TNG-Joomla Bridge For Joomla 1.0.x and TNG 6.x Options

[reverendspam]

This TNG-Joomla Bridge is a hack of the original Cas Nuy Mambo install, Mark Fleeson hack, and various code found on the TNG forums. I got tired of sifting through all the different pages of code on the TNG forums and decided to make a packagable joomla component.

I have this working with Joomla 1.0.12 and TNG 6.1.0

You can see it in action here The Mullis Melange. Click on the Genealogy link in the main menu.

Enjoy.

Joe Cox

 tngjoomla_6.0.1.zip ( 29k ) Number of downloads: 961


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To install:

1) You must have TNG 6 working first and placed in its own directory within in your Joomla directory. ex- /myjoomladirectory/tng/. (You can place this outside of your Joomla directory if need be, but you will need to know the server absolute path for the config setting).

2) Unzip the attached tngjoomla-6.0.1.zip file.

3) Place the index_joomla.php file (found in the unzipped TNG folder) in the root of your tng directory.

4) Install com_tng.zip into Joomla as you would any other Joomla component.

5) After install go to Components --> TNG Genealogy --> edit config menu and make sure the configuration is correct (save).

The configuration file is automatically set up as:

url = /tng (assuming tng is the sub directory in your main joomla directory. You can name it whatever you want)
joomla prefix = jos_ (the standard mysql default prefix for Joomla)
tng prefix = tng_ (the standard mysql default prefix for TNG)

If for some reason this does not work, open up the config.tng file found in "/administrator/components/com_tng/config.tng.php" and manually set the directory and prefixes.

note: If you have ever installed an older version of the TNG Genealogy component into your Joomla it may appear with the new install that a new menu item appears. This is just an old remnant leftover in your Joomla database from the old install. Just delete the menu item and create a new menu item to your new TNG Genealogy bridge install.

That's it.

Addendum:

For folks that are new to Joomla and need to know how to set up a link to the component. This will be a general set up for the main menu.

1) On your Joomla admin menu go to menu>mainmenu click on new>

2) Highlight the "Component" radio button then click on next at the top of the menu.

3) Give the menu item a name such as "Genealogy" , highlight "TNG Genealogy" in the component section, highlight where you want it to be place on your menu bar ##, make it public, make it published and click save.

Do Not!

1) ##Warning - Do not make this the first item in your Joomla main menu. "Home" should always be the first item in your main menu. If you put this component before your home directory in the main menu you may get Joomla regurgitating some strange things.

2) Do not try to use one of TNG's tmeplates that Darrin provides to set this up. Use the original index.php file that was provided when you initially downloaded TNG. You can use my modified index.php file to get you started if you need.


What's new in this bridge?

1) Got rid of iframes on the component end by implementing javascript. Some joomla templates will still create horizontal iframes especially if you open up the ancestor chart to 8 generations. Well at least half the problem is fixed. Thanks David Lovrien for the fix.

2) Updated encryption from base64 to md5. Joomla now passes md5 encrypted password to TNG.

3) Gave the component a logo.

If you have any questions, fixes, additional code please add in this section. There are plenty of helpful people here. I may not be one of them (IMG:style_emoticons/default/icon_smile.gif) --as I state before I am not good at tech support.


ps. Thanks John Vickers for your extra set of eyes on my global configurations issue. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/icon_smile.gif)

John's bridge component that has no iframes is ready for beta testing here. Vickers Code
His bridge is different in that he has recoded actual TNG files. My Bridge does not change TNG files, but you may still get the horizontal iframe. That's the trade off.
I have not had a chance to play with John's bridge yet, but based on John's other project(s) I'm sure it will be good.

pps.
Here is a quick and dirty way to redirect away from your TNG directory.

ppps. If you absolutely have to get rid of that horizontal scroll bar then go to this thread: Topic 573

[Jens]

Got the following error:

Warning: mysql_fetch_row(): supplied argument is not a valid MySQL result resource in ..../components/com_tng/tng.php on line 19

The rest displays well.
Please help!

Jens

[reverendspam]

Got the following error:

Warning: mysql_fetch_row(): supplied argument is not a valid MySQL result resource in ..../components/com_tng/tng.php on line 19

The rest displays well.
Please help!

