Menu Items

Niamh Ferns Updated by Niamh Ferns

Read more on Menus.

Menu Items are used to describe content which can then be placed into a Menu. They are created and exist independently from the Menus which use them. Modifying an existing Menu Item will affect all Menus which reference it.

You can search, modify, create, and delete menu items from the Menu Items page inside your Admin Console. In general you will be able to customize the name and icon of menu items. Be aware that horizontal space inside the Portal Menu is limited, therefore names which are too long will be truncated with ellipses. You can also add searchable metadata to the items, known as tags. These are here to help you manage and organize your items.

System Menu Items

These are the standard menu items that come with DeskDirector. System menu items cannot be created or deleted, but you can customize their name and icon. These menu items are included in every Menu by default.

  • Contact Support - This menu item will show the contact the option to either create a ticket or chat with a technician (if the user has Chat permissions enabled)
  • Invoices - This will display the Invoices table. This will not display if any ConnectBooster Menu Item's are found in the Menu. This is only visible if user has Invoices permission.
  • Learning - Represents the learning center. Once the new menu system has been enabled, top level learning items will instead appear inside the learning center. This is only visible is the Learning Center permissions are enabled for the contact/company.
  • Notifications - This will display the notification center. This is only available if notifications are enabled.
  • Quotes - With this enabled, the quotes table will be displayed to the contact. This menu item is only available if Quotes permission is set for the contact.
  • Tickets - This menu item will show tickets that contacts have access to. By default, it will show tickets he own (open and closed). If "All Tickets" permissions are enabled, he will see the option see all Tickets. Checking this guide on how the ticket list page looks. If the contact is set as an approver, he will see the tickets for approval.

What if I want custom menu items other than the system menu items? Well, you can easily create custom menu items in DeskDirector.

Note: System menu items respect the permissions and settings you have set up elsewhere. e.g. A user will not see the Quotes menu item if they don't have the Quotes permission. A user will not see the Ticket Approval sub-menu if they do not have the Approval permission.

Creating Menu Items

Creating menu items can be easily done via Portal > Menu Items > New Menu Item:

In the Create Menu Item page, you should be welcomed by several forms and checkboxes, the most basic of which is the Name and Icon for the menu item.

Please specify the display name of the menu item, then specify an icon to be used for it. You should be presented with a few options upon selecting the icon form.

If you can't see the icon you want to use, you can search for the specific icon from the material icon set.

Type of Menu Items

After specifying the menu name and icon, you should now choose the type of menu item you want to set up.

Extension Menu

This menu item will embed a static/dynamic website into the portal. You just need to specify the extension site's URL. Among the type of custom menu items listed here, this is the most powerful as this adds a lot of flexibility and functionality to the client portal with the endless possible extensions you can add.

Below the extension site URL form are sections for security and query parameters. Here's a separate guide to learn more about extension menu security and query parameters.

ConnectBooster Menu

This menu item will embed ConnectBooster (invoices and payments) inside the portal. You just need to specify the ConnectBooster site URL.

Only visible if user has Invoices permission
OneNote Notebook Menu

This menu item will embed a OneNote Notebook into the portal. You should be able to choose from a selection of existing OneNote Notebooks. If you have not created one yet, you can easily create OneNote Notebooks from the DeskDirector Portal.

BiggerBrains

The BiggerBrains menu item will allow your customers to view all the BiggerBrains courses for the given product. You can select which BiggerBrains product you want to show in the menu item.

Note that BiggerBrains products are paid add-ons which you will have to purchase in order to use.

Learn more about BiggerBrains

Tutorials

Creating Menu Items

33 STEPS

1. Open DeskDirector Admin Portal and click Portal.

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2. Click Menu System.

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3. In the Menu Item section, we can create individual menu items for our default or custom menu.

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4. Click Menu Item.

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5. The top section displays the menu items which are part of the system's default menu. You can click to edit them.

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6. Click Contact Support.

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7. Click the Name textbox.

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8. Modify the text in the name textbox.

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9. Click the Icon textbox to change the icon.

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10. You can search for an icon by typing in its name. Choose from the dropdown results.

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11. Click Add Tag to add any tags.

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12. Click the name of the tag that you wish to add.

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13. Click Save to save your changes.

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14. Click Items to go back to the Menu Items section.

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15. In the lower section, you can add or edit your own custom menu items.

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16. Click New Menu Item.

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17. Type the Name of the menu item.

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18. Next, click the Icon textbox.

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19. Type to search for the required icon. Then, click the icon name from the results.

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20. Click Add Tag to add any tags.

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21. Click the name of the Tag that you wish to add.

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22. Next, we can select how the portal will behave when the menu item is clicked. Expand the Type of Menu Item drop-down box to view the options.

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23. Let's choose the Extension Menu option. This will let the user view the contents from inside the portal.

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24. It gives the option to run the contents in a sandboxed environment. Toggle the Enable Sandbox switch to enable/disable it.

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25. If sandbox is enabled, the following options can further be enabled, to allow or restrict certain actions.

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26. Scroll up and click the Menu Item drop-down again.

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27. The External Link option will open the contents of a Menu Item in a new tab. Go ahead and click on it.

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28. Next, provide the website address in the External site's URL textbox.

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29. The following options will let you pass query parameters to the external website. You can use them as per your requirements.

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30. Finally, click Save to save the menu item.

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31. Click Items to go back to the previous section.

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32. We can now see our new Menu Item in the custom menu items section.

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33. That's it. You're done.

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** Best experienced in Full Screen (click the icon in the top right corner before you begin) **

https://www.iorad.com/player/2341921/Creating-Menu-Items

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