5 Must-Have Joomla Extensions

Joomla's basic feature set is powerful, especially with Bootstrap being included in Java's core coding. Bootstrap is a collection of javascript and CSS snippets that are easily added to your website, the template, or modules. It provides a great deal of flexibility to an already great content management system, but sometimes you need features that Joomla and Bootstrap can't cover. The open source nature of this script provides fertile ground for an endless amount of extensions. When you're ready to go beyond Joomla's basic functions, a quick jaunt into the available extensions reveals a way to take your website to the next level.  

Its worth noting that we do not earn referrals or commissions from any of these.

Here are 5 Joomla Extensions you must-have in your next site

1.Sh404SEF

Sh404SEF is a painfully named extension from the good folks at Anything Digital, but it helps your Joomla website get noticed by search engines. This is a full featured search engine optimization suite that helps boost Joomla's base SEO, provides you with analytics integration, and has wide compatibility with other Joomla extensions. While Joomla has some SEO features out of the box, you struggle with duplicate pages and other taxonomy issues with the base install. This is one of the first extensions you want for your site.This plugin costs $39 for 1 year, and is compatible with Joomla 3.x, 2.5, and 1.5.

2.Akeeba Backup

Akeeba Backup stops you from tearing out your hair if you have a major issue with your website or servers. You won't lose all of the content you've put your heart and soul into when you get a regular, full site backup. It has been around since 2006 and has over 8 milions downloads - wow! This extension is also handy if you need to migrate between servers or you want to roll back to an older version of your website. Don't get caught without a backup solution, especially for mission critical sites. Akeeba Backup's pricing is a little confusing, but its well worth figuring it out. Prices start at around 20 Euros, or is it 40, or is it 50, or maybe 80? They recommend users upgrade to the latest version of Joomla 2.5.x or 3.2 for full compatibility and support.

3.K2

Like Akeeba, K2 is another must have that will make you love working with content on Joomla again. This replaces the standard content creation interface with a full featured editor that makes it worlds easier to create and work with your content. In addition, it adds fields for galleries, videos, and additional expanded content. K2 has had over 1 million downloads and has a huge community of users world-wide. That's not just because its free, millions use it because it works, and it works great! It is available for Joomla 1.5, 2.5, and 3.x. Based on our experience this module we recommend you first analyzed it before installing and using it.

4.Mobile Joomla

When an extension begins by saying, "Your Joomla site mobilized. Instantly." it sounds a bit as hype and over promising, but that's not the case. Mobile Joomla takes the pain out of converting your Joomla site to a mobile friendly version if you are not using a responsive template. While responsive web design helps in some cases, not everyone can make a responsive design work for their web needs. When you have this issue, this extension converts your website to display properly on smartphones and tablets. Mobile Joomla! comes in 3 versions: Free, Basic ($29) and Pro ($99). It provides support for Joomla versions 1.5 to 3.0. In our case, don't worry about this topic, all our latest templates launched are responsive because of our Wright Framework.

5.Advanced Module Manager

Advanced Module Manager, from NoNumber gives you fine tune control over Joomla modules. Assignment settings restrict your modules for specific situations, such as showing a module to a specific group or operating system. It also makes it easy to search through your list of modules to identify specific ones. Advanced Module Manager has a free version and a Pro version that costs 50 Euros / year. It works with Joomla 2.5 and 3.x.

Tell us your experiences and stories using this extensions. Have they been useful to you?

 Author: Eddie Tabush