Help Please - Title is not unique in the parent category.

[chrisL]

Hey everyone, great job on the directory. I just installed it on my website, and am currently setting it up.

One thing that I found was that I am unable to have two records with the same title. Thats a problem, since I have links from various websites that have the exact same title.

Am I missing a setting in the admin panel? Is there a way I can get around it with a mod? I've made quite a few quick and dirty mods for phpBB so I can write something myself if need be, but want to know if doing so would be the hard way.

Thanks for the help anyone can give me. :)

[vkaryl]

There's a couple of hacks around that accomplish this, you can find them using search....

[chrisL]

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Thanks vkaryl, I did several searches before posting but didn't find anything.

I will search again tomorrow morning though when I finish setting up my directory...

[vkaryl]

Hmm. I couldn't find what I thought I was looking for either....

Now, I had Yktan provide a tweak for me (which allows for input of "no-url-as-yet" sorts of sites) and looking at the code, there's a couple of lines which seem to refer to "uniques" - which might help you, so here's the thread addy:

http://www.phplinkdirectory.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=4034

And maybe one of the others will provide the links I thought I remembered....

[ing]

Try this one...

http://www.phplinkdirectory.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=698

:)

[vkaryl]

Thanks, ing. I think that was the one, which does seem to be in the same area as I was thinking from the other thread....

[chrisL]

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Thanks ing for finding it, and yktan for posting it, but this didn't quite fix my problem. It allowed for duplicate titles to be created in seperated categories, but I needed duplicate titles for the same category.

I dinked around with it and came up with this fix:

Open \libs\smarty\SmartyValidate.class.php
Find:
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Paste this Underneath:
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I'm sure there is a better way to do it than I did, but this is what worked for me. Before implementing this, I manually tested creating a record in the database and couldn't find any bugs operating the link directory with duplicate titles.

So everything seems to be working now. :)

[Ap0s7le]

Actually, shouldn't a title be unique in a way? Does someone have to read a description to find out about the site or use the title to get the idea and bring interest into reading the Desc?

Try adding your own twist to each link, so the directory has some value rather than something that would seem so cookie cutter. This would provide better for your users but also better for search engines by far.

Best of luck.

-Casey

[chrisL]

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A site who's primary focus is a link directory should have unique titles, but our site is not and unique titles do not fit our needs.

Our site's focus is to provide our users with information, not providing them a directory where they can find it. There are many sites out there who's primary focus is a link directory and who can provide it to their users better than we could.

I have installed PHP Link Directory more as a link management system. After doing some pretty extensive research and analyzing our competition we have found that a well managed link exchange program is one of the best ways to have success in Google. In fact, we already are having success in Google with our like exchange program but need a strong tool to better manage our links.

The reason we allow duplicate titles, is that many site operators who request a link want a specific link title. I believe they should be able to have it, assuming we agree to the exchange. Doing this averages out to no more than 3 duplicate titles on the same page so we are still Google friendly and gives the requestor the link they want.

I am confident that what we are doing is a good direction for our site, but am open to anyone who wants to have discussion about what we are doing (pro or con).

Thanks again for PHP Link Directory, after some tweaking I have been able to get it to work exactly as we needed.