Wrong Meta Site Description Front Page

[cfj]

Hello.

Can someone please help me since I have upgraded TNG from 7.1.3 to 8.1.3.

Previously, this has been installed under Joomla, which I don't want to do any more.

In the TNG Admin you have the ability to insert description of your website, so I wonder why this does not appear in the source code.

When I look at my source code, so has my Meta Site Name, also became to Meta Site Description.

I understand this is correct about all the other pages, but not the frontpage.

What I want is to get my own Meta Site description on the first page and I thought this was a simple case, when the opportunity to add my own site description is in the backend of TNG admin.

This description does not come up at all on my side!!!

I hope someone can help me with this at first, then I come back with other questions about tngrobots.php

Kind Regards

[tomk]

In the TNG Admin you have the ability to insert description of your website, so I wonder why this does not appear in the source code.

When I look at my source code, so has my Meta Site Name, also became to Meta Site Description.

I understand this is correct about all the other pages, but not the frontpage.

What I want is to get my own Meta Site description on the first page and I thought this was a simple case, when the opportunity to add my own site description is in the backend of TNG admin.

This description does not come up at all on my side!!!

Hello Cathrin,

I am not sure I am the best one to answer this as you know from your Joomla experience, but in TNG8 one of the things that changed was how Templates are handled, and perhaps that is part of the problem.

When I view source of a TNG page there are two fields that show up:

1) <Title> ...

2) <meta name ="Description" ...

And these two seem to always be the same on a TNG site. The source of information in the field comes from two places:

A) The "Site Design and Definition" found under TNG Administration > Setup > General Settings

B) The "Title" for the page you are on.

On the home Page, the Title for the page is what is specified under TNG Administration > Template Settings in the 'Main Title' field, plus ':' plus what is in your Site Design and Definition 'Site Name' field. (At least of Template 5)

On other pages, the <Title> is based on the page you are on such as 'Surname List', 'Place List', etc. Again followed by ':'and then what is in your Site Design and Definition Site Name field.

I don't recall seeing what is in the Site Design and Definition 'Site Description' field ever showing up. Perhaps it does in one of the other templates, or a mod.

Right now it appears your home page shows

<Title> of: Cathrin Jegersberg Genealogy: Slektsdatabase far Norge go Sverige

and other pages show: (e.g. for login)

<Title> of: Logg inn: Slektsdatabase far Norge go Sverige (example)

What exactly do you want for Title and/or Description on the various pages?

Tom

[cfj]

Hello Tom.

Me and my meta tags

What exactly do you want for Title and/or Description on the various pages?

What I exactly want is that the Site Description under general settings, to show up on my frontpage in TNG.

It is common to have a separate description on the first page so the visitors who are coming from Google and other search engines know what my page is about.

For example, I want to describe the most important districts that my database contains.

In genlib.php you have this code: $site_desc,

Site Description don't work, but when I load up my config file in my HTML editor it's shows, but not in the index.php (source)!

I use Mozilla's Web Developer, to go trough my sources.

The first part of my site desc. I have added in my language file (text.php), so instead of home, it's show my name.

The rest of the meta desc. are from general settings unde Site Name.

I have also added in genlib.php echo '<meta http-equiv="content-language" content="no" />'."\n";.

This shows that my site have my language.

I try to get most of my TNG 8 correct, before it's released to the public and the search engines.

O'boy, it's hard to explain this on a foreign language.

Many thanks for your speedy reply.

[theKiwi]

Hello Tom.

Me and my meta tags

What I exactly want is that the Site Description under general settings, to show up on my frontpage in TNG.

It is common to have a separate description on the first page so the visitors who are coming from Google and other search engines know what my page is about.

For example, I want to describe the most important districts that my database contains.

In genlib.php you have this code: $site_desc,

Site Description don't work, but when I load up my config file in my HTML editor it's shows, but not in the index.php (source)!

I use Mozilla's Web Developer, to go trough my sources.

The first part of my site desc. I have added in my language file (text.php), so instead of home, it's show my name.

The rest of the meta desc. are from general settings unde Site Name.

