Admin area plug-ins

By garyhoffmann - July 30, 2010

Is there a way to create a plug-in that affects the admin area of CMSB?

Here is my specific need / desire:

My users are getting very comfortable with CMSB, so some of them have asked if they can modify the "styles" used in their website

I had to tell them that they would have to edit the styles.css file in the root directory of their website.

Well, I might as well have told them to build a fence around the world.

So, I got this great idea - I could create a category section which is where styles can be defined. Top level entries would be things like body, div id's, class names, etc. Lower level things would be such as font-family, font-size, color, etc. with a "value" field.

Then, I wrote this little PHP script that generates a ustyles.css file which is included in the websites right after my styles.css file. This allows the user to override things if they want simply by using CMSB and running a script.

So, I thought, wouldn't it be cool to allow them to generate the ustyles.css right from the admin menu of CMSB.

So, that brings us to the reason for this post - can I create a plug-in to CMSB that can be RUN from within CMSB? If so, how do I do this?

Thanks so much.
Gary.

Re: [garyhoffmann] Admin area plug-ins

By Jason - August 2, 2010

Hi Gary,

Really interesting idea. From the sounds of it, you just need a way for them to run your script from within CMS Builder to gernerate the ustyles.css file. Luckily, you can do this without having to build a plugin.

Go to the Section Editor and create add a new editor. From "<Advanced Menus>" select "Text Link". Give the section a name and click create. Now click Modify on your new section. Here you can edit the URL that your link will go to, so you just need to link it to your script. The link will appear in your menu list along the left hand side.

Hope this helps.
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