Publications and Publication Pages

There are two fundamental types of content (or kinds of pages) in Ziggurat. There are Publications, and Publication Pages. (There are also Color Palettes, but that is a more advanced feature. They are covered on the Intermediate Styling page.)

Simple enough. Right? Well, yes, but here is the catch. Both Publications, and Publication Pages are web pages. I’ll admit that this is linguistically complicated, but structurally it’s pretty simple. When you make a digital publication with Ziggurat, you will make ONE Publication web page. That acts as your landing/home page, functioning like a book’s cover and table of contents. And then you will make any number of Publication Page web pages. These will house your publication’s content, and will be linked to the Publication in the Publication Page’s Edit view settings.

This basic structure allows Ziggurat to generate a bunch of handy navigational features, like the Table of contents for the Publication landing page, and headers and footers for the Publication Pages. So to the CMS, these pages are very different creatures.

But from a user’s perspective, both Publications and Publication pages function similarly. They both get added and sorted with the Manage Bar. On the Content page, we see all pages non-hierarchically, in a giant index of all Ziggurat pages you’ve created. In Publication Sort, you see pages aggregated hierarchically, by publication. And then they both get set-up, built, and styled in Edit and Layout views in the Button Bar. 

Setting up Publications and Publication Pages is covered in detail on the Edit view page. Designing and placing content on your Publications and Publication pages is covered on the Layout view pages. For now, just know that to make a digital publication or site on Ziggurat, you will need to make a Publication which will function as your landing page, and then any number of Publication pages that will get associated with your Publication.

Making a Publication or Publication Page

Creating a new Publication or Publication Page is simple. Hover over Content > Add Content in the Manage Bar, and then select either Publication or Publication Page. Alternatively, you can click Content, and then click the Add Content button on the Content page. Remember, you will make one Publication, which will serve as the landing page and main navigation for your site or publication, and then make several Publication Pages to populate that Publication. 

This means you will want to create a Publication first, and then create its Publication Pages. Creating either a Publication or a Publication Page will bring you first to Edit view, where you fill out the necessary information for Ziggurat to build out the proper links for page navigation, and where you control a page’s colors and typography. This process is covered in detail on the Edit view page. Any field with a red asterisk is required; all others are optional. You can also return to Edit view to make adjustments to these fields at any point.

Publish/Unpublish

Another important feature is the ability to Publish and Unpublish pages. This option is a Publish check box on a Publication or Publication Page’s Edit view, towards the bottom of the page. 

By default it is set to published. If you wish to delay publishing this page, uncheck this box. A published page will be accessible to anyone with the URL. An unpublished page will only be accessible to users who are logged in and have permission to access the page.

Note that unpublished Publications or Publication Pages will not be visible in Publication Sort, but can be found by clicking Content in the Manage Bar, and searching through the aggregation of all your Ziggurat pages.

Also note that unpublished Publication Pages will not display in a Table of Contents, or be accessible through Header navigation.

Ordering Publication Pages

By default, Publication Pages will appear in the Table of Contents and in Header navigation in the order they are created. But often you will want to reorder the Publication Pages. To do so, go to Publication Sort in the Manage Bar.

Here, you can see all the Publication Pages associated with a particular Publication. You can control the order of pages in your Publication by clicking and dragging the four-directional arrow icon to the left of the Publication Page title to reorder a particular page. Make sure you scroll to the bottom of the page and click Save Order to save your changes.

To the right of the page’s title, there is a column called TOC order. This also demonstrates the page order of the Publication. Note that if all the numbers are 0, that means that you have not specified the order of the Publication Pages yet. Even if you did create the pages in the correct order, it is best practice to double check Publication Sort to ensure that pages are properly sequenced. Click Save Order at the bottom of the page to confirm page order.

Deleting Publications & Publication Pages

There are two ways to delete a Publication or Publication Page: via Content, and via a page’s Edit view.

To delete a page via Content, Click Content in the Manage Bar. This will bring up all your Publication and Publication Pages. Find the relevant page by scrolling or searching. You can delete a single Publication and Publication Page by going to the far right column, Operations, and selecting Delete from the dropdown menu. This will bring you to a warning page, where you can choose to follow through and Delete, or to Cancel by clicking the respective buttons.

There is a second method for deleting Publications or Publication Pages when on the Content page. This is useful if you wish to delete more than one page at once. Select your page or pages by clicking the little box next to your page title (the far left column). Make sure that the dropdown menu under Action is set to Delete Content. (That is the default.) Then click Apply to Selected Items. This will also bring you to a warning page with the options to Delete or Cancel. Note that this warning page will also display the titles of the Publications and/or Publication Pages you have selected.

You can also delete a Publication or Publication Page directly from the page’s Edit view. When in that page’s Edit view, scroll down to the bottom of the page and click Delete. You will then be presented with the same warning message, giving you the options to follow through and Delete, or to Cancel.

Finally, a caveat. As you might have noticed from all the warning messages associated with deleting, you will want to do this with caution. Deleting a Publication or Publication Page is a permanent action. Always double check that you really do want to delete something before finalizing this action.