General settings tab
This tab contains the fields you need to fill in to define your module.
You need to fill in the following fields:
- Namespace: This is the folder name of your new extension. Your company name should go here. Use only letters and numbers. Start with a capital letter. There are some words you cannot use as namespace. See the Naming restrictions section.
- Module name: This is your extension/module name. It should be something meaningful and not very long. Try to use a noun in singular form. Start with a capital letter. There are some words you cannot use as module name. See the Naming restrictions section.
- Code pool: This is the code folder in which your extension will be installed. If you don't know what goes here, choose "local"
- Action: This allows you to directly install the module you create on the current Magento instance, or create a zip with it and install it later. Although I haven't had any problems with installing the extension directly I don't recommend it. It requires write rights on all files and folders of your magento instance
- Version: This is the version of the module.
- Admin menu title: This is the title of the admin menu that will be created for your module
- Admin parent menu ID: The parent menu id of the module menu. Leave empty to add in top menu.
- Admin menu sort order: This is the sort order in the menu. The parent menu id and the sort order cannot be entered manually. Instead, click on the link below them. You will see a tree with the current menu items. You will be able to select a place to insert you menu item. There is a known issue here. If on your current version you have some third party modules installed that have menu items, and you select one of them as a parent for your entity and later you install the extension you create on an instance that does not have this third party module the menu won't appear. So limit yourself to the default magento menu items.
- System -> Configuration tab name: If at least one entity has frontend files then a section in System->Configuration will be created. Fill in the tab name here. Leave empty to use the namespace.
- System -> Configuration tab position: If at least one entity has frontend files then a section in System->Configuration will be created. Fill in the tab position. The higher the number the lower it will appear in the list.
- License : The text you put here will be added at the top of (almost) each file in the module you create. Use {{Namespace}} as a placeholder for namespace, {{Module}} as a placeholder for the module name and {{Y}} as placeholder for current year. If you don't want any License text on your files just leave this field empty.
- Frontend key: This is the route name of your module. It's the first part of the URL. ('module/controller/action'). This is what goes instead of 'module'. Useful only if you have frontend listing or viewing for at least one entity. Leave empty to use default value 'namespace_module'.
Some of the fields already have a value when you create a module.
To see the fields that support a default value and change those default values see the Configuration section.