Question K5 RC5 Possible Crypsis Menu Bug

I'm using Joomla 3.6, Kuena 5.0 RC5, Crypsis template.

In Joomla menu manager, I created menu items connecting to K5 Home page and to K5 Category list. In both cases, the Kenena Menu would not show up on Crypsis front end.

After fiddling, I found out that the Kunena Menu would show up on the Forum / Index page.

However, there was no Joomla Menu Manager / Kunena option to link a menu item to the Forum / Index page. I had to create an External/Internal link via Joomla Menu Manager / System / External Links.

Try backend -kunena - tool -menu manager -fix

Then go to your main menu, then enable the Forum menu item.

This error occurs when kunena menu items are used in other menus. Links of other menus, which are linked to the forum, must be menu type "Menu Item Alias".
Please see here: www.kunena.org/docs/en/troubleshooting/menu-issues

In Joomla menu manager you must create a menu item alias:
"System Links" -> "Menu Item Alias". As menu item select "Kunena Menu" - "Index".

Thank you to everyone for all this help.

Putting all the advice together, this is what I did.

1) Trashed all the new menu items relating to Kunena (but left the Kunena menu, itself, untouched).

2) Used Joomla back end / Components / Kunena Forum / Tools / Menu Manager / Restore Kunena Menu

3) Went to Joomla Menu Manager & published the Forum Menu item created by Kunena.

4) That worked well, except that, on the front end, the Forum menu linked to Recent Topics, instead of to Kunena's Index.

5) In Joomla Menu Manager, Edit item "Forum," I changed Menu Item to Index.

6) Now the Joomla menu worked the way I wanted it to, in that the "Forum" menu link opened the Kunena Index page, and on that page the whole Kunena Menu was working.

7) The Forum menu item that was created by Restore Kunena Menu had an alias of the word Kunena and a date. I changed that alias to something that was more in line with the theme of my website, so hopefully it would be more SEO/SEM friendly.

The source of my confusion
I'm trying to reconstruct why I was confused, in an attempt to help other people. (Please do not take this as criticism.)

1) I did not expect Kunena to automatically create a menu item in my main menu, so I tried to follow Joomla procedure to create the menu item myself. That messed up the Kunena menu system, and required the Restore Kunena Menu procedure. Other people may be confused by this.

2) After the mess up in (1) immediately above, the main Kunena Menu did not show in the Kunena forum at all, until I accidentally stumbled upon the Forum / Index page. Other people may be confused when/if the Kunena menu does not show up in the Forum page or the Category list page.

3) Kunena's main menu already uses the alias "forum," so when I tried to use that alias to create a "Forum" menu item, Joomla would not save the new item because of the duplicate alias. Other people may be confused by this. Being something of a novice, I had to research the problem of duplicate aliases.

Thanks, again, to everyone for your help.

Suggested improvements based the my comment immediately above this.

1) Have a post-installation message explain what should be done next to make Kunena work with the Joomla menu system.

2) Kunena should not use the menu alias "Forum," because that is the natural menu item title and alias that people will use when they create a Joomla menu item to link to Kunena. As it is, people cannot save their "Forum" menu item because they get an error message from Joomla about a duplicate alias. Perhaps Kunena could use a different alias like forum-k.

3) Make the Kunena menu show up on all forum pages including "forum" and "category list." When the Kenuna menu does not show up, people could think they have to create an entire Kunena menu themselves (which was my impression before I received your advice).

4) In Joomla backend / Menus / Menu Items / New / Menu Item Type / Kunena Forum, offer the option to link to Kunena's index page, which is not available now..

5) When people do follow the recommended Kunena menu procedure, the menu item opens to Kunena's "Recent Topics" page. Many people would rather have Kunena open to Kunena's Index page.

6) Put the word "Login" next to the login icon in the Crypsis template.

7) In the login dropdown box, include the option to create an account.

On the index page, I collapsed the category titles so that only section titles showed.
Joomla backend / components / Kunena forum / categories / open a Section category / category settings / display sub-categories / Never in category index
But then the index page was misleading on the front end. Under each Section Title was the following statement:
See Complete List of Subjects (1 hidden)
That confuses and discourages the reader into thinking there is only one topic posted in the section category. Actually, dozens of topics are posted under that Section Category. It would be better to say:
See Complete List of Subjects (113 topics)
or just say
See Complete List of Subjects

Thank you for considering these suggestions.

On Github.com, Kunena (Jelle Kok) said:

1) Kunena menu alias is the same as in K1.0, we never changed this behavior. installation doc is here: www.kunena.org/docs/en/installation
2) If you want to use the foruma alias, then you need to remove it, also on trash.
3) All kunena menu items are showed on the kunena menu, on all kunena pages. If you can't see it, then you have a wrong setting on your new menu item
4) You need to use the alias.
5) You can choose you option, on the menu item, 90% will use recent topics
6) Sorry this is a personal improvement, we don't add custom strings, if you want, you can create a template override.
7) The option is there, if you have enabled the create account on joomla user options
category index is not the index menu item itself, its the view between index and the category item. Category item is only see the category without the topics on the bottom.

I agree, the forum menu system was a nightmare for me aswell. I had to can all the stuff kunena did and remake them myself so I could use them in a manner that worked for me. The alises and kunenas premade menus were a pain to deal with.

The menu item "Alias" is a Joomla feature. You can link more menu items with the same target with it. It is regardless which Alias name you use for them. It will always show the target item in the address.