Jens

This is a very general error. Most of the time it just means that you could not connect to the database (for whatever reason). Could be on your end that the database was not responding. Try refresh a couple of times or try a few hours later and see if it will work.

I'll will also need a bit more info like what platform are you running on Linux, xamp on windows, etc

What version of Joomla. What Version of TNG.

Any modifications to the Joomla database using third party software i.e., jacl, community builder, etc. been done?

Can you give me the url so I can see the error for myself? I'm assuming the page ran other than getting a one line error at the top of the page?

Joe

added: 20 may 2007
never heard from this person again. I just have to assume it was and error on their end?

[Sundog_AK]

Excellent work. I had completely given up on TNG and gone back to PhpGED at our site due to all the hassles with the Joomla integration. I have bridged SMF, Gallery 2, FlashChat, and PhpGED but TNG caused me the most grief.

Everything installed significantly easier than any other integration to date. I did notice a minor issue during install, in that the install of the component seems to add a menu item link automatically in the Main Menu but it didn't work until I deleted the link and readded. After that, it worked fine when I clicked from front end.

It also does seem to unwrap in a couple places when you get a couple menus deep within TNG, but I will make a bit more useful post on that after some sleep. Definitely a major leap forward. Thanks for the work.

Chris

[reverendspam]

Excellent work. I had completely given up on TNG and gone back to PhpGED at our site due to all the hassles with the Joomla integration. I have bridged SMF, Gallery 2, FlashChat, and PhpGED but TNG caused me the most grief.

Everything installed significantly easier than any other integration to date. I did notice a minor issue during install, in that the install of the component seems to add a menu item link automatically in the Main Menu but it didn't work until I deleted the link and readded. After that, it worked fine when I clicked from front end.

It also does seem to unwrap in a couple places when you get a couple menus deep within TNG, but I will make a bit more useful post on that after some sleep. Definitely a major leap forward. Thanks for the work.

Chris

Thanks for the input. It's a relief to hear this worked. I need some other testers and some to look over the code for me.

I'll look into the menu issue. I was not able to repeat it, but hoping others will test this out to see if they get the same problem.

As to the the unwrapping, I find that a couple of TNG pages want to do their own thing (IMG:style_emoticons/default/icon_smile.gif) Joomla templates also want to do their own things to. Please let me know which TNG pages seem to "unwrap" and I will see if I can repeat this.



Joe


added: 20 May 2007

The menu/link issue occurs if you had an old install of the joomla-tng bridge on your site. This is an artifact that Joomla left when you deleted the old bridge component. Just delete the old Joomla link on your menu and make a new link to the bridge component.

[Carlton Brooks]

Thanks for the new linkage.

Some questions.

Install went smooth and everything looks good. Pages open correctly and display correctly.

Now my question is about registration. If I use the Joomla register options, is it supposed to automatically create a user in TNG?

If not do I do away with the Joomla reg and just use the TNG reg in its place.

Thanks
Carlton Brooks
Mesa, Arizona

[reverendspam]

Thanks for the new linkage.

Some questions.

Install went smooth and everything looks good. Pages open correctly and display correctly.

Now my question is about registration. If I use the Joomla register options, is it supposed to automatically create a user in TNG?

If not do I do away with the Joomla reg and just use the TNG reg in its place.

Thanks
Carlton Brooks
Mesa, Arizona

Hi Carlton,

Great to hear the install went smoothly.

Now my question is about registration. If I use the Joomla register options, is it supposed to automatically create a user in TNG?

The TNG-Joomla bridge will automatically place a Joomla registered user into the TNG Database. It goes from Joomla to TNG and not TNG to Joomla. A one way bridge.

When you created the menu item in Joomla go back to it and set the access level. If you set it to registered only registered folks will be able to see the menu link to TNG.

If not do I do away with the Joomla reg and just use the TNG reg in its place.

The whole idea for me to do this was to have Joomla be the front end of all my users and thus registration process goes through Joomla.


Joe

[Carlton Brooks]

Ok I understand what you are doing.

To verify that they have been added to my TNG database where would I look?

Now what access level in Joomla do you give a person.

