[AndrewD]

Originally Posted by Tulsa

I don't know, maybe I'm getting lost in the complexity of this wonderful mod and little guidance would be greatly appreciated.

0. Here's what I'm trying to do, please tell me the best way to go about doing it.

Initial categoy (type) > Sub category (manufacturer - up to 40 entries) > Sub category/item (items - up to 65 entries) > Item


I am wanting to keep from having to create 65 categories then 65 items, one in each category. Is there anyway to simple list the sub category/items, then display upon click the item itself in full?

1. I know I can show full/short entries with expand/collapse for the table but can I force the display to be collapsed for everyone and can I incorporate a thumbnail next to the item name in the collapsed scenario?

2. Is there a better way to achieve this functionality?

3. Also since I have over 1000 items listed currently in their own forum as individual threads, can I import all of these posts into individual entries?

4. For the expanded view of each entry, I prefer the look of the "featured" style but I can't find a way to edit the entry if I utilize "featured". Is there a way to edit the entry using the featured setting?

Thanks in advance and I'm using the 2.2.8 RC1 version.

0. and 3. Question - are the entries you are eventually serving files on your server or urls to external sites? If they are files on your server, you can autocreate the whole structure by using the category synchronisation feature. Ditto if the links in the forums are pointing to files on your server, again you can autocreate them in LDM the same way.

1. and 4. The featured style is supposed to look very clean, so doesn't have the icons. But these are just vbulletin templates - so you can always edit them, mixing and matching the pieces you like. You can find the names of the templates by going to LDM/admin/linkbits and catbits. All the pieces that fit into the various linkbit styles are available to them all, so you can add the thumbnail in with the $linkimgjump variable, etc (take a look in the links_linkbit template to see what I'm talking about).

2. Undoubtedly If I had the last three and half years over again, I might do things differently!

Let me know if you need more help.