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Phoca Gallery

Phoca Gallery is a popular free component for creating galleries in Joomla, dating back to 2007 and having the highest rating on JED. The functionality of the component is expanded with the help of additional (also free) plugins. In this article, we will consider in detail the capabilities and features of Phoca Gallery.

Description of Phoca Gallery

Phoca Gallery is a component, which means that individual created galleries or lists of galleries can be displayed in the component area, assigning them to menu items.

To display galleries inside individual components (for example, in Joomla materials) or in modular positions, you will need to install plugins that can be downloaded for free from the developer's website.

The appearance of the galleries is initially formed from the pre-installed theme. Additional themes are also available for free download.

Phoca Gallery Features

  • Creating image categories and subcategories
  • Various ways to view images.
  • Automatic thumbnail generation.
  • Built-in image commenting system.
  • Integration with JComments or Facebook comments.
  • Built-in rating system for categories and images.
  • Bulk thumbnail regeneration.
  • Various ways to upload images.
  • Uploading files from the frontend of the site.
  • Image rotation.
  • Many free themes for displaying galleries.
  • Customization of display in the component or theme settings.
  • Creating pagination.
  • Display EXIF ​​information about images.
  • Geotargeting support (display Google Maps with images or categories).
  • Adding videos from YouTube.
  • View and download statistics.
  • Text descriptions for images and categories.
  • Links for downloading files.
  • Creating a slideshow.
  • Adding watermarks.
  • Expanding functionality with free additional plugins.
  • Support for "breadcrumbs" (Navigator module) Joomla.

Russification of Phoca Gallery.

You can download the Russian language pack from the official website of the extension (the Phoca Gallery Languages ​​section is at the bottom of the page). However, I do not recommend installing the presented version: the translation is very outdated (2013) and is of low quality.

The best Russifier is available here (after downloading, install the archive via the extension manager), and we will consider all the settings on it.

Phoca Gallery Interface

The component control panel is presented in the classic Joomla 3 interface: on the main page (Components → Phoca Gallery → Control Panel) sections are presented in a tabular form, which are also duplicated in the sidebar.

Phoca Gallery Sections

  1. Info
  2. Images
  3. Categories
  4. Themes
  5. Category Rating
  6. Rating images
  7. Category comments
  8. Image comments
  9. Users
  10. Facebook
  11. Tags
  12. Styles

Info

Despite the fact that the link to this section is at the end of the list, we recommend paying attention to it initially: it clearly displays the state of some of the component's functions.

Images

The first section is the section with images used in galleries.

The image editing page has many options, among which the following deserve special attention:

  • File name
  • Video code (Youtube)
  • Description

The most commonly used button in the Images section is the Add several, where you can:

  • Create folders for images (Create folder).
  • Upload images in bulk (Multi upload) or one by one (Upload).
  • Add a title and nickname to the selected images.
  • Set a category for the selected images.

Categories

A section with categories that are assigned to images.

On the category editing page, in addition to the banal options such as Title and Nickname, you can set an image, a folder with images for this category, its description, etc.

Themes

Here you can change the theme that sets the design style.

To change the theme, you need to download it and install it through this page.

Good to know!
The component does not provide for optional theme changes: to return to the previous theme, you will need to reinstall it.

It should also be noted that all the themes presented on the official website are quite oldie, and it is possible that after installing the theme nothing will change. This is a "big stone in the garden" of Phoca Gallery: to achieve a decent appearance of the gallery you will have to customize the style file, and it is good that there is an Edit CSS button on the Themes page.

Rating of categories and images

These sections display rating values ​​for categories and images. The rating function is activated in Components → Phoca Gallery → Control Panel → Settings → Tab Users → Section Rating settings.

Comments of categories and images

These sections display comments for categories and images. The commenting function is activated in Components → Phoca Gallery → Control Panel → Settings → Users Tab → Comment Settings Section.

Good to know!
Integration with JComments is possible. To do this, you need to download and install a special plugin.

Users

Here you can see users who are assigned to certain galleries (in the category settings).

Facebook

Here you can create users to integrate Phoca Gallery with Facebook.

Good to know!
Before you add a Facebook user to Phoca Gallery, you need to create an application in Facebook itself.

Tags

Phoca Gallery, like many other content components for Joomla, has a system of tags added to images. On this page you can create these labels, and in Components → Phoca Gallery → Control Panel → Settings → Main Settings tab there are options Show labels and Labels (links), the latter allows you to define the action when clicking on a label.

Styles

This section displays style files included by the Phoca Gallery component, which can be edited, copied and disabled. A very useful option for advanced administrators and developers.