Acqal Blogging

Add META Abstract & Author to seo_basics

2009-11-03T00:29:42-05:00

Meta Abstract & Author complete

Seo_basics is an excellent starter for rapidly implementing basic search engine optimization capabilities in TYPO3. For most, seo_basics when used with realurl for search engine friendly URLs is enough. However, for content publishers that require passing along more information about articles or publication contexts being included directly in a page, a meta abstract and author tag is needed.

After you've included seo_basics in your TYPO3 template, add the following TypoScript to the Setup box to enable meta abstract and author tags.

plugin.tx_seobasics {
	# Building the Abstract tag
	70 = TEXT
	70 < .30
	70.data = page:abstract
	70.stdWrap >
	70.wrap = <meta name="abstract" content="|" />


	# Building the Author tag
	# Thank you Joey <info@cybercraft.de> for the postCObjet cleanup
	80 = TEXT
	80 < .30
	80 {
		data = page:author
		ifEmpty.data = page:author_email
		stdWrap >
		required = 1
		postCObject = TEXT
		postCObject {
			data = page:author_email
			noTrimWrap = | (|)|
			if.isTrue.data = page:author
			required = 1
		}
		wrap = <meta name="author" content="|" />
	}
}

You'll notice that the TypoScript for the author tag is a little more complex than usual. The reason being is that you have 4 states in which the author tag can be presented. Those meta author tag states are:

No author tag at all
Name only
Email only
Name and email

Samples of each, except none, are included as images.

If you've got questions, please feel free to contact us.

Acqal Corporation is an official TYPO3 agency with over 40 years of Internet experience. Acqal offers you TYPO3 hosting, TYPO3 support, TYPO3 templates and TYPO3 training and tutorials.

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© 2009 Acqal Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

More TYPO3 Goodies

2009-10-24T00:36:02-04:00

There was / is an interesting discussion on the LinkedIn TYPO3 Users Group called "Do you blog about TYPO3?"

Some of the responses I was aware of, others were new. They are worth putting on the "Ultimate TYPO3 Reource List," plus I added a few more.

David Smeringe's blog - Programming and web design centric weblog with a lot on TYPO3.

mediaVROG Blog - Maik Vlcek's blog, XHTML/CSS, Javascript/Ajax mit mootools, Barrierearmut, Typo3 (German)

Nikolay Orlenko's blog - TYPO3, Drupal and other CMS in Ukraine. (Russian)

Scenic Living - From the Netherlands, blogging about typo3, html/css, useful tips and more

SeeThrough Web Blog - Simon Browning's blog. Tutorials, tips, snippets and observations about TYPO3, Magento, and our web work in general.

TheDemo.ca - TYPO3 video tutorials and extension module demonstrations.

Typebased - Pavel Antonov's blog (mostly in Russian)

TYPO3 Addict - Maarten Mandemaker's blog. Tips and tricks for developing websites with TYPO3. Here you'll find TypoScript snippets, TSConfig and configuration options for your own TYPO3 website.

Acqal Corporation is an official TYPO3 agency with over 40 years of Internet experience. Acqal offers you TYPO3 hosting, TYPO3 support, TYPO3 templates and TYPO3 training and tutorials.

Please subscribe to Acqal Newsletter and Acqal Blogging via Email or RSS Feed .

© 2009 Acqal Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

TYPO3 Extension Manager Beginner Tip

2009-10-16T20:48:45-04:00

TYPO3's Extension Manager is a great way to easily import extensions into your web site. But, how many times have you searched for an extension you know is there and had no results?

This may be because your settings on what extensions the manager is allowed to search for keep you from finding the extension you are looking for.

There are two settings, one for reviewed extensions and one for all extensions. Reviewed extensions are certainly completely safe, but so are many unreviewed extensions. If your are set to search only for reviewed extensions, you will miss many others.

As long as you know that the extensions you need are safe, reviewed or not, you can change your settings so that all extensions in the repository may be searched for and downloaded.

Go to Settings

Check the "Enable extensions without review (basic security check):" box

Now, you can search for all extensions!

Acqal Corporation is an official TYPO3 agency with over 40 years of Internet experience. Acqal offers you TYPO3 hosting, TYPO3 support, TYPO3 templates and TYPO3 training and tutorials.

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© 2009 Acqal Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

WAP Detect Failure in TYPO3? Use WURFL Instead!

2009-09-23T02:34:44-04:00

Beware of using [device = wap] in TYPO3, it's outdated. As such Internet Explorer 8 is detected and your mobile code is activated.

Try using extension wurfl, based upon the Wireless Universal Resource File, instead as follows.

# Send mobiles to mobile site
[userFunc = user_wurfl_getDeviceCapability(is_wireless_device)]
	config >
	config.additionalHeaders = Location: m.example.com
	page >
	page = PAGE
	page.10 = TEXT
[end]

While I haven't been successful getting wurfl2 working on a PHP 4 box, wurfl does fine.

Though documentation says that [device = wap] detection is over written, I haven't found that to be the case.

