Social network implementation has become a necessity for successful websites. Joomla!, the popular Open-Source CMS, has some great and affordable ways to bring your site to the social networking level. Let's review how.

This article will walk through the beginnings of setting up a social site using Joomla. Some of the end goals and solutions will vary depending on your needs.

Joomla! shouldn't just be looked at as a CMS but a framework from which to build your applications and accomplish your dreams. Before you jump in and start lacing together extensions to build your site, proper planning and a roadmap is essential.

Article sources: http://net.tutsplus.com/tutorials/other/build-a-social-network-using-joomla/

Step 1: Set up the Load Module plugin

The first thing you need to do is navigate to the plugin manager in your Joomla! Administrator panel. In Joomla! 1.5, you can access the plugin manager by clicking Extensions->Plugin Manager in theadministrator main menu. In the plugin manager, locate the "Content - Load Moudle" plugin. If you have a lot of plugins, it might help to filter the list to only show content plugins. The filter is in the top right hand corner above the page just above the list of plugins. Under "Select Type", select "content."

Once you have located the Load Module plugin, click on it to open it in the plugin editor. First, make sure the plugin is enabled. Then set its style however you choose. The style is the way in which modules will be loaded via this plugin. I prefer to choose "Wrapped by Divs", "Wrapped by Multiple Divs" or "No wrapping (raw output)" because those offer cleaner, more semantic output. Once you have set the parameters how you want them, save the changes you have made to the plugin.

Step 2: Create module you wish to display

You can display any type of module you want to display through this plugin. To display an RSS feed, you need to create a Feed Display module.

First, navigate to the module manager by clicking Extensions->Module Manager in the administratormenu. Then, click new in the toolbar to create a new module. A list of module types will be displayed. In that list, select "Feed Display" to create a module that displays an RSS feed.
Module position

You can choose any module position to display this module because the Load Module plugin lets you specify any module position. A good idea is to choose some name that will not interfere with the othermodule positions on the site because you do not want to display this module anywhere but in an article. For my article, I chose "tjx", but you could use anything. For the "position" parameter, simply delete the position that is currently selected and type the position name you wish to use.
Module parameters

Under the module's parameters, be sure and set the feed URL. Otherwise, the module won't work properly. The rest of the parameters can be set however you want according to how you want themodule to display.

Step 3: Embedding the module into an article

Now that the Load Module plugin and Feed Display module are set the way you want them, you are ready to embed the module into an article. To embed the module, you simply need to add the followingplugin tag to your article:

{loadposition position_name}

Make sure you set position_name to the name of the module position you chose in Step 2. In my case, the tag looked like this:

{loadposition tjx}

That's all there is to it. The module position is now loaded into your article with the Feed Displaymodule that you set up, so you now have an RSS feed embedded in an article.

Joomla! 1.5.12 Changes were made to the framework PHPMailer class in order to allow secure connections (SSL/TLS) to SMTP servers. Given these changes, Joomla is now able to use services such as Gmail to handle e-mail from the application. If you have access to a Gmail account, consider testing this new functionality.

In the Administrator Panel, navigate to Global Configuration > Server and set the following options:

* Mailer: SMTP Server
* SMTP Security: SSL
* SMTP Port: 465
* SMTP Authentication: Yes
* SMTP Username: Your Gmail username
* SMTP Password: Your Gmail password
* SMTP Host: smtp.gmail.com

Then retest to ensure e-mail services continue to work.

Mimbo Pro is a Wordpress template designed for magazine style sites. With a colorful design and customisable layout it’s perfect for users of all skill levels.

Mimbo Pro is compatible with WordPress 2.5 and above!

Mimbo Pro is a full-featured magazine/ news theme for Wordpress. Already familiar with the original Mimbo? Imagine no more manual template editing, no more Photoshop, no more image-cropping or FTP’ing. Plus a built-in contact form, image gallery, custom archive pages, breadcrumbs, ad management, Feedburner and Google Analytics options, and more. Enjoy using Wordpress like a CMS, now more than ever.

FolioBlogger is a WordPress Portfolio theme with full Blogging capabilities and is ideal forphotographers, artists or designers. It was created to be VERY easy to maintain using simple WordPress posting and writing capabilities and has numerouse php and jquery enhancements.

