?tp=1 – Who has my reading glasses?

For some time now we can enjoy the new version of Joomla, despite the many advantages it has referred to several “failures”. One of them is a preview of module positions, in this article I will show you how to deal with it, both in both versions of Joomla!: 1.6 and joomla 1.5, as well.

Let’s Start from the Beginning …. since joomla 1.0.x adding the parameter ?tp=1 behind the URL, e.g. http://www.YourPage.com/?tp=1 – will show locations of all module positions within a Joomla template. In Joomla 1.0.x it looked very a clearly, red boxes with labels, no extras.

Even now in Joomla! 1.5, note that if the templateDetails.xml file does not have positions defined and the index.php calls those positions they will still show up.

In Joomla! 1.5 – this function was also available, but something has changed, in my opinion to the detriment, often because reading the names of items with difficulty, particularly if the web page is full of content. Since the module positions are shown with CSS – I think that can be, be easily corrected.

Example HTML code:

<div class="mod-preview"><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>
     <div class="mod-preview-info">slideshow[none outline]</div>
     <span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>
     <div class="mod-preview-wrapper"><span style="white-space: pre;"> </span>slideshow<span style="white-space: pre;"> </span></div>
     <span style="white-space: pre;"> </span></div>

How to see the module positions without buying new glasses

So I use default general.css file from /templates/system/css folder. I added two lines of code (see below) and you’re done, now names of the modules are more readable than the default ones.

.mod-preview { background: #fff; border: 1px solid red;padding:2px;}
div.mod-preview-info {background-color: #fff;border: 0;z-index: 999;color: red;}

Fortunately, the same method also works in the latest edition of joomla 1.6. You can also set :

div.mod-preview-wrapper {display:none; } 

How to turn it on ?tp=1 in Joomla 1.6?

I’ve got some e-mails from people with the question: “What happened to ?tp=1 in Joomla 1.6?”. The simple answer is nothing, still this feature is available, the only difference lies in the fact that by default it was disabled. To turn it on go to Joomla Top Menu: Extensions -> Template Manager. Find a Options icon in the upper right corner. Remeber that you have to be an administrator or super administrator to do this.Choose Templates tab, and set Preview Module Positions to Enabled. That’s all.