Acqal Corporation is an official TYPO3 agency with over 40 years of Internet experience. Acqal offers you TYPO3 hosting, TYPO3 support, TYPO3 templates and TYPO3 training and tutorials.

Please subscribe to Acqal Newsletter and Acqal Blogging via Email or RSS Feed .

© 2009 Acqal Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

Quick Tips for TYPO3 Security

2009-10-20T09:53:54-04:00

Security Check Results

TYPO3 website security is an imperative these days and ignoring it is quite costly in terms of time, money and resources. However, with TYPO3, many of the most common security checks can be easily done with a single TYPO3 extension.

Security Check, found as security_check in the TYPO3 extension respository, runs from the TYPO3 backend and checks about 40 of the most common TYPO3 security concerns. Besides a report of potential lapses and guidance on how to fix them, there are a couple of tools for finding unnecessary and insecure files.

When TYPO3's Security Check is combined with the principals and steps outlined in the TYPO3 Security Cookbook, downloadable below, a TYPO3 website's security is quite solid from the server side.

So... What Does Security Check, Check?

Per the security_check manual, the following points are checked. Sample results at right.

Php Ini Check
- Test if the Setting open_basedir is set
- Is the PHP Setting "error_log" is set?
- Is the PHP Setting "register_globals" off?
- Is the PHP Setting "display_errors" off?
- Is the PHP Setting "magic_quotes_gpc" off?
Database Check
- Test the access to mysql config Database
- Test the Host Restrictions of the Mysql User
- Test the Mysql User passwords
loacalconf
- Is the encryptionkey set?
- Are the Filerights on creation of new Files to hight?
- Are the Filerights on creation of new Folder to hight?
- Is the Installtool Password changed?
- Is the Option lockSSL active?
- Is the Security level the highest?
- Is a Warning E-Mail Address inserted?
- Is the Session Timeout to hight?
- Is the SQL-Debug Feature disabled?
- Is the Display of Errors disabled?
- Is the Option to install global Extension disabled?
- Is the Flag "disable_exec_function" activated?
- Is the Option to edit of Extensions disabled?
Backend Access
- Is the access to Typo3 Backend protected?
- Is the access to Typo3 Install Tool protected?
Files Check
- Are there Backup Files on the Server?
- Are there CVS Files on the Server?
- Are there Files without Extension on the Server?
- Are there CVS Files on the Server?
- Are there Readme Files on the Server?
- Are there Subversion Files on the Server?
Typo3
- Is the standard Password used?
- Checks if insecure Extensions loaded.
- Is Typo3 up to Date?
External Tools
- Search PHP-Info Outputs.
File rights
- Checks the Rights of Folders.
- Checks the Rights of Files.

User Input TYPO3 Security Suggestions

While Security Check and the TYPO3 Security Cookbook help with server side concerns, these following TYPO3 extensions check incoming data. In turn, they help protect the website from spamming, cross-site scripting XSS and SQL injection attacks.

Anti-spam - wt_spamshield & captcha
Bad request dropping - timtab_badbehavior
Parameter checking - wt_doorman

Acqal Corporation is an official TYPO3 agency with over 40 years of Internet experience. Acqal offers you TYPO3 hosting, TYPO3 support, TYPO3 templates and TYPO3 training and tutorials.

Please subscribe to Acqal Newsletter and Acqal Blogging via Email or RSS Feed .

© 2009 Acqal Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

Create a Menu Section Header with TypoScript

2009-09-23T02:38:18-04:00

Submenu and Header Level 1

In the name of usability, it's extremely helpful to keep website users informed of where they are on a website. Frequently, this "where am I" functionality is handled by a breadcrumb, but you can also use section headers to provide similar capability.

The TypoScript that follows, put into your TypoScript template Setup section, performs two functions. The first, lib.nav.sub.header, is to create the section header. The second, lib.nav.sub, incorporates lib.nav.sub.header into the submenu for the section in which a user is located.

When you're ready to insert the submenu, use lib.nav.sub in your TemplaVoila Data Structure XML or TypoScript Setup.

lib.nav.sub.header = HMENU
lib.nav.sub.header {
	special = rootline
	special.range = 1|1
	wrap = <li id="title">|</li>
	1 = TMENU
	1 {
		NO {
			doNotLinkIt = 0
			ATagTitle.field = description // title
			stdWrap.htmlSpecialChars = 1
		}
	}
}

lib.nav.sub = COA
lib.nav.sub {
	wrap = <div id="submenu"><ul>|</ul></div>

	10 < lib.nav.sub.header
	
	20 = HMENU
	20 {
		entryLevel = 1
		1 = TMENU
		1 {
			NO {
				wrapItemAndSub = <li>|</li>
				ATagTitle.field = description // title
				stdWrap.htmlSpecialChars = 1
			}

			CUR < .NO
			CUR = 1
			CUR {
				wrapItemAndSub = <li id="active">|</li>
				doNotLinkIt = 1
			}
		}
		
		2 < .1
		2.wrap = <ul>|</ul>
		3 < .2
		4 < .2
	}
}

Reference

Acqal Corporation is an official TYPO3 agency with over 40 years of Internet experience. Acqal offers you TYPO3 hosting, TYPO3 support, TYPO3 templates and TYPO3 training and tutorials.