There are a number of levels in TNG ie:
Allow to add new records
Allow to edit existing records
Allow to submit edits for administrative review (People, Families and Sources only)
No edit rights
Allow to delete existing records
Allow to view information for living individuals
Allow to download GEDCOMs
Allow to view LDS information
Access Limits:
Allow access to all system settings and administrative functions, and apply rights to all trees and branches.
Restrict access to the following:
Tree*:
Branch**:

Notify this user upon account activation

If jJoomla is being used as the sole registration format what do you set to control the above settings, or I am being clueless .

Thanks
Carlton Brooks

[tomk]

Thanks for the input. It's a relief to hear this worked. I need some other testers and some to look over the code for me.

I'll look into the menu issue. I was not able to repeat it, but hoping others will test this out to see if they get the same problem.

Joe, Thanks for your work.

I updated my joomla site and test site (both 1.0.12 stable) with your updated component.
A) The test site has a mostly clean TNG 6.0.4 installation that never worked with the old bridge.
B) The production site has an older TNG 5 version that has been upgraded to 6.0.4 which still works with the old bridge (albeit some display problems) as long as I don't try to change the component configuration.

Happily I was able to easily uninstall the old bridge and reinstall your new one which went well with two hitches:

1) I too noticed in both cases that a new public "Genealogy" mainmenu item was created, and the auto created menu item has a type named "Component" with an early CID# (possibly the originally installed component). The manually created registered Genealogy sub-menu I added has a much higher CID# and the type is named "Component - TNG Genealogy". In my case this public menu did work and still enforced the administration setting that login is required.
Note: I had verified that after the uninstall, the old link was not in the menu where it had been, but I didn't look for the created one (which was more than my Joomla template would allow)

2) The only real problem that I have noticed so far in both sites is that when I click on the Administration link it flashes up the Administration menu, then goes to just the top line menus. If I log in directly to the TNG subdirectory I can login with admin user and the admin screen shows correctly. So this is only happening when invoking Administration from within Joomla.
Note: The only mod I have made to TNG was to modify the Login.php to eliminate the ability to register, ask for password reset, etc. I force all changes through the Joomla registration.

I would like to figure out what is happening to the administration link from within joomla, but at least I can update the TNG administration by going directly to the site. If I get a chance tomorrow, I'll replace the Modified login.php with the original files to see if this makes a difference.

By the way the new component fixed the display problems I had with the older bridge. THANKS!

Tom

If jJoomla is being used as the sole registration format what do you set to control the above settings, or I am being clueless .

The TNG access privileges are defined within TNG. When a user registers on the Joomla site they are able to connect to TNG via the bridge, but unless TNG is updated the new user will only see the default settings for TNG - which normally means not seeing Living persons, etc.

Once the new user has signed in to Joomla, there will be a record for that user within the TNG database that you can then set privileges for including which branch they are able to see living persons.

This has been my limited experience. Hope that helps.

Tom

[reverendspam]

1) I too noticed in both cases that a new public "Genealogy" mainmenu item was created, and the auto created menu item has a type named "Component" with an early CID# (possibly the originally installed component). The manually created registered Genealogy sub-menu I added has a much higher CID# and the type is named "Component - TNG Genealogy". In my case this public menu did work and still enforced the administration setting that login is required.
Note: I had verified that after the uninstall, the old link was not in the menu where it had been, but I didn't look for the created one (which was more than my Joomla template would allow)

2) The only real problem that I have noticed so far in both sites is that when I click on the Administration link it flashes up the Administration menu, then goes to just the top line menus. If I log in directly to the TNG subdirectory I can login with admin user and the admin screen shows correctly. So this is only happening when invoking Administration from within Joomla.
Note: The only mod I have made to TNG was to modify the Login.php to eliminate the ability to register, ask for password reset, etc. I force all changes through the Joomla registration.

Hi Tom,

1) Ah....That answers a previous question about the menu item being automatic. This is a Joomla hiccup. The link was from the previous install of the bridge. Joomla does not automatically un-install menu links when a component is uninstalled. You have to do it manually or an old menu item (like you saw) will reappear.

If you delete the menu item then uninstall the TNG-Joomla bridge then reinstall it you should not get a menu link. This makes sense now that you pointed out it was an older cid#. I checked this out and also found this to be the case so it was not an error with the current bridge.

2) I do not know what is going on with your admin menu. Do you mean the Joomla admin menu or your TNG admin menu? The bridge component does not touch TNG pages/code.

