Idea Code Fix - "Allowed Categories" Entrypage Menu Parameter

The Entrypage menu type in the Kunena Menu has two parameters: "Default Menu Item" and "Allowed Categories". "Default Menu Item" determines what to display (index, categories, recent topics, etc) and this works as expected. "Allowed Categories" however, doesn't work as expected in all cases.

On the index page, it limits what categories are shown.
On the recent topics page, it does nothing.

I presume that this is a bug. I would expect this behavior to apply to all child menu items yet it doesn't. As far as I can tell, only the global Kunena configuration option "Category List in Recent Topics" affects what categories to display in recent topics.

I've added a few lines of code to the Kunena component to allow the "Allowed Categories" parameter in the parent Entrypage menu item to take precedence over the global configuration, if defined. That way, multiple Kunena menu instances can be setup and configured to show only the categories desired (ie "Cats" menu for cat categories/topics, "Dogs" menu for dog categories/topics, etc).

Is this something the Kunena dev team would be interested in integrating into the baseline?

Before we get into any arguments about whether something is (or isn't) a bug - given that K 1.6 went through a fairly rigorous testing cycle over a 6-month period, has been deployed on 100,000 websites and this is one of the first occasions that we've seen this particular issue - have you checked the documentation Wiki: Customised Menus

The Wiki could benefit from direct contributions from the community.

"Allowed Categories" should effect the Index and Recent Topics pages in the same way as they are affected here at Kunena.org. For example, topics in the Playground category are listed on the Index page but they are not shown on the Recent Topics pages at this website. You can verify this for yourself. So I'm puzzled when you wrote

jdenver wrote:

On the recent topics page, [the Allowed Categories setting] does nothing.

Is there some way that you can demonstrate this for us? If you would like to see how this has been configured at Kunena.org, I can show you.

Hi Sozzled,

If you don't mind going over your configuration, I'd be very happy to compare.

Yes, I followed the instructions in the wiki but it really doesn't go into any detail about this particular configuration. It makes a passing reference to it only.

In looking at the code, I noticed that only the global configuration was considered in the Recent Topics function (latestx.php IIRC). So I'm equally perplexed! Hooray to confusion. Now if only we can sort out why....

Looking at your setup, the playground menu item does not have a "recent topics" tab enabled. The tabs point to individual <sub>categories using, presumably, the Category menu type. I wonder what would happen if you enabled Recent Topics in Playground? Just curious.

Anyway, I really appreciate your response. I really do hope it's just me (that would simplify things immensely!), but after examining the Recent Topics code, I don't think it is. Unless the Config class itself is accounting for this behavior when it generates the latestcategory array (admittedly that's one place I didn't examine), it simply appears to be coded to work this way.

Thanks!</sub>

You might find this worked example will help: Multiple forums on one Joomla Please let us know if you need more information.

Hi Sozzled,

That thread didn't address the problem with "Recent Topics", which is that it doesn't recognize the "Allowed Categories" of the menu it's in. It only recognizes the global Kunena configuration.

It should be easy to confirm though. Can you add a "Recent Topics" child in the Playground menu? The header on the page will say "Recent Topics". There isn't one currently. If you're correct that "Allowed Categories" in the menu is in fact recognized, then only topics in the Playground forum should appear.

I suspect that the reason Recent Topics on the main forum excludes Playground is because the global configuration has been set to exclude it. But this is a global restriction, meaning it would also apply to the Playground forums. If we enable Recent Topics on the Playground menu, we'll know for certain if the configuration is supported. I hope that's not asking too much.

Thanks again for your help!