CommonHeaderFooterPlugin Development Discussion

I've just uploaded first version. Comments and suggestions welcome!

I've noticed one problem that I'm not sure how to solve. When a topic INCLUDE's another topic, this plugin gives the INCLUDE'd topic a header and footer, resulting in multiple headers and footers in the final document. I can think of several approaches, none completely satisfying:

Use the allow and deny preferences to prevent headers & footers for the included file.
, If defining a SECTION to be INCLUDE'd, use COMMONHEADERSKIP inside the section (to prevent the extra header) and COMMONHEADER outside the section (to explicitly add the header when not INCLUDE'ing).

-- ClifKussmaul - 16 Jun 2006

Thanks Clif for contributing this Plugin!

I made a small change to the SHORTDESCRIPTION, please feel free to take this into the next release.

Wondering if it might be easier to add the header/footer conditionally in the skin, depending on preferences settings. That way you do not have multiple headers/footers in INCLUDEs, and users are less likely to remove them by accident.

-- PeterThoeny - 16 Jun 2006

I have create a header topic in the TWiki web. When I try to include the header content in a topic by using the %COMMONHEADER% variable, the header content is not inserted. I'm using the latest TWiki version - Jun 25, 2006. What is the problem?

-- AlokNarula - 29 Jun 2006

Have you enabled the plugin in bin/configure?

-- JasonHill - 29 Jun 2006

Peter, Thanks for your encouragement.

I don't know much about skins yet. Would I have to modify each skin? I was trying to make this work with any skin.

-- ClifKussmaul - 05 Jul 2006

Alok, Are you still having trouble? Does the plugin appear in TWiki/InstalledPlugins? I'd be happy to take a quick look at your twiki to see if I can figure out the problem.

-- ClifKussmaul - 05 Jul 2006

Oh, if you intend this for any skin than the Plugin might be a an easier way to go.

-- PeterThoeny - 05 Jul 2006

Clif, I couldn't get this plugin to work. I enabled it via configure and created a header and footer topic. Then I used the %COMMONHEADER% and %COMMONFOOTER% variables in a topic in Sandbox, expecting to see the content of the header and footer topics. But the content wasn't there.

-- AlokNarula - 06 Jul 2006

Here's a working example, which might help you figure out what is going on. This is the configuration page:

http://melchior.muhlenberg.edu/twiki/bin/view/TWiki/CommonHeaderFooterPlugin

The is the WebHome for a wiki that uses the plugin:

http://melchior.muhlenberg.edu/twiki/bin/view/PUIeship/WebHome

-- ClifKussmaul - 06 Jul 2006

I've been able to configure this plugin. However I notice one bug. When I edit a topic in Wysiwyg mode, the content from the CommonFooter topic is copied into the topic being edited. Everytime I edit the topic in Wysiwyg mode, the content is copied. Thus if I edit a topic n times in Wysiwyg mode, the footer content appears, n+1 times.

-- AlokNarula - 12 Jul 2006

Alok, please give me a bit more information. I assume you're using WysiwygPlugin (which I haven't used much) which has known issues with "non-standard syntax".

Are you using %COMMONHEADER% and %COMMONFOOTER%, or setting the headers via settings? Do you see the problem for footers but not headers?

(Sorry for the delay in responding; WebNotify isn't working for me, so I didn't see your question right away.)

-- ClifKussmaul - 24 Jul 2006

I just enabled WysiwygPlugin, and when I have headers & footers in settings, both are expanded by WysiwygPlugin.

I tried putting WysiwygPlugin before CommonHeaderFooterPlugin, by adding the former to the list in configure, but that didn't help.

Can anyone suggest possible solutions to this problem?

-- ClifKussmaul - 24 Jul 2006

FYI - I just upgraded to TWiki 4.1.2, and CommonHeaderFooterPlugin seems pretty badly broken.

-- ClifKussmaul - 13 Aug 2007

Too bad! :cry: I was hoping to use it together with CacheAddOn to add a [cached at - refresh] line at the bottom of every page.

I only use the footer. The footer is also inserted after each unknown WikiWord. (using Twiki 4.1.2). Too bad, I liked the concept!

-- ArnoldAtMallos - 22 Dec 2007

AliasPlugin seems to insert fixed text by modifying the view template. This seems like a way to avoid most of the problems described above. I'm still figuring out how it works, though...

-- ClifKussmaul - 08 Apr 2008