Some Magento extensions built into the theme cannot be used for a certain store, or they are temporarily not needed. In this article we will review how they can be disabled and why.
Why do we disable blocks and extensions
Any detail in the store causes a certain page load. This may negatively affect the store behavior, especially if there are a lot of unnecessary extensions on the main page and a client has a low-speed internet connection.
It is all clear with the process of disabling additional modules – they can be simply deactivated. But what do we do with the blocks which are built into the theme by default?
There are several categories of such blocks:
- 1. Usability – social buttons, categories, slider, etc.;
- 2. Payment data, systems, etc.;
- 3. System – welcome messages during the registration and account login, site map, permissions to access certain categories, etc.
How to disable standard Magento extensions:
Site map
This is a quite complicated element which not always works for good. In order to disable the site map in Magento you need to go to the admin panel and then go to System → Settings → Catalog → SEO.
In the optimization settings we can disable the automatic generation of the site map.
Payment systems
It is impossible to disable them at all however we can reduce clients’ attention to them (this action is often necessary for reconfiguration of the store or correction of the payment options). Go to System → Settings → Catalog →PayPal and disable the logo. As a result, only the functionality will remain on the main page (the link without a logo).
Tag cloud is a beautiful but, depending on the settings, a very complicated extension. We will need to go to the admin panel, then to System → Settings → Advanced and locate Mage_Tag. This is what we need to disable.
Magento banners
Many users wonder how the promo banners in Magento can be disabled? This only requires few mouse clicks.
For instance, every Magento theme has a banner in sidebar. In order to remove it we need to go to the admin panel, then to the theme settings and open default/layout/catalog.xml. In this file we need to find the banner link or its description (you will recognize it as soon as you see), disable or remove it. We can do the same things with other banners.
In the same section but in checkout.xml folder there are such banners as heading, best selling products and a link to customer’s shopping cart. They can also be disabled by simply erasing the corresponding part of the code.
If you have any questions regarding GoMage services you may use our Magento experts’ help, visit our forum http://magentoforum.com/ or leave a comment to this article. We do not recommend you to modify or delete any code if you have not had any experience with that before. Also you should not close the menu items important for customers for a long time as this may cause negative results for your store efficiency.
