 565 (above //Finish the page) Version 2

* homepagename/moodle/mod/wiki/view.php, line 355, adapt and insert the Version 2 code between </div> and <div id=”wiki-view” class = “mwiki”> Clsoe the table above print_footer, Version 2

* homepagename/moodle/mod/resource/type/file/resource.class.php, line 514, above if (trim($resource->summary)) { replace old code and close in new line 731 with following: if ($inpopup) {
echo "<div class=\"popupnotice\">(<a href=\"$fullurl\">$strdirectlink</a>)</div>";
echo "</div>"; // MDL-12098
//Hack Arvid Ende der Tabelle
echo '</tr></tbody></table>';
print_footer($course); // MDL-12098
} else {
print_spacer(20,20);
//Hack Arvid Ende der Tabelle
echo '</tr></tbody></table>';
print_footer($course);

That's it for now,
Arvid