Jack McDade

My Standard ExpressionEngine Addons

Posted on 18. Feb, 2009 by Jack in ExpressionEngine, Productivity

Everyone has their own list of ExpressionEngine addons they roll with, or at least they should. Call them building blocks, foundations, what have you. In fact, once you nail this list down, take a look at Ryan Irelan’s post on setting up a quick deploy script — trust me. It’s worth it.

Here’s what I deploy with nearly every single site and why:

Structure

Type: Module/Extension Combo
Price: $65
Creator: ME! + Travis Schmisser

I love Structure. I love love love it. I can build out big sites with fully dynamic navigation really fast. And on top of that, the interface is super client friendly. Drag and drop page re-order, dynamic and static content all in one hierarchical view… Very slick.

It basically replaces the Pages module with loads of more options by taking control of the URL structure, letting you build out static sites almost like a sitemap. One main weblog and a default template for static pages with the ability to change that out on a per page level. This lets you have a handful of the templates control the whole site.

Edit: Since this article, i have tag teamed with Travis Schmeisser to take this module commercial and keep it moving. Huzzah!

LG Better Meta

Type: Extension
Price: $39.95
Creator: Leevi Graham

This bad larry from Leevi Graham kicks some serious EE butt. Is SEO important to you? (If your answer is no, we should probably talk) Then you need this extension. It lets you manage all the meta content on each and every page, using the latest in DC Meta type standards. Oh and it generates your XML sitemap. Twofer! You can control a number aspects of the sitemap, including frequency, robot controls, etc. If you haven’t tried it yet, do it now. He just needs to make the sitemap portion of this one compatible with Structure and I’ll be a really happy guy.

LG Site Name

Type: Extension
Price: Free
Creator: Leevi Graham

Ever want to customize the header in your control panel? Maybe put the client (or your for that matter) logo in there? Done. This extension is a breeze to work with, letting you insert your own HTML and/or CSS into the header. And it’s Multi Site Manager compatible too. We’re currently using this for a multi-country site in MSM to let the user know which country they’re editing. We’ve got flags up in there and everything. Pretty cool. Also from Leevi Graham.

Get it now.

Search Marker

Type: Plugin
Price: Free
Creator: utilitEEs

This is little bugger is super useful. It lets you highlight the search keyword in your results page. It just throws a tag around it and lets you style at will. It changed my life. Kind of.

TruncHTML

Type: Plugin
Price: Free
Creator: utilitEEs

You may have used Word Wrap or even Word Wrap Plus, but they do lack one thing. They can cut your HTML off, breaking your site or at least your styling. This free plugin from utilitEEs takes care of that. Limit the number of words or characters and make sure those tags close, perfect for automatic excerpts or summaries.

FreeForm

Type: Module
Price: Free
Creator: Solspace

Contact forms. Resume submissions. Surveys. Just about any type of form you can think of, this module nails it. Just a simple tag pair very similar to {exp:weblog:entries}, you put in the input fields, it takes care of the rest. It emails the contents of the submissions to whoever you want, saves everything in a db and takes very little time to set up. The info can even be pulled back dynamically in your templates if you need to. I’ve used it to personalize a thank you page and serve up a pdf based off a drop-down selection. In no time. The one downside there is that the entry id ends up in the URL structure.

There are talks of a Pro version coming up with even more features, so I’m excited about that. I hope it includes customized data exports. The standard tab delimited export usually isn’t enough when working with corporate IT departments and their bizarre data parsing requirements…

LG Add CP Tabs

Type: Extension
Price: Free
Creator: Leevi Graham

If you’re handing off a site to a client who will be adding a number of admins or members with control panel access, this one is a must. I seriously don’t know why this function isn’t built it. It lets you set the default tabs and links for a given member group which will be applied every time you add a new member. So if you’ve been teaching clients how to set up the needed tabs… you’ve been missing out. And wasting time.

Editor

Type: Extension
Price: Free
Creator: Brandon Kelly

Ever see Ryan Irelan’s screencast on setting up a control panel for client access? Well this replicates the “Edit Page” button on the site, with some extra flair. For everyone else, this adds an Edit icon next to your content on the front end of your site while you’re logged in. One click -> right into the edit page. Piece of cake. Done and done.

You can even hack the css in the extension to customize the position and style. Note: it uses an icon with a low opacity, so sometimes it’s tough to see on a light colored site. A quick tweak and you’re back in business.

LG Addon Updater

Type: Extension
Price: Free
Creator: Leevi Graham

This one is a gimme if you’re running a number of addons. It’s becoming the defacto method for notifying users of an available update, as well it should be. It’s simple and straightforward and just plain works. Throw this puppy in each and every time.

For what it’s worth there are a many, many more awesome addons so I’ll be featuring some of those in the future. These are the ones i pretty much can’t build without, but addons such as Playa, Data Matrix, and the others may come in handy as well.

So there you have it it. My secrets. What do you use?

Tags: addons, brandon kelly, ExpressionEngine, extensions, leevi graham, modules, plugins, recommendations, solspace