Please subscribe to Acqal Newsletter and Acqal Blogging via Email or RSS Feed .

© 2009 Acqal Corporation. All Rights Reserved.

Ultimate TYPO3 Resource List - More Great Stuff

2009-10-03T01:15:24-04:00

Before T3CON09, I started a TYPO3 "Ultimate" Resource List with a blog post. I now have created a permanent web page for all the resources we discover. This is a work in progress and eventually it will become quite comprehensive.

One thing I am doing that most English sites don't do is include sites in other languages. There are an amazing amount of great resources in German, for example. If you have sites to suggest, please email me. The one thing I look at besides good TYPO3 information is how up-to-date the posts are. There are many blogs I've found that haven't had a new post since 2007. Those usually aren't going to make the cut.

Here is the next installment. A couple of these were suggested by people commenting on my prior post, so thanks for those recommendations!

TYPO3Development - A blog for professional TYPO3 developers, Jochen Rau's blog: Not a lot of posts, but those that are there are worth a look.

TYPO3forum.net - Deutsche TYPO3 Community and Forum - this looks like a great and active site, I wish I could read German better :-) (German)

TYPO free - Fighting for TYPO3 free code, Michiel Roos' blog: Not just about TYPO3, Michiel also posts about FLOW3, MAC info, NGINX, Debian, etc.

TYPO3 Security, by Marcus Krause, this site focuses on TYPO3 security awareness, it has a blog, a couple of tutorials and CMS comparison of security advisories (TYPO3 beats Drupal and Joomla big-time in this area).:

TYPO3weblog.de - Das Blog zu TYPO3, JavaScript und openSource, Frank Nägler's blog. This is another one where I wish I could read German better, tons of useful posts (German)

Web Empowered Church How-to's - a variety of tutorials on WEC and non-WEC specific TYPO3 topics.

Words of Wisdom, Benjamin Mack's blog: This blog has lots of good TYPO3 technical tips.

Acqal Corporation is an official TYPO3 agency with over 40 years of Internet experience. Acqal offers you TYPO3 hosting, TYPO3 support, TYPO3 templates and TYPO3 training and tutorials.

Clean Up sr_freecap captcha with TypoScript

2009-09-29T09:06:34-04:00

sf_free_captcha Cleaned Up

Is your sr_free_captcha image unmanageable? Then try the following in your TypoScript templates Constants section to bring about an initial usable image.

plugin.tx_srfreecap.backgroundBlur = 0 
plugin.tx_srfreecap.backgroundMorph = 0 
plugin.tx_srfreecap.backgroundType = White with squiggles
plugin.tx_srfreecap.imageHeight = 80
plugin.tx_srfreecap.mergeWithBackground = 0 
plugin.tx_srfreecap.morphFactor = 0 
plugin.tx_srfreecap.textColor = 0

If you want more configuration options, then check out the Template Constants available for your further editing.

Acqal Corporation is an official TYPO3 agency with over 40 years of Internet experience. Acqal offers you TYPO3 hosting, TYPO3 support, TYPO3 templates and TYPO3 training and tutorials.

TYPO3 Workbench and Clickity, clack, click

2009-10-06T21:37:53-04:00

T3CON09 Frankfurt - The Plan - http://www.flickr.com/photos/daniellienert/3919344722/

TYPO3 Workbench

Have you ever wondered if you can more easily access and search TYPO3 manuals from within Firefox? If so, you need to check out TYPO3 Workbench, a Firefox add-on.

You can use TYPO3 Workbench for quicker access to TYPO3 backends, bookmarked TYPO3 projects, TSREF and TSConfig document quick links, and searching of the TYPO3 Extension Repository and search forums on TYPO3.org.

Internet Poetry

Now for a little fun. Just after the T3CON09 Frankfurt keynote by Kasper, I was inspired to write.

clickity, clack, click
there's coding afoot
architecture to tackle
web visitors thirst to slake
viral hits grow
server loads rise
a smoking pipe bursts
our success too grand
no retirement yet
pages to fix
folks crave more

Acqal Corporation is an official TYPO3 agency with over 40 years of Internet experience. Acqal offers you TYPO3 hosting, TYPO3 support, TYPO3 templates and TYPO3 training and tutorials.

Poem: TYPO3 is of the community

2009-09-22T23:27:56-04:00

Mr. TYPO3 getting ready for the keynote (http://www.flickr.com/photos/nizger/3917134398/)

TYPO3 is of the community
and for the community.
Together we succeed,
apart we fail.
With another year comes,
us together in Frankfurt
to join and raise a glass
for a cheer.
To new friends,
new sites
and new techniques.
At the close,
we go a little sad,
a bit tired,
but fuller of hope
to a brighter future
of more friends
and growing success.
–
9/11/2009 – Thinking about TYPO3’s future during the T3CON09 Frankfurt keynote.

Acqal Corporation is an official TYPO3 agency with over 40 years of Internet experience. Acqal offers you TYPO3 hosting, TYPO3 support, TYPO3 templates and TYPO3 training and tutorials.