Using ProductCart - Category Menu width

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Category Menu width

Printed From: ProductCart E-Commerce Solutions
Category: ProductCart
Forum Name: Using ProductCart
Forum Description: Running your store with ProductCart
URL: https://forum.productcart.com/forum_posts.asp?TID=2458
Printed Date: 28-February-2025 at 12:10am
Software Version: Web Wiz Forums 12.04 - http://www.webwizforums.com

Topic: Category Menu width

Posted By: katharina
Subject: Category Menu width
Date Posted: 09-February-2009 at 1:10pm

I'm trying to figure out how wide the category menu needs to be, and/or where to modify this. Right now it looks good at the top level, but when I follow down into subcategories it gets wider and then it does not look good on the page anymore. All I need is to know the max width it will use and I can modify the header.asp to reflect this. I'm in the process of redoing this file for 1024 screen width.
Examples:
http://www.germanplaza.com/productcart/pc/viewcategories.asp - http://www.germanplaza.com/productcart/pc/viewcategories.asp looks fine
http://www.germanplaza.com/productcart/pc/viewCategories.asp?idCategory=278 - http://www.germanplaza.com/productcart/pc/viewCategories.asp?idCategory=278 looks off
Katharina

Replies:

Posted By: Hamish
Date Posted: 09-February-2009 at 4:33pm

Hi Katharina,
      If you look at the code in your admin directory pcGenCatNavigation.asp there is a line :
    maxProNameL = 22
If the category name is longer than this (22 characters) then it is trimmed to 22 characters and has ... added to the end. You can adjust this if you wish.
The text will wrap if necessary (See http://www.germanplaza.com/productcart/pc/viewCategories.asp?idCategory=357- which is using the narrow version) although this leads to your already long menu getting much longer. One issue I see with the truncated menu entries is that some become identical to others - For example in EF German Scap Pictures :
      EF German Scrap Sheet...
     EF German Scrap Sheet...
     EF German Scrap Sheet...
     EF German Scrap Sheet...
     EF German Scrap Sheet...
     EF German Scrap Sheet...
     EF German Scrap Sheet...

The only way I can see of resolving that would be renaming of categories to shorten them, perhaps combined with increasing the menu width and the "maxProNameL" to a higher figure than 22

-------------
Editing ProductCart Code?

See http://wiki.earlyimpact.com/developers/editcode" rel="nofollow - WIKI Guidelines for Editing ProductCart's ASP Source Code

Posted By: katharina
Date Posted: 09-February-2009 at 7:33pm

Now that is confusing. Why does it in some cases truncate and wrap nicely, and others not? Shouldn't it be consistent throughout? What would be the right pixel width for the  found in the header.asp file? This would help when creating the header template.
Katharina

Posted By: Hamish
Date Posted: 09-February-2009 at 8:26pm

Hi Katharina,
Yes, no idea why it's behaving differently on different pages. Anyway, it looks better in Firefox (no surprise there then :-) ) I used the web developer add-on and it's ruler function and a width of 175px looks ok - with the current font & 22chars + ...

I really recommend the combination of Firefox and the web developer add-on, although checking your site still looks fine in IE is very important as well.

-------------
Editing ProductCart Code?

See http://wiki.earlyimpact.com/developers/editcode" rel="nofollow - WIKI Guidelines for Editing ProductCart's ASP Source Code

Posted By: katharina
Date Posted: 09-February-2009 at 8:48pm

Thanks for the help. I'm using FF, and have the developer add-on. Still trying to learn it, but I actually found the rulers in it and they came to the 175px. I will upgrade the site to 1028 width and plan on using 200px for the left side nav. Also thanks for the tip on the genCatNavigation.asp. It is really nice that you all help on this . I know you are a staff guru now, but you have also helped before. I've subscribed to most of the forum categories here and read all the messages. This is also how I learn a lot about PC. That and the wiki. I will never know enough ASP to do any programming, so I will keep on asking things like that and anoy you guys. On the upside, I bet there are other users who learn just like me.
Katharina

Posted By: postitworld
Date Posted: 14-July-2009 at 12:34am

There is not pcGenNavigation.aspin my directories? Can someone help me? How do I change the width of the category menu and the length of the category names? Thank you

Posted By: Greg Dinger
Date Posted: 14-July-2009 at 12:44am

The name is not pcGenNavigation.asp. GenNavigation.asp is in your pcadmin folder.

This statement appears in GenCatNavigation.asp and controls the number of characters that appear for a category name before it is truncated.

maxProNameL = 22

Settings for the width of the menu are dictated by CSS. If you are working with the stock header/footer, have a look at pcHeaderFooter08.css.

-------------
GreyBeard Design Group

Certified ProductCart Developer

Web Design/Development/Hosting

http://tinyurl.com/5c8t4t" rel="nofollow - Add-Ons & Custom Code |

Posted By: Greg Dinger
Date Posted: 14-July-2009 at 12:45am

typo: genCatNavigation.asp is the correct name.

-------------
GreyBeard Design Group

Certified ProductCart Developer

Web Design/Development/Hosting

http://tinyurl.com/5c8t4t" rel="nofollow - Add-Ons & Custom Code |

Posted By: postitworld
Date Posted: 14-July-2009 at 1:04am

Thank you but I cannot find the file? What folder is it in?

Posted By: postitworld
Date Posted: 14-July-2009 at 1:10am

All set...I found it..Thank you very much for your help!! One last question, if I wanted to widen the entire site, width, what file can I change the width of the site in? Thanks again!!

Posted By: Greg Dinger
Date Posted: 14-July-2009 at 1:23am

If you are working with the stock header/footer(/pc/header.asp and /pc/footer.asp), have a look at pcHeaderFooter08.css. For custom designs we scrap that altogether and build the layout from scratch. Be sure to look at pcStoreFront.css as well.

-------------
GreyBeard Design Group

Certified ProductCart Developer

Web Design/Development/Hosting

http://tinyurl.com/5c8t4t" rel="nofollow - Add-Ons & Custom Code |

Posted By: postitworld
Date Posted: 14-July-2009 at 1:46am

Thank you for your response. The width is set to 100%. Something is causing the width to stay locked. It has to be in another file, I just do not know which one.