I have my Devo page setup the way I want (I think). I have set things up so it will not work by dates (e.g. daily, weekly) but by 'series'. The first 'series' will be on prayer with 4 lessions with no definite start/stop date for each lession, how long each lession will last will depend on the paster getting them written (possibly every couple of weeks).

Here is how I have the DEVO setup now
3 Tabs
[Introduction] - Pastor's Intro to the series is about
[Study on Prayer] - Where the scripture & content sections live.
[Discussion] - where the discussion forum & questions live

I want to use the Topic feature to allow the user to switch between lessions (e.g. lessions 1, 2, 3, 4) and have the page redraw with the content for the Topic (lession) selected.

I have a Topic created for Lession #1 - and it shows up in the drop-down box on the [Study on Prayer] & [Discussion] section. For grins I setup another Topic for Lession #2, but no content for that yet.

My thought was to create a new content record for each lession in the series and have the user use the drop down to pick which lession to use (if they come in late, they can still get back to previous lessions). When they pick the Topic/Lession, the info in the [Study on Prayer] & [Discussion] tabs would switch over to the content for that Topic/Lession.

However, I do not understand how you setup the link from the Topic to the Content, so things switch when you pick a different Topic.

You can see what I've got setup so far at http://asburyunitedmethodist.org/learn_grow/on_line_bible_study/
You will need to log on with the following userid to see the page:
user: test
pw: password

Thanks for your assistance.
Bob.[/quote]

Hi Bob,

This looks like a great application of the Devo. Unfortunately, the way the Devo extension is designed is that it is all date-based. Which means that you every element needs a date. We have had plans to make it so that you can do something close to what you are wanting but I have not looked into how much of a redesign it is. The extension is being updated later this month, so I can work towards that then.

A few questions:
> it sounds like you would have variable dates when a lesson gets updated, right? Not every two weeks.

> if someone were to start in the middle, they should go to the current lesson, with the ability to go to the previous, right?

> you want to support series or "groups of lessons". Were you thinking of wanting a dropdown or start page where you could choose which series to go through? Would you have to go through one series before another?

For now, all that I can think of is that if each lesson has the same start and end date, then you can let the user pick which lesson #. However, it would always go to the first lesson. But topics will not work, because those are date-based too. And a topic goes to either specific dates or weeks of the year. So with the current system, topics will not work. Perhaps there is some trick to try to get around this, but I cannot see any right now.

We can definitely find a solution for you on this, and it will be a matter of determining how much of the Devo extension needs to be redesigned. Knowing how you would want to use it more (above questions) will help us to think through this better.

-Dave

For now, what if I do the following.

For each lesson add a new section - which will work, but the problem may be that the way I want to have the questions on the the discussion page can only have questions for one lesson at a time. I guess I can just have the questions from all of the sections listed together on the discussion page, adding the new set as the next lession is posted. I think I'll try that and see how it looks.

Also, I'm thinking that perhaps for the next series, I can just create a new Devo page for the next series and keep the old one available as well.

Any other thoughts?

Your questions:

1. yes, dates will be variable, not on a regular schedule.
2. yes, should start at the current lesson, but be able to go back.
3. yes, that is the thinking, however, I don't think we would force people to go from one to another, just pick the one then want, I'm thinking the lessons would be named such that the users would be able to tell which one to select based on what they have done previously.

Bob,

I guess you could create one devo with discussion for each class. And you could set the dates to basically last forever. The challenge is that the devo is all about dates. The only advantage I can see is that you'd have the tabbed page.

It feels like this may be an incorrect application for the devo extension. Wouldn't it be easier just to create pages in TYPO3 and to add the discussion extension to them?

In Him,
Mark

Ok thanks for your feedback Bob. That will be helpful in trying to design out a Devo that could support these and other needs.

As for the new series, you could create a new Devo -- that would definitely work. I can see though for 4-5 lessons, it may seem a lot of work to create new pages, etc. (you can copy), so I will see how difficult it would be in adding a series.

-Dave