Working with the Joomla plugin shortcode

Admin permissions to manage integrations.
A hosted website with the free Joomla software.
Ability to copy and paste into your website code or some helpful person to do this for you!
The Joomla integration is available to both those using items (Inventory > Items), a key feature of our classic version of Checkfront, and those using products (Inventory > Products), a key feature of our newest version of Checkfront.

New to Checkfront - Products ✨

Products (Inventory > Products) is the successor feature to (Inventory > Items) and is available in our newest version of Checkfront.

Not yet on our newest version and interested in upgrading? Please contact our Technical Support team for more information.

Discover more product-related help articles here: Products (New).

Version Support

At this time, our integration supports Joomla versions up to and including 3.8.

Do you need support for a higher version? Submit your feedback to our Product Team via the Community.

For now, we recommend using the widget to display your Checkfront booking page on your website.

In this article, we look at how to generate and place Joomla shortcodes, as well as, how to extend the shortcode using additional code/arguments.

New to Joomla and the booking plugin? Read the first article in this series for an introduction.

Please read the full series of articles, accessed at the side and bottom of this page, to get set up with the Joomla plugin.

Generating the shortcode

You should have by now selected all the previous options that make the most sense in terms of your requirements. It's now time to generate the shortcode for your website!

Joomla Shortcode Generate

Click on the Generate Code button and copy the resulting shortcode to your clipboard. The basic shortcode generated looks like this: [checkfront].

Placing the shortcode

Joomla Default Shortcode

With the shortcode pasted to your clipboard, head back over to Joomla and locate/create the page/post in which you wish to embed the booking portal.

Place the shortcode wherever you want the portal to appear. This may be before, after, or somewhere within your page content.

Using arguments with the shortcode

Joomla Advanced Shortcode

Adding some of the arguments from the list lower down this page controls how the booking portal appears and the information it contains. Above is an example of what this shortcode might look like.

Extending the shortcode

Following is a list of arguments that can be added to the basic [checkfront] shortcode to change the look and behaviour of your booking portal.

Type	Variable	Description
Inventory	`[checkfront item_id="3,8,37"]`	Show specific items or products
	`[checkfront category_id="2,3"]`	Show specific categories
	`[checkfront filter_category_id="3"]`	Limit upcoming events to a specific category
Options	`[checkfront options=tabs]`	Tabs as categories
	`[checkfront options=category_select`	Dropdowns as categories
	`[checkfront options=hidesearch]`	Hide search and calendar
	`[checkfront options=hidedates]`	Hide date picker
	`[checkfront options=tabs,hidesearch,hidedates]`	Together they would look like this
Discount Code	`[checkfront discount_code="insert_code"]`	Include an automatic discount code
Language	`[checkfront lang_id: "en"]`	Set default booking portal language
	`[checkfront locale_id: en_US"]`	Set default customer language. Customers can change this from the menu bar. Supercedes lang_id
Style	`[checkfront style="color: #000000"]`	Font colour
	`[checkfront style="font-family: arial"]`	Font-family
	`[checkfront style="background-color: #873333"]`	Background colour
	`[checkfront style="color: #000000; background-color: #873333; font-family: arial"]`	Font styles combined
Date	`[checkfront date="20141224"]`	Fast forward to a specific date
	`[checkfront end_date="20140131"]`	Add an end date
Tracking ID	`[checkfront tid="promo-page"]`	Tracking ID

Frequently Asked Questions

Is it possible to have multiple shortcodes on the same webpage?

No. You can only have one shortcode per webpage. If you want to have multiple integrations on the same webpage, then you need to add a code block with a generated Booking Widget code.

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< Configuring advanced options for the Joomla plugin

Articles in this section

Generating the shortcode

Placing the shortcode

Using arguments with the shortcode

Extending the shortcode

Frequently Asked Questions

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