Other Block Types

There are a number of Block types that fall outside of the Create Custom Block category. How are these Blocks different? Unlike the Blocks we have under Create Custom Block, which you enter or select content in a Configure window, all these blocks draw their content from elsewhere in the CMS. These are pre-populated blocks. We have three different kinds, depending on how they are pre-populated.

We have Content Fields, Custom, and Lists (Views). In general, they are organized by where and how they get their content. Content Fields draw content from fields in the Publication Page’s Edit view. Blocks under Custom (not Create Custom Block) are special blocks made in the Structure tab on the Manage Bar. They can be used site-wide. This is how you create publication headers, but can also be used for making custom footers or other complex blocks that you want to repeat across pages. Finally, List (Views) Blocks aggregate information from across a Publication to generate citations and tables of content. TOCs can be used on Publication main pages, and also as footers on individual Publication Pages.

 

Content Fields

Content Fields has seven different options: Attach a Drupal Library, Bibliography/Links/Etc., Color Palette, Endnotes, Long Title, Media Credits, and Page Credits. These are all common types of content that can be handy to have for a publication. Recall, as well, that all these blocks draw their content from information entered into fields on the Edit page of the Publication Page.

 

Configure Window

As with all Block types discussed on this page, these Blocks have a configure window, but no WYSIWYG to enter your information. That’s because this info lives on the Edit view of this page. All Content Field Blocks give us the same configuration options: Title, Label, and Formatter.

The Block Title is pre-filled, and Display Title is conveniently unchecked.

Below that is a dropdown menu for Label. The Label is the same content as the Title, just styled differently. Titles are smaller and labels are larger; both styles are default to the CMS. We have four different options for how we want the label to appear. It can be Above or Inline—those options show the label—or Hidden or Visually Hidden—those options hide the label. Hiding the label is useful if you want to make your own title and style it yourself.

Disregard the Formatter dropdown menu.

 

Edit View Configuration

With the exception of Attach a Drupal Library and Color Palette, Content Field blocks draw their information from the General Info tab in the Edit view. (See the Edit View page for more information about the General Info tab.)

Note that if you fill in information in Edit view, but don’t add the corresponding Block, that content will not display on your page. For example, you can fill out a million Bibliography entries, but you won’t see any of them on your page unless you add a Bibliography/Links/Etc. Block to your page in Layout view.

You’ll also notice that Page Credits, Media Credits, Bibliography/Links/Etc., and Endnotes all give us a WYSIWYG editor just like you’re familiar with. That means any text styling you want to do you’ll do in Edit view, and it will appear dynamically on your page.

Finally, if you want to control the text or styling of your Block’s title, you would do that by adding a title in Edit view, and then hiding the Title and Label for that Block in Layout view. Let’s say, for example, that you don’t want the block to be called “Bibliography/Links/Etc.” and you just want it to say “Bibliography.” You would simply add the text “Bibliography” above your text in the Edit view WYSIWY, and style it as you want. Make sure to click Save when leaving Edit view. Then go back into Layout view to turn off the automatic Title or Label if you had them displayed. Make sure that the Display Title box is unchecked, and you have selected Hidden from the Label dropdown menu.

 

Color Palettes

While most of the other Content Field Blocks draw information from the General Info tab, the Color Palette Block takes its cues from the Color tab in Edit view. As covered on the Edit View page, the Colors tab has a special dropdown menu that allows you to choose which Color Palette you want to apply. (See the Intermediate Styling page for how to make a Color Palette.) 

Just like other Content Fields Blocks, if you set the Color Palette in Edit view, you will need to place a Color Palette Block onto your page for that feature to work. You will also need to configure the Block properly. In the Configure window for the block, set Label to Hidden so that the Block is not visible to page visitors. Set the Formatter dropdown menu to Rendered Entity. Finally, set the View mode to Styles.

 

Attach a Drupal Library

While most of the other Content Field Blocks draw information from the General Info tab, the Attach a Drupal Library Block takes its cues from the Libraries tab in Edit view. As covered on the Edit View page, the Libraries tab is where you choose which Library you want to apply. (See ; the Advanced Styling page for how to make a Library.) 

