Information blocks
The Information blocks is the module aimed to manage and catalogue different types (blocks) of uniform information. Some examples of information blocks are:
- news;
- product catalog;
- photo galleries;
- job lists and other information.
Information blocks offer a convenient way to store the frequently upd ated information. This method of publishing the information saves time and efforts. You can easily add new information to the site. For example, you can se t up a news feed informing visitors on important events in your company or new products.
The online store built with Bitrix Site Manager offers an immense potential of extensibility due to use of information blocks to group and catalogue products and services. That's why becoming familiar with the information blocks concept is essential if you intend to launch a trade representative of your company in the Internet.
The Information blocks module implements the following hierarchical model of information repository.
The information block types are created in the Information block types form (Content -> Information blocks -> Information block types), and displayed in the content and structure access area:
Blocks are populated with information via the administration section web interface. The only thing you have to do is to fill several required fields. As soon as you save changes, new information will be placed in an appropriate site section.
The site can have more than one types of information blocks, for example: news, catalog and other. You are free to create new types of information blocks depending on the subject of the site.
If your site provides multiple language mirrors, you can publish news and create catalogs in any available language. Documents will be dispatched to an appropriate site automatically. For example: if you denote the news is to be published in English, this news will be shown in the English mirror only.
A good take-off with information blocks is creating and publishing several types of blocks. A block type requires that you specify whether elements of the type can be grouped by categories. Example of a groupable type is a product catalog with commodities combined in different groups. For instance, a Video cassette player can be bound to groups Domestic equipment and Video equipment.