Old dogs, new tricks ...

At last month’s Melbourne Joomla User Group, we were discussing how to assign a Joomla template to a specific page and someone pointed out a setting that I had completely missed in the menu manager. I can’t count the number of times I’ve created a menu item in Joomla 3 but I have never seen the “Template Style” dropdown. This option obviously provides you with the ability to assign a specific Joomla template for a menu item, but I can honestly say I have never seen it.

So the How to Joomla series will be dedicated to fleshing out those little (and sometimes big) issues that new users and experienced users alike face when building Joomla sites.

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We released the Ascent Joomla template back in October 2012 and it proved to be a popular choice for folks looking for a corporate or business template. I'm very happy to announce it is available for Joomla 3. This is the first template that we have released which is based on the Zen Grid Bridge format.

What's the Zen Grid Bridge?

The Zen grid bridge is basically a stepping stone framework that enables users of the old Zen Grid Framework to move their sites to Joomla 3. It is a cut down version of the old Zen Grid Framework built specifically to be able to quickly and easily move older Joomla 2.5 templates to Joomla 3. This framework is stand alone and does not require the Zen Grid Framework, T3, or the JB Library plugin.

Zen Grid Bridge compatible templates basically use the assets found in the old framework and the old template in a Joomla 3 compatible skin. There have been a number of changes to the way that the template functions - with some key changes to functionality and of course soem improvements under the hood, but the basic design is the same.

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One of the more common requests we receive is for us to design a simple one page design. While our slider and scroller themes from back in 2007 were one of the first Joomla templates to use this as a concept, we haven't really touched that style since then, so this month we decided to go a little "one page crazy".

In addition to the One Page template we released a week ago and the modified Motion theme which now supports one page mode, I would like to present a new and beautiful one page design. It's name is Profile.

The Profile Joomla template is an elegant design that is ideal for those situations where you need to create a professional web presence but don't need a full blown website. It's a lightweight, framework-free one page design with a tonne of personality. Check out the links below to find out more information.

Features Live Preview Download

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Hot on the heels of the release of the responsive One Page scrolling theme, the Motion template now has an option to be used as a one page scrolling template.

Demo Features Download

The new version of the template is pretty easy to use. In addition to the usual Motion setup simply set the One Page option under the general parameters and it transforms the Motion menu into a same page link scrolling theme.

There are a few other designs in our collection that might suit this functionality so keep an eye out for some future updates. Enjoy!

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Im happy to announce the availability of a new starter theme called One Page. As you may have guessed it's a one page responsive theme based on our original Responsive Joomla template.

It's a minimal theme designed as a scaffold for you to create your very own one page design masterpiece.

Demo Download Features

Zen animate - free css3 based Joomla plugin

In addition to the One Page template I have also released a new free Joomla plugin that makes adding css3 transitions to your Joomla content super easy.

Just wrap your text in one of the available tags and your text will animate into place. There are 35 available transitions but please careful, these kind of effects are best used discerningly.

Features and Download Fork on Github

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Back in April, 2011 I announced a new club subscription that gave (and still does give) lifetime access to our products and services. While it has been great having that plan in our range of products, it's time to say goodbye.

I've actually really enjoyed offering that plan as a part of our subscriptions. It was a way for us to say thankyou to all of our loyal members, who have been with us over the years and to encourage them to continue to use our products. However after some lengthy consideration I've decided to remove it and replace it with a new plan.

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This month we hit a number of remarkable milestones for our Joomla template club and so I thought what better way to celebrate than to create a coupon or two to celebrate.

It's our birthday ...

... Well sort of. This month back in 2006 I registered the domain name Joomlabamboo.com. At that time I had no idea where that decision would lead me to.

In 2006 I was a practicing acupuncturist who needed a website and so I dove in (head first) and taught myself how to use Joomla, started to learn how to code (look ma - no tables) and also started to learn a new language - visual design.

It's been a pretty amazing ride since then and it's a ride that continues to challenge and push me, creatively and technically.

A big thanks goes out to all of the wonderfully talented people I've had the opportunity to work with over the last six years.

100,000 Forum Posts

A few weeks ago we also hit another really important milestone - 100,000 forum posts. I can still actually remember writing the first announcement on the forum and could only dream of a day when we would hit such a magical milestone. 100,000 posts ... wow really hard to believe.

In addition to this we have approximately 10,000 support tickets in the system and will continue to make support one of our highest priorities. While we may not get it right 100% of the time it's a really important part of our work. I've learnt a lot from our support system personally and truly treasure the deep life lessons that I've gleaned from it.

I want to send out a big thanks to all of the members who helped to create a really friendly atmosphere in our forum and ticket system. We couldn't have done it without you.

Coupons, coupons, coupons ...

To say thankyou I'd like to extend a whopping 40% coupon to past and current members. Just use the coupon "100000" and you will receive 40% off any renewal.

Plus to any new members if you use the coupon "celebrate" you will receive 20% off the cost of any new subscription.

Please note - The coupons will be available until Sunday 11th August.

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Each month I run a check through our download statistics to see which version of our joomla templates is getting downloaded the most. Interestingly our Joomla3 downloads have been consistently more popular than the Joomla 2.5 versions of the same themes. In fact Joomla 3 versions of our templates have been anywhere from 10% to 45% more popular than their Joomla 2.5 counterparts.

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I've just taken the wrappers off our latest Joomla template release and I really hope you like it.

Nebula is a business oriented theme that merges soft, blurry header elements with crisp lines and lots of white space.

It features a bouncy / css3 animated slideshow treatment of our Zentools module as well as a thourough integration of our stand alone responsive templates for K2 - Zenkit. Which makes this theme a truly versatile template to build your next Joomla template with.

Live Preview Features Download

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One of the complexities joys of operating an international business is keeping tabs on the cross border currency conversion and conversion rate costs. Last year we moved to selling our services in Australian dollars in order to ensure we could keep our subscription costs low - Paypal charges some pr…

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Just a quick not to let you know that v1.9.0 of JB Type has just been released with the addition of 58 new (and very useful icons). You can view the new icons on the Font Awesome page or check out the icons and their new code on the JB Type plugin page.

JB Type now provides the Font Awesome library to our templates

We are also in the process of rolling out new releases for our existing T3 based templates that removes the Font Awesome library.

There are a number of reasons for this and to avoid any potential conflicts we feel that it is better to maintain a single library for the font icons that are featured in our themes. This of course makes it easier for our users to update when new icons are added to the library.

So if you are using a template that is already compatible with T3 v1.2.5+ all you need to do is update to the latets version of JB Type and you will all set to go.

Enjoy!

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Sorry for the pun but I couldn't resist ...

The Moments template started out as a template design reminiscent of the Platform Joomla template we released last year, but the more I worked with it, the more it grew into something with a whole lot more potential.

First some links ...

Live Preview Features Download

Moments has lots of layouts ...

Masonry tiled layout

The front page of the demo features a pinterest-like masonry-driven flexible grid layout but if you dig deeper into the demo you will see that we packed a lot more into this neat little design.

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