Folio Blogger has many features that are seen and unseen that make using your new theme easy to set-up and manage. Some of the features Include:

* Two Widget Sidebars ( one for the home page and portfolio & one for the blog)
* Different Excerpt lengths for the slider, Blog and Archives to keep things neat
* Automatic Image Sizing using best fit and zoom scale – PHP (No Plugin Required)
* Automatic Thumbnails and image handling
* Gravatars for comments
* Ad Management (turn On or Off with a click)
* Google Analytics
* Six Color Options (simply select in the options menu)
* Adjust How many blog post you want on the home page in the admin (You can have a different number for the interior blog pages AND the portfolio will show ALL post from the selected category… Flexibility!
* Custom Theme Options Panel
* Slider for all portfolio categories
* Blog section (select a post to go in the blog or it will go to the portfolio – automatic!)
* Jquery enhanced
* Jquery slide down Category menu – supports 2nd level items!
* valid css and xhtml
* and More…

Our Community - ThemeForest, For editorials, magazine, community, corporate, anything. WordPress 2.7 supported! With threaded comments! Demo: http://themeforest.net/item/our-community/15953

Features
-Threaded comment ( up to level 3) and paged comments supported. - 2 widget sidebars for different pages.
- Login on any pages.
- Custom admin menu.
- 3 column
- Drop down menu ( for categories and Pages)
- Featured post in main page.
- An image a post. (recommended)
- Full layout PSD Included.
- 2 different categories below the featured section.

Custom Admin Panel
- RSS count is text with awesome display
- Well built tabbing system with most wanted features.
- Able to insert your Google analytics codes.
- Ad banner management system.
- able to control the number of popular posts, recent comments, related posts and recent posts to be displayed in the sidebar.
- Able to define which categories to be shown in fron page and in which section.

Usage
- Sidebar 1 will be shown in main page while
- Sidebar 2 is just for the single post page.

Requirements
- Required php5, simplexmlelement and curl enable (for the feed count).
- If you are using Google FeedProxy, you need to edit the feed.php to make the feed counter works. Please refer to this tutorial in order to modify. It is very easy to do.

If simplexmlelement and curl is disabled, the feed counter will not be displayed.
- You need to contact your service provider in order to enable simplexmlelement and curl.

KeKo is a 2 columns fixed width Wordpress theme with theme option and twitter integrated. This urban grunge style theme is suitable for use on any niche blogs such as music, personal, social, etc.

Theme Features:

* 2 column and 3 column footer
* Widgetize sidebar
* Adsense loop integrated
* Twitter integrated
* Customize category, archive and tag page with post excerpt and thumbnail (seo purpose)
* 6 125×125 banner ready (controlable via theme option)
* 2 featured spot in sidebar and footer (choose your featured category via theme option)
* Thread comments ready
* Header image changeable in admin panel
* Tested working on all major browsers
* Tested working on WP 2.7 and above
* Valid XHTML

Download:

Make Sure have latest version of Wordpress (2.7 and above)
1. Upload the theme folder into wp-content/themes/ directory.
2. Go to Your WordPress Dashboard and select Theme.
3. Select The Falkner Press theme.
4. Upload the Twitter for Wordress and the flickrRSS plugin that are found in plugins folder into the wp-content/plugins directory.
5. Activate the plugins.

More Info and Download: http://camelgraph.com/falkner-press-theme/
Download Mirror:
http://rapidshare.com/files/257595356/wp_falkner.rar
http://www.filefactory.com/file/ahegd2c/n/wp_falkner_rar

Dimaggio Free Premium Wordpress Theme | Demo: http://wpstart.org/goto/http://led24.de/wordpress-themes/dimaggio/
Dimaggio theme is another free WordPress theme by Led24.de for the WordPress community. The theme is a 2-column wide desing, perfect for personal and small blogs.

Common Features

* Works on Wordpress 2.5+
* Tested on IE6/7, Firefox, Opera, Safari
* xHTML & CSS Validated

Goodies

* Widgets ready – easily arrange sidebar and bottom bar
* Gravatar ready
* Page templates for archives and links page
* Theme options admin panel

Download: http://wpstart.org/goto/http://led24.de/wordpress-themes/2008-dimaggio-wordpress-theme-released/

Download Mirror:
http://rapidshare.com/files/257970369/wp_dimaggio.rar
http://sharebee.com/6a36f080
http://www.easy-share.com/1906835792/wp_dimaggio.rar

New template Phoenix we are introducing a new era in YOOtheme templating: our shiny new Warptemplate framework. Warp is what's under the hood of a YOOtheme template. With Phoenix, you get a wide range of awesome new features.

First of all, there is our amazing new multi-column dropdown menu, which is a true novelty for the Joomla world: You can set as many columns as you want, set the column width in the backend, display big icons for second level items ... you gotta check it out yourself, it looks so cool!