I have also added in genlib.php echo '<meta http-equiv="content-language" content="no" />'."\n";.

This shows that my site have my language.

I try to get most of my TNG 8 correct, before it's released to the public and the search engines.

O'boy, it's hard to explain this on a foreign language.

Many thanks for your speedy reply.

Which page in particular are you trying to put this - what is the URL to that page?

Is the top part of the main page being generated by TNG or somehow else?

You can get a lot of what you're looking for into a custom TNG page by calling the tng_header function - for example like

tng_header( "Roger's Genealogy Online", $flags );
?>

Is the top of my index.php page on this site http://roger.lisaandroger.com/ so everything in the source text of that page up to

<div align="center" class="index">

is generated by that code above. A default TNG index.php file has

tng_header( $text['mnuheader'], $flags );

where mnuheader is by default saying "Home Page" So if you want it to say something different, you could put this line

$text['mnuheader'] = "Home Page";

Into the cust_text.php file for each language you support and then translate "Home Page" to say whatever you want it to say for each language.

Hopefully this makes some sense and isn't rambling too much...

Roger

[cfj]

Hello Roger and thank you for your reply.

A default TNG index.php file has

tng_header( $text['mnuheader'], $flags );

where mnuheader is by default saying "Home Page"

So if you want it to say something different, you could put this line

$text['mnuheader'] = "Home Page"

Into the cust_text.php file for each language you support and then translate "Home Page" to say whatever you want it to say for each language.

The tng_header ($text['mnuheader) has nothing to do with my issue.

As I explained to Tom, it's the Site Description on the homepage or index.php.

Your website shows just the issue I dont' want on my homepage.

The line I have marked red I will have changed on my home page (index.php).

Example from your site:

<title>Roger's Genealogy Online: Roger's Online Genealogy</title>

<meta name="Keywords" content="Roger's Genealogy Online" />

<meta name="Description" content="Roger's Genealogy Online: Roger's Online Genealogy" />

<meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" />

You've made a great site Roger, but when I looked at your source code, so didn,t it tell me anything about your database.

Just the same as the title:Roger's Genealogy Online: Roger's Online Genealogy

By the way, the title at your website appears twice at the top of the browser.

I have changed the home title in text.php and added something else in the backend at the TNG under General Settings, Site name.

The problem is that I previously said, the Site Description that the TNG software allow us to write in the backend under General Settings.

Such settings are common to use, but in TNG there is clearly an error, which fails to capture the code $site_desc

All websites should have their own description, that tells visitors from the various search engines what your website is about.

I have testet your site on Google, with site:roger.lisaandroger.com/ and your Site description are just Roger's Genealogy Online: Roger's Online Genealogy

Wouldn't it be great to have your personal description on your homepage?

You can't see it your selves, only when you view your source, but Google will pick it up and that way the visitors also know what your website is about, before they visit you.

Well you might think I'm picky, but this should be common knowledge to all webmasters.

Thank you Roger for showing some interest in my question.

[tomk]

All websites should have their own description, that tells visitors from the various search engines what your website is about.

I have testet your site on Google, with site:roger.lisaandroger.com/ and your Site description are just Roger's Genealogy Online: Roger's Online Genealogy

Wouldn't it be great to have your personal description on your homepage?

You can't see it your selves, only when you view your source, but Google will pick it up and that way the visitors also know what your website is about, before they visit you.

Well you might think I'm picky, but this should be common knowledge to all webmasters.

Thank you Roger for showing some interest in my question.

Hello Cathrin,

Roger is usually a good source to work out problems. But perhaps in this case, this is a bug that you should report to Darrin directly. I believe what the issue you have is:

The TNG Site Design and Definition section under Administration > Setup, has both a Site Name: and a Site Description: fields that you can populate. The Site Name: information does make it to the HTML Source on your TNG Home Page, but the Site Description does not.

On the home page, the <title> and <meta name="Description"... are equal.

