Tutorials for Magento and Joomla! - Yireo

Managing MageBridge extensions

While MageBridge offers its main functionality in the form of a Joomla! component and several Joomla! plugins, there are various extra extensions (modules and plugins) that allow you to configure specific things for your Joomla! site. MageBridge also introduces its own type of extension - a connector.

If you browse within Joomla! Administrator to the MageBridge Update page, you will find that core extensions can just be updated by hitting the Update button, but optional extensions can be easily selected to install them as well. As soon as an optional extension has been installed, it will be updated just like any core extension.

Core plugins

The following plugins are considered to be core plugins and should not be removed from your system. They may be disabled but only under special circumstances.

• Authentication - MageBridge plugin - needed to authenticate Joomla! users against the Magento database
• Magento - MageBridge plugin - forwarding Magento events as Joomla! plugin events
• MageBridge - Core plugin - allows for specific tricks before and after the bridge is built
• System - MageBridge plugin - used for various tricky things within Joomla!
• User - MageBridge plugin - used to synchronize profile changes within Joomla! to Magento
• XML-RPC - MageBridge plugin - used to transfer events from Magento to Joomla! (Joomla! 1.5 only)

Keep the plugins above enabled at all times!

Optional plugins

The following plugins are not required for the proper working of MageBridge, but might still come in handy.

• Content - MageBridge plugin - parses Joomla! content as if it was Magento CMS-content
• Content - MageBridge Tags plugin - allows Magento tags to be inserted into Joomla! articles
• Search - MageBridge plugin - extends the Joomla! search to Magento products
• Community - MageBridge plugin - only used in combination with JomSocial

The MageBridge Content Plugin is very powerful and allows for Magento widgets to be included in Joomla! content.

Modules

All of the Joomla! modules available for MageBridge are considered to be optional. They are not required for the functioning of the bridge. However, they are very useful when setting up a good site.

• Custom Block module - used for displaying custom Magento blocks
• Cart module - used to display the shopping cart block (either using a Magento block or native Joomla! code)
• CMS Static Block module - used to display Magento CMS-blocks
• Category Menu module - displays a menu of product-categories
• Login module - a replacement of the Joomla! login-module, with support for Magento pages
• Checkout Progress module - a simple progress-block that fixes some issues in the Magento checkout
• Products module - displays a list of products in various ways (a listing, a menu and even a slideshow)
• Customers module - displays a list of latest customers in the Joomla! backend
• Orders module - displays a list of latest orders in the Joomla! backend
• Newsletter module - A copy of the original Magento block, minus unneeded JavaScript
• Store Switcher module - A simple module to allow switching between Magento Store Views

Note that Joomla! modules are in no way similar to Magento modules. Joomla! modules add extra content to the page, while Magento modules are in general Magento extensions.

The MageBridge Custom Block module is capable of adding any Magento block to Joomla! While the other modules offer specific functionality, this MageBridge Block module makes everything else possible.

Removing modules or plugins

Optional modules or plugins may just be removed using the regular Joomla! Installer. After removal, when you update MageBridge these optional extensions will not be installed again (unless you choose to do so). When removing core extensions, these extensions will be just installed again when you update MageBridge.

Templates

MageBridge also ships with one Joomla! template - tpl_magebridge_root - which is not ment to be used in production. When a MageBridge Custom Block module is configured to display the Magento block root and is assigned to the Joomla! template-position root, this will wrap the entire Magento site within your Joomla! environment. The usage of this template is more for developers.

Connectors

Besides Joomla! modules and plugins, MageBridge also uses its own plugin-like system to alter several things inside the MageBridge logic. As of now, all connectors are shipped by default with the MageBridge core, but in the future we will also offer a way to install them separately.

Store connectors can be used to determine which Magento Store or Store View should be loaded under which circumstances. The following store connectors currently exist:

• Special days - allows to load a specific store in a specific time period
• Nooku - integrates the multilingual extension Nooku
• Joom!Fish - integrates the multilingual extension Joom!Fish
• m17n - integrates the multilingual extension m17n
• Joomla! User Group - load a specific store for a specific user group
• Domain Name - bind a specific store to a specific domain

Product connectos can be used to sell a Magento product and configure something in Joomla! accordingly.

• Joomla! User Group - sell access to a Joomla! User Group
• DOCman Group - sell access to a DOCman Group
• JomSocial Group - sell access to a JomSocial Group
• JomSocial User Points - sell JomSocial user points
• OSE MSC - sell access to a OSE Membership Control group
• Acajoom - autosubscribe a customer to a specific newsletter based on Acajoom
• jNews - autosubscribe a customer to a specific newsletter based on Acajoom
• Acymailing - autosubscribe a customer to a specific newsletter based on Acajoom

Profile connectors can be used to synchronize the Magento profile with some third party component in Joomla! (from Magento to Joomla!). The reverse is also possible (from Joomla! to Magento) but this is accomplished through the architecture offered by that third party component.

• JomSocial - synchronize the Magento customer profile with JomSocial
• Community Builder - synchronize the Magento customer profile with CB