Just like other Content Fields Blocks, if you set the Library in Edit view, you will need to place an Attach a Drupal Library Block onto your page for that feature to work. You will also need to configure the Block properly. In the Configure window for the block, set Label to Hidden so that the Block is not visible to page visitors. Leave the Formatter dropdown menu set to Attach Libraries. Finally, click Add Block.

 

Endnotes

Ziggurat has this fancy feature that allows you to have linked endnotes. This means when you click on an endnote number, it takes you to the corresponding note in the Endnotes Block. Clicking on the note number in the Endnotes Block will return you to the body text.

To write your endnotes, go to the Edit view and scroll down to the WYSIWYG for Endnotes. Enter your endnote text there. Highlight all that text, and then create an ordered list. Now open the Styles dropdown menu and select this new option: Endnotes List. And that’s all you need to do to set up the Endnotes list. You can also add any text styling here. (There are also helpful reference instructions for making endnotes and inline endnote numbers below this WYSIWYG.)

To set up your inline endnote numbers, go back to Layout view. You can add an inline endnote to any text on your page. (That would be any Block that has a WYSIWYG editor.) To make an endnote, open the Configure window for your Block. Type endnote number, and then highlight it. Click Superscript, then the Link button. Type a hashtag (#) into the URL space, and click Save. Now, in the dropdown Styles menu, select Endnote Number at the top. There you go! That’s how you make an inline endnote. It is now a hyperlink that will link to the Endnote Block on your page. The CMS will know which number goes to which endnote entry.

Note that you can create your inline endnotes first and then make your endnotes list, or vice versa.

 

List (Views)

List (Views) are similar to Content Field Blocks. You have three options: Citations, Table of Contents: Advanced, and Table of Contents: Simple. All these blocks draw from content entered in Edit view, but for both this page and other pages within the publication.

 

Citations

This Block creates auto-generated Chicago and MLA citations for your page. 

The Configure window gives you three controls: a Display Title box, an Items per Block dropdown, and an Override Title box. Display title is automatically checked, which gives you the text “Cite this article as.” Uncheck the box to hide the title. Ignore the Items per Block dropdown. Next you have the option to Override the Title. To use that feature, uncheck Display Title and check it instead. This brings up an open text field where you can enter our own title. You might want to do this, for example, if you don’t consider this page an article, and want the Block title to be ”Cite this entry as” instead.

The Block will usually display as placeholder text in Layout view. To see what it looks like, save your changes and go to preview.

In View, you’ll notice that the citations are links. If you click them, they will automatically copy, so you can easily paste them into a bibliography.

For the most part, Ziggurat creates these citations from information you’ve already entered in Edit view for this Publication Page and for the Publication itself (like titles), or from information it knows (like URLs). But sometimes you need to supply some extra information. Specifically, Ziggurat will need to know author or editor information if you want to include that. To supply that, go to Edit view, and click the Citation Info tab. You will then enter that information, if applicable, into the text fields there. Make sure that you follow the instructions below each field for proper formatting. Click Save and that content will automatically be added to your citations.

Once again, if you fill out this information, but do not add a Citation block, then you will not see citations on your page.

 

TOCs

TOC is an abbreviation for Table of Contents.

We have Simple TOCs and Advanced TOCs. We use Advanced TOCs on Publication Main Pages as our main Table of Contents, and we use Simple TOCs as default navigational footers on Publication Pages.

 

Simple TOCs

Simple TOCs appear as the Publication title, which is a link takes you back to the Publication main page, and then the titles of the associated Publication Pages below, which are also links. You style the text for these pages in Edit view of each respective page and you control the order that they appear in Publication Sort (See the Introduction to the Interface page for more about Publication Sort.)

A Simple TOC has the same configuration options as a Citation Block, concerned solely with titling options. Display title is automatically checked. In this case, you will probably never want to leave this checked, as the title for the block is “Simple” which doesn’t mean anything to a reader. You do have the option to override the title and add your own, but most of the time you will just leave both boxes unchecked. Ignore Items per Block.

