But if you've ever used Joomla please start by forgetting you've ever heard of it.
From a Design Perspective
Sections are a hierarchical organization system. Every node (article, section, static page, etc.) lives in a section. There is one special node which doesn't have a parent, and that's the root. Every other node has a parent. Permissions, styles, navigation items, and layouts are all assigned by section. We have a widget that displays the section hierarchy in a javascript-expandable view.
Categories are a hierarchical organization system. Every category has a parent, which can be another category or a section. You cannot assign permissions, styles, navigation items, or layouts to a category. On a category list page the style and layout come from the section to which the category belongs. We have four different category widgets, but none of them display the section hierarchy. Yes, we know we need to do that, but it hasn't been a high enough priority yet. Think of categories as a loosely structured tagging system.
From a Practical Perspective
I think in terms of drilling down vs. browsing. When I drill down on a site, I know within reason where I'm going, and I go straight there. That's how sections work. I expect section structures to be the most obvious way to structure your content.
The categories were intended to, in Don Kuramura's words, promote discovery. That's browsing. When I browse a site, I expect to click on a link which leads to something else with an interesting link, which leads to another interesting link, and so on. On a really good site, I can click on interesting links until I get sleepy or hungry. That's categories. So categories can be anything that your users might find interesting. They are there to pique interest
So that's another way to think of of it. You organize by sections and add interesting links by category.
An Example
If it's a game site I would expect sections like WII, XBOX, PS2, etc. You might want to have subsections, so you could have
WII
Categories would be things like “Favorites”, “Classics”, “Adventure”, “Family-friendly”, etc. RPG
Driving
Sims
etc.
XBOXDriving
Sims
etc.
RPG
Driving
Sims
etc.
etc.Driving
Sims
etc.
Another Example
Think of a pet site. I would expect something like
Dogs
Categories would be “choosing a vet”, “medical issues”, “Good for children”, “Show”, “breeders”, “end of life”,etc. Retrievers
Setters
Pointers
Herding Dogs
Protection
Minatures
etc.
CatsSetters
Pointers
Herding Dogs
Protection
Minatures
etc.
Long Hair
Short Hair
Medium
Hairless
BirdsShort Hair
Medium
Hairless
Parrots
Parakeets
Falcons & Hawks
Other
etc.Parakeets
Falcons & Hawks
Other
Another Example
Let's build a video website. We'll have a section for children's videos, one for grownups, and one for adult content. We'll provide the children's section free, the grownups section will require membership, and the adult site will require a paid membership. So the site structure will look like
Family-Oriented
Categories would be things like “Academy Award winners”, “Academy nominees”, “Disney”, “Crowd favorites”, “Sean Connery”, “Rat Pack”, “Brat Pack”, “30-something alums”, (Imagine your moderators are Bill, Cheryl, and Steve) “Steve's favorites”, “Cheryl's favorites”, “Bill's Favorites”, etc. Comedy
Animated
Television Characters
Adventure
Religious
MembersAnimated
Television Characters
Adventure
Religious
Comedy
Adventure
Romance
Thriller
Military
Classics
AdultAdventure
Romance
Thriller
Military
Classics
I have no idea how this would be organized. If I did I wouldn't brag about it.
Summary
Ultimately these are just tools. I would suggest you start by organizing your content in whatever way feels natural. That will include
- Do you want to limit access to parts of the site? If so that will define the highest-level section layout.
- Do you want parts of the site to look different? Because style and layout are based on section, that will also define the sections.
- What feels natural? If there is a way that would seem intuitive or expected by your users, that's the section layout.
Once that's in place you should ask yourself what other ways someone might want to look at or find content. Those are your categories.
Hope that helps.
A lot of vb4 sites out there still opt to use wordpress as the homepage/CMS because the vbcms is just not well thought out. Developed by coders who have no idea how to run a forum and blessed off on by suits with the same deficiency.
There are even more sites out there sticking with vb 3.8 series just so they can continue using wordpress.
I sincerely hope I've helped you better understand what you're talking about.
That's like handing me a bowl of spaghetti that's named soup, and telling me to think of it as spaghetti....
Just call it spaghetti!!!!!
One suggestion I have though is to have parent categories display everything in their child categories. If I have a gaming site and I have my category hierarchy set up like this:
- PS3
-- Hardware
-- Games
--- Fighting
--- Racing
--- Action
and I click on "games" I'd like to see every category within it. I can narrow this down if I'd like by choosing "racing" and so forth.
Thanks!