what script? the collection of scripts that makes concrete5 possible, or the javascript that makes it all easy to use? Either way, none of it is encoded/compiled so you should be able to glean all your info from that..although the docs help.

Guess I wasn't clear. Excuse my lack of knowledge. Since I posted this thread I downloaded a free HTML editor (Hapedit) and have seen how to save a web page to a folder on my hard drive then open the file in the editor program. Next I hope to learn how to load the file back into C5 (haven't gotten that far).

Any thoughts? Am I on the right track?

By the way, I have no idea what you just said. Ha!

no, you're heading down the wrong track..

concrete5 puts all your content in a database and generates web pages on the fly as someone navigates your site.

there are no html files being generated and saved on the back end..

if you're interested in getting more under the hood, you should explore CSS and then check out the Themes inside of concrete5

gluck!

Thanks for the response. You put your finger on exactly what I want to do; namely "look under the hood". I intend to take your advise and learn CSS (first learning HTML). I found a good site for this at W3schools.com.

Please tell me how I get under the hood when I'm ready? I assume I'll need to export and import a file from C5 somehow? Sorry for such an obvious and basic question. Just make believe I'm 4 years old and I'll probably get it.

Thanks

don't export things, you must understand php beside html, css and javascript too if you want to understand how concrete5 works.

even though I really like c5, it's probably not the best thing to learn html with since you should understand a little bit more than that!

Even still. Could you please answer my question of how to look under the hood, as it were?

Thank you.

It isn't exactly easy, took me a while to wrap my head around it.

I would first look at the templates, that is a very good start.

I would also use something like notepad++ or e text editor to be able to easily browse the directory structure of the site.

That being said, a few good PHP books will get you on the right track, you first have to understand the syntax. You can't read spanish all day and somehow understand it unless you have some sort of learning guide (or already know the language).

Learning online is ok, but I guess I am old school in that i learn from books and straight reading code.

danct,
It challenging because as Scott points out, you're kinda jumping the gun. It's almost like someone saying "I want to make souffle, what's a kitchen? Tell me how! What's an egg??" Great to have that interest and energy, and frankly I think curiosity is the only pre-requisite to being a brilliant developer, so I want to give you nothing but encouraging words - that being said, i think there's a lot of background you need to get up to speed on before you're going to be able to make a great dish with concrete5...

Get on google and figure out answers to the following. You should understand what these things are and how the interact with each other to deliver a web page...

1) What's Apache, what's a webserver.
2) What's middleware?
3) What's PHP?
4) What's HTML, whats CSS, and what make those different than PHP.
5) What's a database? What's mysql?
6) What's Object Oriented mean?
7) What's MVC (model view controller) mean?

Once you have at least a passing understanding of this stuff, I think you'll be able to get much more meaningful answers from this crew. Until you do, it's a little like asking 4 star chefs how to cook that souffle without having ever even looked up what goes into one.

Gluck!

Yes I understand it's tricky and complicated.

Why, however do I get the impression you guys are acting like gatekeepers to information you don't seem to be willing to part with?

I have researched most of the things you outlined above and I will do much more I assure you, but none of this will be worth anything unless I know how to get this information into C5 and in turn onto my website. I'm sure I can easily do this with other web builders like Kompozer, but I want to do it with C5.

I watched the tutorial about modifying the theme page, but it was unclear how he got his revised theme into C5. This is ALL I'm asking. Surely this is the easiest part. Even a 4-star chef should be able to show how to put the souffle into the oven, no?

Thanks

We really couldn't be further from gatekeepers ever. You have all the source to concrete5. If you look for any file that ends in PHP from what you downloaded/installed... THATS the brains of concrete5.

Again, unlike Frontpage or some other offline editing tool, concrete5 is a middleware based content management system that creates and delivers HTML on the fly, as it's requested by the user. There is no doing something locally and then putting it INTO your website. There is only editing the theme for your website and editing the content for your website. You might have seen Andy in that tutorial upload a theme to the live website... thats as much "work here, push there" that I can think of.

I promise you there is nothing going on that you can't see. Just look though what you get after unpacking the file you download from "Host Your Own" in our footer.

I appreciate your patience.

1) specifically I wanted to see if I could increase the size of a slideshow I've put into my website, but if you could at least explain to me how he put that modified theme into c5 I would appreciate it.

2) Please tell me where that downloadable file is you spoke of in the "footer"? What footer?

http://sourceforge.net/projects/concretecms/

slideshow wise I don't use one I haven't personally wrote, however most of the blocks I use have their dimensions contrained by their wrapping div's width.

I am not a huge fan of slideshows, I prefer images on a page with a lightbox effect, or something like slideshowpro, now that is cool :)

So for you either the width of the slideshow is defined in the siteroot/blocks/slideshow(guessing at name)/view.php or your width of your main content container div is too narrow for what you are looking to accomplish :)

themes get uploaded to siteroot/themes/

Now I feel like I'm getting somewhere... Thanks. I downloaded C5 to my hard drive and I can now see The program and even found the file you directed me to.

Why can't I access these same files through my server-installed C5? I have no obvious means through my dashboard to do this. Maybe I'm not being clear and I apologize for that, but I'm running out of ways to ask you and others for the means to access and thus modify what I see on my website beyond the standard sizes for slide shows for example.

I must be using the wrong vernacular. Sorry.

[Edit]
Perhaps I'm missing this entirely..... You say "siteroot". THIS must be the area that I access the holy grail. Is this somewhere in my dashboard or at my webhost?

If you have your test example domain hosted at the super sweet getconcrete5.com site then you won't have access to the actual core files that are powering the site, instead you may or may not have access to the directories outside of concrete5 where things like files/cache/themes/packages reside. I know you would have this access with a paid account, i don't see it happening with the free demos. Maybe it does? dunno.

That being said, to look at the core install which is free and open you need to download the core concrete5 app/package/zip/program whatever you want to call it.

I like to think of concrete5 as an awesome extensible CMS that is the de-facto standard for how a CMS should be written. It doesn't provide everything, but it doesn't get in the way if you want to change it :)

yes. the demo you're playing with at getConcrete5.com does not give you access to any files. If you want to pay to have us host a real account for you at getConcrete5.com you can get complete FTP access, cpanel, etc..

-frz

I don't think it's a demo. I think it was offered free with my web domain account (bluehost). Other free web builders were offered as well, but I settled on C5 because I liked it best.

Are you saying that I need to pay for this C5 in order to gain functionality? My web page is up and running now with C5 through my web host.

Thanks for all your help.

I went to Bluehost (my web host) and found a file called index.php.

All that it was,however is:



What does this mean? Do I need to use a FTP client?

http://www.concrete5.org/help/building_with_concrete5/developers/the-dispatcher-understanding-the-concrete-applic/


but you really need to goto PHP.net and learn that language first.

http://concrete5.org/download