In Layout view you will often just see a placeholder, but if you save changes and go into preview, you can see it in full. All TOCs have hover states that create a black box around a page link on hover.

If you have pages that aren’t appearing in the TOC, there are two possible reasons. First, the missing page could be linked to the wrong Publication. Double check that in the missing page’s Edit view. Second, the missing page might not be unpublished. Only published pages appear in the TOC. This is also controlled in Edit View. (Refer to the Edit View page for information on publishing and unpublishing pages.)

Simple TOCs are a very useful navigation feature, as Ziggurat will automatically and dynamically supply the links and page titles for you. This way, you don’t have to worry about broken links, which can happen if you are manually supplying links to navigational elements.

Finally, head to Edit view to see where Ziggurat is getting the page name from and how to style that text. Click the TOC Info tab.

You have several fields, but only one is used for the Simple TOC. That is the first WYSIWYG (Primary Text), which is mandatory when you set up the page. That is the text that Ziggurat is pulling to create the page title in the Simple TOC. You’d do any text styling here in the Primary Text WYSIWYG, and those changes would automatically appear in the Simple TOC wherever it is used in the entire Publication.

To save any changes, make sure you click Save at the bottom of the page.

A final note about the Publication title in the Simple TOC. This information is getting pulled from the Publication main page’s Long Title field in Edit view for that page. This ensures consistency across Publication Pages. You cannot style it directly, but could target that text with CSS if you wanted to apply an advanced style.

 

Advanced TOCs

Advanced TOCs are much like Simple TOCs, but give us more fields to enter information. That’s why we use Advanced TOCs on a Publication main page, and Simple TOCs as footers on individual Publication Pages. In fact, if you add an Advanced TOC to a Publication Page, it render as “no results.”

Once again, the Configure window gives you some titling options, but you will almost always just want to uncheck Display Title.

Unlike the Simple TOC, an Advanced TOC doesn’t have the Publication title. That’s because that Block should live on the main page and don’t need to navigate back to it. By default, the Advanced TOC will look much like a Simple TOC, listing all the Publication Page titles. However, you can add additional information on an individual Publication Page that will appear in other fields on the Advanced TOC. This can be used to add subtitles, author information, chapter numbers, etc.

However, because this information is associated with the individual Publication Page and NOT the Publication main page, you will need to go to the individual Publication Page’s Edit view to supply that information. When in the page’s Edit view, go to the TOC Info tab. There are three other WYSIWYG fields besides Primary Text: Secondary Text, Text Before, and Text After. Of course, only the Primary Text field is required, so if that is all you need, then you’re all set. But you do have the option for adding additional text in those other three fields.

The Primary Text is for your page title. The Secondary Text appears below that. For example, you could use it as a subtitle. The Text Before appears in a column preceding the Primary Text. For example, this could be a chapter number. The Text After appears in a column following the Primary Text. For example, this could be author information. And all of these are styleable.

All these additional (non-Primary Text) pieces of text will align to the bottom of each other, while the Primary Text appears above. If you remove the Secondary Text, everything will condense into a single row instead of two rows. 

These different fields give you a number of options for supplying information on your Publication main page.

Note, however, that while you can style the text, you do not have much control over spacing or positioning. Once again, it is entirely possible for you to target these elements with CSS, but that requires familiarity with code. We won’t cover that here, but know that it is possible.

 

Custom

Admittedly, the use of Custom with these Blocks creates terminology that is is slightly confusing. After all, when making standardcontent Blocks, our Basic Blocks and Image Blocks, you click a button that says Create Custom Block. So what are these other Custom Blocks?

These Custom Blocks are very special block types. They’re Custom Blocks whose content are universal across the site, and they are made in the Manage Bar. You want to use these sparingly, as you can very quickly accumulate a long list of block in the Custom field of the Choose a Block menu. All Custom Blocks live in the Custom Block Library, accessed through Structure > Block Layout > Custom Block Library in the Manage Bar. If you need to go back and edit a Custom Block, you will do so there.

 

Headers

The most common use case for these special custom blocks are Headers. You will have to make a new one for each publication you make.