Phoenix also comes with lots of modules, some of them with color variations. Now you can also show icons in your module headers. Phoenix provides an endless supply of combinations of module styles, colors, badges and icons. The new 2-1-3 column ordering makes Phoenix super search engine friendly. The two nested 3-column-layouts makes your website amazingly flexible. And also, this is our fastest template ever, sporting a new way of CSS/JS compression and background image sprites.

Feature list

* Built with the new Warp template framework
* Amazing new muti-column dropdown menu
* Icons in module headers
* Lots of modules with color variations, endless combinations with icons and badges possible
* 2-1-3 column ordering for search engine friendliness
* Our fastest template ever, using image sprites
* Works with all YOOtools

Dugg Plazza - Digg-like site running on Joomla | Demo: http://demo.templateplazza.net/dugg_plazza/

Dugg plazza is a template from template plazza that is dedicated to make a website with joomla where your visitors can share or vote articles that they like, just like in digg.com.

This template is completed with tpdugg components, an article sharing social component that is specially designed for dugg plazza. This component has features like: submit stories form, ajax-based vote system, commenting system, tags, etc.

Not to forget, this component also completed with 3 supportive modules, they are; tpdugg module, tpdugg directory module and tpdugg tags module, in which each of them has a function to enrich the feature and performance of the dugg plazza itself.

Affinity is the July 2009 release from RocketTheme and features extensive third party support for powerful and popular community products, such as JomSocial, K2 and phpBB3. The template's core feature is Sortable Elements, which allows for the movement of modular rows, individual positions and stacks of modules.

We also have styled support for various RocketTheme Extensions such as RokTabs and RokAjaxSearch.

NOTICE: Affinity is a Joomla 1.5 only template.

RocketTheme JomSocial Coupon

NOTE: Only current RocketTheme Joomla Club members can access the special JomSocial Coupon. To ensure you get JomSocial at the very best price possible, please join the club today.

RocketTheme's base price is $50, so by joining the club and then saving $50 on the JomSocial, you are actually getting your RocketTheme membership for free!

Features and Screenshots

* JomSocial Integration
* K2 Styling
* Community Builder Support
* Sortable Elements
* Complex Typography
* RT Extension Styling
* Javascript Form Styling
* Multi-Column Menu
* RokMoomenu, Suckerfish, Splitmenu menus
* 6 Preset Styles
* 35 Module Positions
* FF3, Opera 9.6, Safari 3, IE6,7,8 Compatible
* W3C XHTML 1.0 Transitional. W3C CSS Valid

RS: http://tinyurl.com/nrauyj | FF: http://tinyurl.com/kpdvd8 | MF: http://tinyurl.com/nwavb3

RT Affinity v1.5.1 Joomla Template Upload:
RS: http://tinyurl.com/nv3tet | MU: http://tinyurl.com/mdcq7h

Who Else Wants An Easy Way To Create Their Joomla Templates WITHOUT All The Hassle?
Here's a Complete Solution and you, DON'T need any HTML or PHP experience.
What comes with the package?
You receive the following:
* Complete Windows Application
* “How to” Movie
* Documentation Package

Quite Simply it takes your graphic images and creates a complete template zip file ready to load into Joomla. It does what it says quickly and cleanly. Technically - It creates a 100% width ‘autostretch’ 3 column layout. The layout is 3 seperate 100% tables ’stacked’ vertically-the top table is for the header area, the middle table is for the Joomla left, center and right columns, and the bottom table is for the footer area. Additionally, the middle table will contain a 3 column 100% nested table. In addition we create the valid XML file and CSS descriptors all ready to run.

I was totally amazed when I first started using Joomla. For what was a BRILLIANT Content Management System, it seems to me so complex when it came to designing the Templates. Arcane instructions left me bewildered. I really didn't know which way to turn.

I began by 'buying in' ready made templates and trying to convert them. But there was something missing. Trying to embed my own graphics was a nightmare. What I needed was a simple way to take my own graphic headers etc and create a Joomla Template Package ready to rock 'n roll.

Sure there were plenty of Dreamweaver Add-On's but I need something that would run directly from Windows - a kind of simple Q+A - Fill in the Blanks and Go.

Download Link:
http://rapidshare.com/files/262118224/PSD_File___Jellyfish_by_zaib.rar
http://rapidshare.com/files/262126679/PSD_File___Jellyfish_by_zaib.rar.htm
http://hotfile.com/dl/7802574/bd900c5/PSD_File___Jellyfish_by_zaib.rar.html