Widgets and Widget Types

So far in this manual, we have often used the word widget to mean widget type (it's difficult to avoid doing so), but it is important to clearly understand the difference between the concepts widget and widget type. If you click on File > New > (Core/Community) Widgets in Content Studio, then what you see in the displayed menu is a list of widget types. If you click on one of the listed types - let's say you click on Menu Widget - then this results in the creation of an actual widget, an instance of the widget type Menu. One of the things you are required to do when you create any kind of widget, is to name the instance you have created by setting it's Name property. The following illustration shows the property list for a newly-created menu widget: the Title label is displayed in red, indicating that this property is required.

graphics/new-widget-properties.png

Naming the widgets you create is important, because you can create many widgets of the same type. You might, for example, call your Menu widget Header Menu, and place it in the Header area. But if you also want your publication to include a footer menu, then you can create another Menu widget called Footer Menu and set it up accordingly. A typical content template will usually contain several instances of the Content Field widget type, each set up to display a different content item field: a Title widget displaying the title field and a Subtitle widget displaying the subtitle field, for example.