As example, on your slekttdatabase TNG page if you view html source you see:

<title>Cathrin Jegersberg | Slektsdatabase: Slektsgrener fra Norge og Sverige</title>
<meta name="Keywords" content="Cathrin Jegersberg | Slektsdatabase: Slektsgrener fra Norge og Sverige" />
<meta name="Description" content="Cathrin Jegersberg | Slektsdatabase: Slektsgrener fra Norge og Sverige" />

And for your Login page (other pages need password) you see <title> and Description both equal, and picking up the information of the specifc TNG page - e.g. Logg inn.

<title>Logg inn: Slektsgrener fra Norge og Sverige</title>
<meta name="Keywords" content="Logg inn: Slektsgrener fra Norge og Sverige" />
<meta name="Description" content="Logg inn: Slektsgrener fra Norge og Sverige" />

Based on the previous discussion you and I had concerning the Joomla bridge and TNG, I think you are looking for the TNG home Page to include the TNG Administration Site Design and Definition "Site Description" field similar to the following:

<title>Cathrin Jegersberg | Slektsdatabase: Slektsgrener fra Norge og Sverige</title>
<meta name="Keywords" content="Cathrin Jegersberg | Slektsdatabase: Slektsgrener fra Norge og Sverige" />
<meta name="Description" content="Slektsdatabase me slektslinjer fra Akershus, Ostfold, Agder, Drangedal, og Sverige" />

where the Description above comes from the TNG Site Design and Definition Site Description field.

If my summary above is what you are looking for, then perhaps you should send an email to Darrin directly and make reference to this forum posting. Or perhaps he can explain where the Site Description Field should show up.

Hope this helps,

Tom

[cfj]

Bingo Tom

You explained it perfectly. Thank you.

Roger is usually a good source to work out problems.

I use several of Roger's mods in my TNG, so I know he is good and have a lot of experience, working with TNG.

I hope I didn't hurt his feelings.

Sorry Roger if you read this.

Even TNG Wiki Setup - Site Design explaines how to set up Site Description.

Sorry I did'nt saw it before. The image there shows exactly what I'm looking for.

I will write to Darrin about this problem.

Thank you for the tips and for all the helps I get on this forum.

[cfj]

Just an update.

I got a quick responce from Darrin today, after the e- mail I sendt today.

The only place that the Site Description is currently used is in the RSS

feed (tngrss.php). For version 9 I will add it as the page title for the

home page, however. You can do that too by editing your index.php file and

changing the "tng_header" line to look like this:

tng_header( $site_desc, $flags );

Well, it was not the best solution, so I found my own way to change it in genlib.php

echo "<meta name=\"Description\" content=\"$title-$site_desc\" />\n";

[Ken Roy]

Just an update.

I got a quick responce from Darrin today, after the e- mail I sendt today.

Well, it was not the best solution, so I found my own way to change it in genlib.php

echo "<meta name=\"Description\" content=\"$title-$site_desc\" />\n";

Hopefully, you provided that feedback directly to Darrin, since he does not monitor the TNG Forum.

[tomk]

Hopefully, you provided that feedback directly to Darrin, since he does not monitor the TNG Forum.

I responded to Darrin on the TNG_U2 list with importance of Description field. I did not cfj's Forum response before sending. I too don't spend much time on the forum.

But since I will probably be migrating away from Joomla in the next couple of months due to absence of bridge development, this becomes more important to me.

Tom

[cfj]

Ken.

Hopefully, you provided that feedback directly to Darrin, since he does not monitor the TNG Forum.

Of course I have sendt feedback to Darrin and he has also responded to my last mail and asked me more about what I'm looking for.

I will first respond to his e-mails before I update this forum.

Last mail from Darrin:

The problem with putting it in the genlib.php file like that is that it will

appear in the meta tags for *every* page. Was that your intention?

I have sendt my suggestion back , and suggested that the index.php should have it's own meta description.

To use the meta description as a title is not good enough, since the title will be to long.

Tom.

I responded to Darrin on the TNG_U2 list with importance of Description field. I did not cfj's Forum response before sending. I too don't spend much time on the forum.

But since I will probably be migrating away from Joomla in the next couple of months due to absence of bridge development, this becomes more important to me.

So good that you are beginning to see my point of view, with the importants of meta tags and SEO.

I have seen that others also are trying to do something about this issue with both titles and meta descr.

C