To make a Custom Block, hover over Structure in the Manage Bar, and go to Block Layout > Add Custom Block. You can create a universal custom block for any block type.

To make a Header, select the Header block type. The rest is quite simple. You will give your header a name, and then find your Publication from the list and select it by clicking on the circle next to it. (Note that you first need to have created a Publication in order to create a header for that Publication.) Now click Save.

Next you will arrive at a page that allows you to control how that block appears when it is used, and also set some rules for who can use it and where. Do NOT adjust anything on this page, or click save. Your Block will already have been created at this point. If you save any changes on this page, then your Header Block will appear on every Ziggurat page you have made.

A final note about Headers. They have a special Configuration setting, found in the View Mode dropdown menu. You have the options of Default, Full, and Full (No Pager). Usually you will want to leave this as Full. But sometimes you will want to use Full (no pager). This option is useful for complex publications that have multiple Publication main pages. It suppresses an individual Page’s title from displaying in the Header, which will appear as “no results” if used on a Publication main page. For example, when we built the RISD Grad Show publication, we needed one Publication main page as the home page for the entire site, but then needed to create multiple Publication main pages for each department landing page. However, the department landing pages needed headers to link you back to the main page. So we used Full (no pager) Headers on the department landing pages.

Below we have some styles you can apply. I’m going to leave them blank for now. As I said, you can leave these blank here and still access these styles for each individual page. But if you know that you always want the background color to be something, you can select that here.

Next, we have some options to restrict how, where, and by whom this block can be used. This is for advanced uses. Mostly, we just leave those blank.

Finally, we need to select a region for this block. In this case, we want it to be a header, so select that.

This brings us to this page. Do not modify or save anything on this page; if you do, it will appear across the entire site!

If you do want to make changes to your header, you can find it in the Custom block library tab. To modify, click the hyperlink.

Let’s return to the individual publication page. I already have a header, but let’s add one for demonstration. We’ll click add block, and then find the custom block that we made with the title we gave it.

We’ll uncheck display title. And you can see that we do have the option here to choose Full no pager if need be. Click add block and you’re all set.

 

Other Custom Block Uses

There is a Custom Block comes with the CMS that allows you to place a print page icon on your page. This is useful if you want to include a print page icon on a Publication. (Publications Pages usually have Headers, which include a print icon.) If you add this block, this is what you get.

There is also a Custom Block comes with the CMS that allows you to place a shareable link on your page. It simply takes the page’s link and displays it. If you add this block, this is what you get.

The other way to use a Custom Block is a little bit more complex, but can be incredibly useful. Recall that you do have the option to create other types of custom blocks that aren’t headers. Sometimes, it’s useful to make a block, with content, that is the same, and can be used across a publication, or even across all publications. 

For example, perhaps you want a site-wide copyright, or a logo or watermark. You’d make a Custom Block for that the same way as the Header, by hovering over Structure > Block Layout > Add Custom Block in the Manage Bar. This time, however, you’d select the Block type that is most useful for us. That will usually be a Basic Block, as that gives you a WYSIWYG and therefore the most options.

Let’s say you wanted to create copyright text with our logo. You’ll name your block, and then add that text into the WYSIWYG below. You can also add an image as either background media, just like a normal basic block. Or I can get a bit advanced with code and add it inline with some CSS. Adding an image to a Basic Block with CSS is covered in Advanced Styles.

The handy thing about these blocks is that any edits you make to the Block in the Block Library then get automatically applied wherever the Block lives on a page. So if you update your logo, or decide that you want a Creative Commons license instead of a copyright, you only need to fix that in one spot.

As you can imagine, this can be a pretty powerful tool. We’ve used this feature to build out more complicated custom footers for some of our sites. While this is more work as you have to hand code the footer’s design and manually enter the links, it does give you more design flexibility if you want that.

We’ve also in the past used it for nesting complex CSS or JS code blocks into pages across a publication, allowing us to edit the CSS in one place, rather than on each page. However, we now have the Library Load feature, which is better suited for this task. This is covered on the Advanced Styles page.