The only admin backend is for Joomla is found within the Components>TNG Genealogy>edit config menu. All it does is write to config.tng.php (found within /joomla/administrator/components/com_tng/ ). It does not touch TNG and tells the bridge where to find your TNG directory as well as when it accesses the database tells it what the prefixes are for the tng and joomla databases.

Joe

[reverendspam]

Ok I understand what you are doing.

To verify that they have been added to my TNG database where would I look?

Now what access level in Joomla do you give a person.

There are a number of levels in TNG ie:
Allow to add new records
Allow to edit existing records
Allow to submit edits for administrative review (People, Families and Sources only)
No edit rights
Allow to delete existing records
Allow to view information for living individuals
Allow to download GEDCOMs
Allow to view LDS information
Access Limits:
Allow access to all system settings and administrative functions, and apply rights to all trees and branches.
Restrict access to the following:
Tree*:
Branch**:

Notify this user upon account activation

If jJoomla is being used as the sole registration format what do you set to control the above settings, or I am being clueless .

Thanks
Carlton Brooks

When someone signs into Joomla it passes the user name and password form Joomla to the TNG database.

It will only pass this information only upon clicking on your genealogy menu link(TNG) in Joomla.

To verify this go into your TNG admin menu and click on users viola! they you are. This is also a good way to see who hasn't accessed TNG because if they have registered in Joomla but do not show up in yout TNG users directory you then know they have not checked out your genealogy database.

Access in Joomla is what you want to give the person. It's a matter of preference.

I personally leave my TNG database public access open to all users on the frontend of Joomla. Understand though, even if you give public access through Joomla that does not mean the user can edit your genealogy database. You must set individual access within TNG for that.

Keep in mind again all this bridge is for is to let you interface Joomla with TNG using Joomla as your frontend while passing user names and passwords to the tng database. This is for the convienence for the user to not have to log in to both TNG and joomla and the convienene of the webmaster to use joomla and have TNG wrapped within it.

This bridge is not used to control the TNG program or the TNG administration.

I hope this helps?


Joe

ps. Play around with both your Joomla access level settings and your TNG access level settings and it will eventually come to you. If you are new to joomla this can be very confusing at first because there are so many levels that can be set within menus, modules, and components.

[Carlton Brooks]

Having used Joomla and other bridges I understand what is supposed to be happening but mine is not after reading the previous post.

My TNG install is located at gpjgs_genealogy
My Joomla install is located at gpjgs

I installed the index_joomla.php in gpjgs_genealogy
Installed the component in Joomla
set component to
/gpjgs_genealogy
tng_
jos_

Created a menu component link using the TNG component.
When I click on it in my menu I get a 404 error
If I edit
/gpjgs_genealogy
tng_
jos_

to

gpjgs_genealogy
tng_
jos_
I get a 500 error

That is why I had questions. I thought the user thogh registerd in Joomla should at least show up in the TNG files, they do not.

What can I check to see why this will not work.

Thanks
Carlton Brooks

[tomk]

2) I do not know what is going on with your admin menu. Do you mean the Joomla admin menu or your TNG admin menu? The bridge component does not touch TNG pages/code.

The only admin backend is for Joomla is found within the Components>TNG Genealogy>edit config menu. All it does is write to config.tng.php (found within /joomla/administrator/components/com_tng/ ). It does not touch TNG and tells the bridge where to find your TNG directory as well as when it accesses the database tells it what the prefixes are for the tng and joomla databases.

Joe

Joe,

This is happening when I click on 'Administration' link within TNG. Backend of Joomla is working fine.

As I said in previous post, it may be related to something I did with login.php, but I just haven't had the chance yet to check it out.

Tom

Having used Joomla and other bridges I understand what is supposed to be happening but mine is not after reading the previous post.

My TNG install is located at gpjgs_genealogy
My Joomla install is located at gpjgs

I installed the index_joomla.php in gpjgs_genealogy
Installed the component in Joomla
set component to
/gpjgs_genealogy
tng_
jos_

Created a menu component link using the TNG component.
When I click on it in my menu I get a 404 error
If I edit
/gpjgs_genealogy
tng_
jos_

Carlton,

I had a similar problem. With the old bridge I had it pointed to a subdomain such as genealogy.domain.tld, but this didn't work with the new bridge. So I tried to use /tng for the directory that TNG is working in, and I got a 404 error. In my installation, both my joomla directory and my TNG directory are subdirectories of public_html. To get it to work I set the URL to "../tng" and it worked fine (well at least for the public area).

