Using Drupal menus

Putting your page on a menu

The easiest way to put your page on a menu is while you are creating or editing the page:

• Create or edit your page, story or whatever
• There should be a section on your screen, called "Menu settings" - click on it to open it out
• Enter a title for your menu
• User the "Parent item" drop-down list to choose which menu to pur your page on - for example, to make it a main page in your site, you might put it in the Primary Links menu
• You can use the weight setting to determine the position of the item in the menu - there are also other ways of doing this (see below)

Giving your page a proper URL

When you create or edit your page it will be given a rather boring URL, like "node/239", or something.  You can give your page a more interesting URL, such as "all-about-gerbils", or whatever:

• Look for a section on the screen called "URL path settings" - click on it.
• Type in a more descriptive name for your page.  Note the following:
  • This is a good thing to do to help seach engines find your page
  • Don't make the URL too long (or search engines will give up)
  • Use hypens rather than underscores, "all-about-gerbils" is better than "all_about_gerbils"

Altering menu items

You can control menu items using the Administration screens:

• Click "Administer", then "Menus", then the name of the menu you want to alter, eg "Primary links"

You will see the menu items listed

Altering the position of menu items

If you see a "four-way" arrow alongside each menu item, you can move items around the menu simply by dragging them with the mouse.  Remember to click the "Save configuration" button at the bottom of the screen to save your changes before leaving that page.

If you don't see the "four-way" arrow, you can move items by adjusting their weight.  Low numbers at the top, high numbers at the bottom.

Other menu settings

• The Enabled checkbox can be used to turn menu items off or on
• The Expanded checkbox controls whether any items below the current item are shown
• Edit takes you into a detailed screen with more options for that menu item.  Use this, for instance, to change the title.
• Delete can be used to delete the menu item