Omni Breadcrumbs

About Breadcrumbs

The breadcrumb is the row of links underneath the website navigation. This shows you where you are in the site hierarchy. Each link represents a nested folder and the hierarchy flows from left to right.

(e.g., home directory > folder > subfolder > page title)

Diagnosing and fixing broken breadcrumb links
Sometimes you’ll discover that a breadcrumb link doesn’t work. This is usually because there isn’t a published index.php file in that directory listed in the breadcrumb path. The index page is the root address for each directory and that page must be published in order for a valid breadcrumb link to be created. Without that index.php file, the folder hyperlink in the breadcrumb path will be invalid and if you click on that link it will give you an error message.

Breadcrumbs are automatically created when you have them enabled on a page and the root for each directory will always be index.php. So, if your breadcrumb path is home > about > contact, then the about and contact directories would each need a published index.php file in order to create valid breadcrumb links. “Home” will also need an index.php file, but it should already have one because that is the home page for your website.

Note about .PCF vs .PHP files
When you edit the page, you will be on the Staging server and the file extension will be index.PCF. Once you publish the page, the file extension will be index.PHP. To see the published index.php file, you will need to look on the Production tab in the server view. If all you see are .PCF files in the directory, then you are on the Staging server.

Enable or disable breadcrumbs
You can enable or disable breadcrumbs through the Parameters tab located in Properties. The page must be checked out to you (lightbulb icon illuminated) to adjust these settings.

How to Edit Breadcrumbs

Screencast Tutorial

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Step by Step Tutorial

In web design, breadcrumb navigation shows you where you are within the site’s hierarchy. For Vanderbilt’s Omni sites, the breadcrumb navigation is at the top of each web page. The breadcrumb navigation defines both the current page and the primary pages above the current page.

Below is a screenshot of the breadcrumb navigation from Vanderbilt’s Omni Training site – the breadcrumb navigation is outlined in red.

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Whenever you create a new directory (folder) in Omni, you need to edit the breadcrumb navigation. By default, Omni gives the breadcrumb navigation the same text as you named your folder. So, if you named your folder “reading-materials”, the Breadcrumb navigation would display as “reading-materials”. It would be more readable to have the navigation displayed as “Reading Materials”.

This tutorial will show you how to edit the breadcrumb navigation to make your titles more readable and  usable.

1. Navigate to any page of your Omni site. Scroll down to the bottom of the page and click on the copyright symbol. Log in with your Omni user name and password (unless you’re already logged in).

2. Click on the link for Pages, in the gray bar at the top.

3. Then scroll down until you get to the folder that has the breadcrumb navigation file that you want to edit. Click on the link for that folder.

4. Within that folder, you’ll see a file named breadcrumb.xml. Click on the light bulb icon to check out the file, and then click the file name link.

5. You’ll see source code for the breadcrumb file. To edit the title we need to go into Properties.

Change the breadcrumb name by editing the Title field.

6. Then click Save.

7. Review your changes. If you’re ready for the new breadcrumb to go to the live website, click Publish.

8. To see your changes, navigate to a page in that directory.
(You won’t be able to see your changes while still in the breadcrumb.xml file.)
Once you visit a page in that directory, you should see your new breadcrumb displayed.