Question

Instead of categories I would like products to appear in the drop-down navigation menu similar to lowes.com. Is this possible? I am not paying for anything either 🙂

I’ve attempted to alter core/Mage/Catalog/Block/Navigation.php and try to ‘fake’ products as categories but the object requirement is very specific. Since the function to create the menu is recursive it will only work on actual categories and nothing else. Any ideas?

I know another option is to create 2nd level categories and name them as my products and then do a rewrite in .htaccess but this is not dynamic and very messy.

Answer 1

After a bit of experimenting I’ve got this working! Below is the new code to use in

app/code/core/Mage/Catalog/Block/Navigation.php

function _renderCategoryMenuItemHtml (swap ‘local’ for ‘core’ if localizing)

protected function _renderCategoryMenuItemHtml($category, $level = 0, $isLast = false, $isFirst = false, $isOutermost = false, $outermostItemClass = '', $childrenWrapClass = '', $noEventAttributes = false)
{
    if (!$category->getIsActive()) {
        return '';
    }
    $html = array();

    // get all children
    if (Mage::helper('catalog/category_flat')->isEnabled()) {
        $children = (array)$category->getChildrenNodes();
        $childrenCount = count($children);
    } else {
        $children = $category->getChildren();
        $childrenCount = $children->count();
    }
    $hasChildren = ($children && $childrenCount);

    // get products listing
    $cur_category = Mage::getModel('catalog/category')->load($category->getId());
    $_productCollection = Mage::getResourceModel('catalog/product_collection')->addCategoryFilter($cur_category)->setOrder('position','ASC');
    $k = 1;
    $hasProduct1 = $_productCollection->count();
    $phtmlChildren = '';
    if ($hasProduct1 >= 1) {
        $l = $level+1;
        foreach ($_productCollection as $_product) {
            $cur_product = Mage::getModel('catalog/product')->load($_product->getId());
            if ($cur_product->getStatus()) {
                $phtmlChildren .= '<li';
                $phtmlChildren .= ' class="level'.$l;
                $phtmlChildren .= ' nav-'.$this->_getItemPosition($l);
                if ($k == $hasProduct1) {
                    $phtmlChildren .= ' last';
                }
                $phtmlChildren .= '">'."\n";
                $phtmlChildren .= ' <a href="'.$cur_product->getProductUrl().'">'.$this->htmlEscape($cur_product->getName()).'</a>'."\n";
                $phtmlChildren .= '</li>';
                $k++;
            }
        }
    }

    // select active children
    $activeChildren = array();
    foreach ($children as $child) {
        if ($child->getIsActive()) {
            $activeChildren[] = $child;
        }
    }
    $activeChildrenCount = count($activeChildren);
    $hasActiveChildren = ($activeChildrenCount > 0);

    // prepare list item html classes
    $classes = array();
    $classes[] = 'level' . $level;
    $classes[] = 'nav-' . $this->_getItemPosition($level);
    if ($this->isCategoryActive($category)) {
        $classes[] = 'active';
    }
    $linkClass = '';
    if ($isOutermost && $outermostItemClass) {
        $classes[] = $outermostItemClass;
        $linkClass = ' class="'.$outermostItemClass.'"';
    }
    if ($isFirst) {
        $classes[] = 'first';
    }
    if ($isLast) {
        $classes[] = 'last';
    }
    if ($hasActiveChildren) {
        $classes[] = 'parent';
    }

    // prepare list item attributes
    $attributes = array();
    if (count($classes) > 0) {
        $attributes['class'] = implode(' ', $classes);
    }
    if ($hasActiveChildren && !$noEventAttributes) {
         $attributes['onmouseover'] = 'toggleMenu(this,1)';
         $attributes['onmouseout'] = 'toggleMenu(this,0)';
    }

    // assemble list item with attributes
    $htmlLi = '<li';
    foreach ($attributes as $attrName => $attrValue) {
        $htmlLi .= ' ' . $attrName . '="' . str_replace('"', '\"', $attrValue) . '"';
    }
    $htmlLi .= '>';
    $html[] = $htmlLi;

    $html[] = '<a href="'.$this->getCategoryUrl($category).'"'.$linkClass.'>';
    $html[] = '<span>' . $this->escapeHtml($category->getName()) . '</span>';
    $html[] = '</a>';

    // render 'product' children
    $htmlChildren = '';
    if ($hasChildren) {
        $j = 0;
        foreach ($children as $child) {
            if ($child->getIsActive()) {
                $htmlChildren .= $this->_renderCategoryMenuItemHtml($child, $level + 1, $j++ >= $k);
            }
        }
    }
    if ((!empty($htmlChildren)) || (!empty($phtmlChildren))) {
        $html[] = '<ul class="level'.$level.'">'."\n".$htmlChildren.$phtmlChildren.'</ul>';
    }

    // render children
    $htmlChildren = '';
    $j = 0;
    foreach ($activeChildren as $child) {
        $htmlChildren .= $this->_renderCategoryMenuItemHtml(
            $child,
            ($level + 1),
            ($j == $activeChildrenCount - 1),
            ($j == 0),
            false,
            $outermostItemClass,
            $childrenWrapClass,
            $noEventAttributes
        );
        $j++;
    }
    if (!empty($htmlChildren)) {
        if ($childrenWrapClass) {
            $html[] = '<div class="' . $childrenWrapClass . '">';
        }
        $html[] = '<ul class="level' . $level . '">';
        $html[] = $htmlChildren;
        $html[] = '</ul>';
        if ($childrenWrapClass) {
            $html[] = '</div>';
        }
    }

    $html[] = '</li>';

    $html = implode("\n", $html);       
    return $html;
}

Basically there are two new added sections. The first section builds the product collection to get relevant info (name, url, etc). The second section appends the new unordered list inside the existing root category list items. Hope this helps someone. Now you don’t need to pay $99 for the extension that is out there 🙂

Tested on v.1.6.1