I'm guessing here that your two directories /gpjgs_genealogy and /gpjgs are at the same level like in my example above. If your genealogy directory is a subdirectory of your joomla directory, then it may be a different problem.

Tom

[reverendspam]

Having used Joomla and other bridges I understand what is supposed to be happening but mine is not after reading the previous post.

My TNG install is located at gpjgs_genealogy
My Joomla install is located at gpjgs

I installed the index_joomla.php in gpjgs_genealogy
Installed the component in Joomla
set component to
/gpjgs_genealogy
tng_
jos_

Created a menu component link using the TNG component.
When I click on it in my menu I get a 404 error
If I edit
/gpjgs_genealogy
tng_
jos_

to

gpjgs_genealogy
tng_
jos_
I get a 500 error

That is why I had questions. I thought the user thogh registerd in Joomla should at least show up in the TNG files, they do not.

What can I check to see why this will not work.

Thanks
Carlton Brooks

Hi Carlton,

I'm a bit confused. Your previous post stated "Install went smooth and everything looks good. Pages open correctly and display correctly." and you were trying to figure out how to set registrations with Joomla and TNG programs.

If everything is set up correctly the bridge will pass the user when he she logs in to the TNG databases only after they access TNG through your Joomla menu link.


Joe

[reverendspam]

Joe,

This is happening when I click on 'Administration' link within TNG. Backend of Joomla is working fine.

As I said in previous post, it may be related to something I did with login.php, but I just haven't had the chance yet to check it out.

Tom

Thanks for clarifying Tom.

There is nothing in the bridge code that will touch TNG php pages other than moving username and password from the Joomla database to the TNG database.

I hope you can get things worked out.

Joe

[Carlton Brooks]

I spoke to soon. Now that I understand what is "supposed" to happen mine install is not.

If I register a user in the standard Joomla login, from what I understand, it should send that user to the TNG program. It is not.

What else do you need me to tell you. The list has been very helpful and I appreciate the time and effort that you put into this.

Carlton Brooks

[Carlton Brooks]

Bear with me for a minute.

I registered a name and password in Joomla

I then used this new login to access Joomla.

Went to TNG Users and nothing appeared.

Went back to Joomla and clicked user check in.

Went back to TNG and there was the new user.

I am dreaming this or is there another step.

Can someone explain "How to register" this seems like a stupid question, but I am missing a step.

Again thanks
Carlton Brooks

[tomk]

Thanks for clarifying Tom.

There is nothing in the bridge code that will touch TNG php pages other than moving username and password from the Joomla database to the TNG database.

I hope you can get things worked out.

Joe

Well I've isolated this so far as a problem only in FireFox and not Internet Explorer.

Will keep you posted with what I eventually find out.

Tom

[reverendspam]

Well I've isolated this so far as a problem only in FireFox and not Internet Explorer.

Will keep you posted with what I eventually find out.

Tom

That's a switch usually I have problems with ie (IMG:style_emoticons/default/icon_smile.gif)

Joe

[reverendspam]

Bear with me for a minute.

I registered a name and password in Joomla

I then used this new login to access Joomla.
Went to TNG Users and nothing appeared.

Went back to Joomla and clicked user check in.

Went back to TNG and there was the new user.

I am dreaming this or is there another step.

Can someone explain "How to register" this seems like a stupid question, but I am missing a step.

Again thanks
Carlton Brooks

Hi Carlton,

I am assuming you set up a menu item in Joomla called Genealogy or whatever you may have named it and have linked it to the TNG-Joomla Bridge Component.

Joomla will not pass the user name and password until you actually click on the menu item you created in Joomla to access TNG.

This is because when you click on your menu item "Genealogy" in Joomla this actually tells the module to send the user name and password to the TNG database at that time. That is when you will see the user in the TNG backend.

It sounds like you may need to get your feet wet in the Joomla system and how to set up and use up modules, components, and bots within Joomla.

You will find a module called login within joomla there should be switches to set a link to be able to register users within it.

I don't want to get into Joomla internal workings here because we will start to get off topic in this thread.

Joe