CSS Category just like dhtml but seo friendly

[bkpie]

Need help or collaboration PLEASE

I took a contribution osCommerce Community Add-Ons and changed the file slightly and the changed the css to look exactly like the dhtml one with flyouts currently on my site. The difference is dhtml does not have spiderable links which hurts in seo and this css one does show the links. It can easily change to match your site current attached is for mine.

The problem is it causes the page loads to load more slowly than my dhtml. Can anyone with more knowledge take a and maybe change the querys so it loads more quickly?????
Or possibly strip it out for bts if that would make it quicker. It runs fine on my current oscmax site but to slow for me. This would be great if we can get this to work quicker and help out with SEO a ton. Thanks. I put the dhtml for now back up on mine.

I will attach the file that goes into catalog/includes/boxes file then just go to infobox admin and create a new info box called categories css turn that one on in admin and the one you are using off in info and there it is adjust the css to match your site. Hope someone can help really want to use this one.

[JohnW]

Okay, I've installed it on my test site and it is making over double the queries that the dhtml menu makes so I see what you mean. I'll work with some more today and see what I can accomplish. I think you're correct that there are several advantages to it over dhmtl.

There is a small error in the file in your zip though around line 124 here.

/* The main categories with sub-categories */
//.suckerdiv .subfolderstyle{
//background: url(images/arrow-list.gif) no-repeat center right;
//}

I just uncommented out for the moment.

[bkpie]

Oh yeah sorry about the error..my bad.. it was for the arrow gif in catalog/images when you had subcategories. I didn't like the arrow for now and eliminated it but many like it. I did not upload that gif.

[bkpie]

I commented out a bunch of queries dealing with products but the one the made it move quicker was line 265 I commented out this.
// $totalitemsincategory = tep_count_products_in_category($categories['categories_id']);

I think a couple of other lines of code need changing dealing with total items in category

This makes it much quicker but not quick enough yet I will attach the lasted file I worked on. I am tired and have not thoroughly tested yet.

[JohnW]

I did some comparisons today and I actually get a faster page load and parse time with the CSS menu versus the dhtml menu even though the CSS menu has more queries. Using Firefox/2.0.0.12 I did some test with Firebug 1.1 enabled and the CSS menu aslo makes the site throughput smaller.

CSS menu
Current Parse Time: 0.131 s with 245 queries - queery cache cleared
Current Parse Time: 0.097 s with 245 queries
Current Parse Time: 0.097 s with 245 queries
35 requests 94 KB (84 KB from cache) 1.55s

DHTML menu
Current Parse Time: 0.326 s with 119 queries - queery cache cleared
Current Parse Time: 0.326 s with 119 queries
Current Parse Time: 0.322 s with 119 queries
36 requests 156 KB (99 KB from cache) 1.77s

This was using my index page but I'm getting similar results on all the pages. I haven't modified anything on either menu for queries. I've always thought the DHTML menu was kind of clunky in operation, but I never tried to change it.

What are you getting?

[bkpie]

That's funny mine is about the reverse of that with Dhtml being quicker How do you figure that one.

Internet explorer css edited file .39 with 23 queries
Dhtml .10 with 87 queries

[bkpie]

John I went to Firefox to do some testing and I noticed something else With the Dhtml menu in firefox the info boxes on the right remain and only the text changes which makes for a smooth transistion but the css reloads everything. So I guess we have to make it work with BTS to get a smoother transistion.

[JohnW]

It's not doing that on mine with the CSS so it's something else causing that. I have Google urchin.js and Commodo cot.js running on mine so that may be an issue on mine but I don't know for sure. cot.js causes some warnings though so that might be a problem on mine. But, Firebug is showing a bunch of warnings for your coolmenus.css and I don't use that. Do you use coolmenu for anything? Maybe try taking it off.

Your site is loading much faster on Firefox for me but is slower and quirky on IE7. If you want to see the css on my test site to compare let me know because I have it restricted with .htaccess so it doesn't get indexed by a search engine. it's tankraisedcorals but it's just a duplicate of driedflowersrus.

[JohnW]

Blayne,

This menu is a better idea IMHO over the dhtml and my site runs better with it although I haven't worked on the queries at all.

I'm now using it on my site and it's switchable from the admin panel by replacing the CoolMenu option with CssMenu in the configuration table and replacing coolmenu.css with cssmenu.css in main_page.tpl.php. Since coolmenu doesn't work for centered shops perhaps this could be a replacement.

I'm attaching cssmenu.css, css_menu_animation.js, boxes/categories.php, and boxes/categories_css.php in case anyone wants to try it.

[bkpie]

John:

Thanks I downloaded it and will do a file compare with mine after I removed some un-needed queries that seemed to slow it down

Blayne