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Block regions

A block can be placed on one or multiple pages within a site and can be located in one of six regions:

• Highlighted: directly below the horizontal menu bar, and above the site breadcrumb links
• Sidebar: right side of the page
• Top of content: between the left side menu and right sidebar; the right sidebar only exists if blocks have been placed in this region
• Top of page: above any blocks in the right sidebar region
• Bottom of content: between the left side menu and right sidebar; the right sidebar only exists if blocks have been placed in this region
• Bottom of page: just above the footer area; below the left-side menu and below any blocks in the right sidebar region

Blocks that are placed at the 'Top of content', 'Bottom of content', 'Top of page', or Bottom of page', can cover the full width of those regions, or you have the option to fit multiple blocks side-by-side within these regions depending on the blocks’ View Mode. See Blocks and the View mode.

If there are no sidebar blocks assigned to a particular page, the main content area expands to fill the right side of the page.

Note: Call-to-action and Hero blocks are preferred in the highlighted region. Other types of blocks should not be placed in this region.

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Blocks available by default in the Web Management System

All sites in the WMS currently have the following default blocks pre-created, and more may be released in the future:

• On this page: displays links to any anchors that are defined within the current page.
• Articles: displays a list of articles along with summary details.
• Follow Site: enables users to follow a department or unit on social media
• Feed Aggregator: displays RSS feeds from external websites

Notes:

• You cannot delete default blocks; you can only disable them.
• If you want to add your own block, see Create a Block in the WMS.

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Access the Blocks administration page

From the Administration toolbar, go to Structure > Blocks to access the Blocks administration page.

You will see a list of all the blocks that you can configure on your site.

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Position a block in a region

The Blocks administration page provides a drag-and-drop interface for easily assigning a block to a region, and for managing the order of blocks within regions.

1. Go to Structure > Blocks and locate the block you want to move.
2. Click on the icon beside the block to drag it to a region and to a position within that region relative to other blocks where you want it to appear.

Once a block is moved, its name will be highlighted, and an asterisk will appear next to its name to note that the changes have not yet been saved.

Note: You can also select a region from the REGION drop-down menu beside the block. However, this will place the block randomly within that region. You will then need to drag and drop the block to fine-tune its position relative to other blocks in the same region.

3. Click Save blocks once you are finished, otherwise your positioning changes will not take effect.

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Place a block on a page

When working with blocks, remember that:

• Disabled blocks are never shown on pages. If a block is located under the Disabled region, you will first have to position it in another region. (See Position a block in a region.)
• Blocks can be configured to be visible only on certain pages.

1. Access the configuration settings of the block.
   
   Either
   
   A. Hover over the top right-hand corner of a block until the gear icon and drop-down list appears, then click Configure.
   
   

   OR

   B. From the Administration toolbar, go to Structure > Blocks to locate the block, then click configure.

   

2. Scroll down to Visibility settings and click Pages.
3. Under Show block on specific pages:
   
   • If All pages except those listed is selected, make sure that the page you want the block to appear on is not in the list.
   • If Only the listed pages is selected, add the path of the page(s) you want the block to appear on to the list.

     See below for samples of page paths.

     

4. Click Save Block once you have finished. The block should now appear on the page(s) you wish it to appear.

Samples of page paths for use in page Visibility settings:

• Any page can be referenced by using its node ID in the following format: node/27947 (when you reference a page by using its node ID, you don't need to worry about the page path). The node ID of a page can be found in My Workbench. For more information on node IDs, see Links in the WMS
• Home page: <front> (e.g., www.mcgill.ca/sitename)
• First level page: about (e.g., www.mcgill.ca/sitename/about)
• Second level page: about/history (e.g., www.mcgill.ca/sitename/about/history)
• Third level page: about/history/campus (e.g., www.mcgill.ca/sitename/about/history/campus)
• All subpages (children) of a page: about/* (e.g., excludes or includes all subpages of /about, but does not include www.mcgill.ca/sitename/about)

Note: To remove the block from all pages, in the configuration of the block, select - None - in the Region Settings.

Blocks can also be configured to be visible only when specific conditions are true.

From the Visibility settings, click Languages

By default, if no language is selected, blocks will show regardless of the language. Select English or French if you want the block to appear only on pages of the appropriate language.

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