Add Icons to the Navigation Bar Tabs

[Admin]

Prior to the vBulletin 4.0 upgrade, I had these neat little icons in the navigation bar of my v 3.8 forum's theme. Since I upgraded the forums, I wanted to put these icons back once again. However, with the rewrite of the whole code, I was at a complete loss as to where to make these changes.

After a lot of searching and hit and trial, however, I did manage to come up with something that suited my needs. So I thought I'd write an article myself, with the hope that it would help others trying to do something similar.

These template modifications allow you to add icons to the tabs in the Navigation Bar, right below the logo, as shown in the image below:

​

I'll stick with the default Navigation Bar tabs, i.e. Home, Forum, Blogs and What's New. Although you may use images of any size, but since I did not want to meddle too much with the default design / layout, I resized all the images to 24px × 24px.

Note: I have colour coded all code edits / additions in red to make it easier to see what has been added.

Note: You may find instructions for vB 4.1.2 over here.
------------------------------

"Home" Tab: (2 modifications needed in only 1 template)

In your Admin Control Panel (ACP), go to:

ACP > Styles & Templates > Style Manager > Double arrows on the right of the style you want to edit (Expand Templates) > vBulletin CMS Templates > vbcms_navbar_link

Here, look for the following code:

<vb:if condition="$vboptions['selectednavtab'] == 'vbcms'">
<li class="selected">
    <a class="navtab" href="{vb:raw vboptions.site_tab_url}{vb:raw  session.sessionurl_q}">{vb:rawphrase site}</a>

Replace this with:

<vb:if condition="$vboptions['selectednavtab'] == 'vbcms'">
<li class="selected">
    <a class="navtab" href="{vb:raw vboptions.site_tab_url}{vb:raw  session.sessionurl_q}">[COLOR=Red]<img src="path_of_image"  border="0" align="top" alt="" /> [/COLOR]{vb:rawphrase  site}</a>

Now find:

<vb:else />
    <li><a class="navtab" href="{vb:raw  vboptions.site_tab_url}{vb:raw session.sessionurl_q}">{vb:rawphrase  site}</a></li>

Replace with:

<vb:else />
    <li><a class="navtab" href="{vb:raw  vboptions.site_tab_url}{vb:raw session.sessionurl_q}">[COLOR=Red]<img src="path_of_image" border="0" align="top"[/COLOR][COLOR=Red] alt=""[/COLOR][COLOR=Red] /> [/COLOR]{vb:rawphrase  site}</a></li>

Remember to press "Save" after making these changes to the template.
------------------------------

"Forum" Tab: (3 modifications needed in only 1 template)

In your Admin Control Panel (ACP), go to:

ACP > Styles & Templates > Style Manager > Double arrows on the right of the style you want to edit (Expand Templates) > Navigation / Breadcrumb Templates > navbar

Here, look for the following code:

<vb:if condition="!$vboptions['selectednavtab'] AND THIS_SCRIPT  != 'search'">
            <li class="selected"><a class="navtab"  href="{vb:raw vboptions.forumhome}.php{vb:raw  session.sessionurl_q}">{vb:rawphrase forum}</a>

Replace this with:

<vb:if condition="!$vboptions['selectednavtab'] AND THIS_SCRIPT  != 'search'">
            <li class="selected"><a class="navtab"  href="{vb:raw vboptions.forumhome}.php{vb:raw session.sessionurl_q}">[COLOR=Red]<img src="path_of_image" border="0" align="top"[/COLOR][COLOR=Red] alt=""[/COLOR][COLOR=Red] />[/COLOR] {vb:rawphrase  forum}</a>

Now find:

<vb:elseif condition="$vboptions['selectednavtab']=='usercp'"  />
            <li class="selected"><a class="navtab"  href="{vb:raw vboptions.forumhome}.php{vb:raw  session.sessionurl_q}">{vb:rawphrase forum}</a>

Replace with:

<vb:elseif condition="$vboptions['selectednavtab']=='usercp'"  />
            <li class="selected"><a class="navtab"  href="{vb:raw vboptions.forumhome}.php{vb:raw session.sessionurl_q}">[COLOR=Red]<img src="path_of_image" border="0" align="top"[/COLOR][COLOR=Red] alt=""[/COLOR][COLOR=Red] />[/COLOR] {vb:rawphrase  forum}</a>

Finally find:

<vb:else />
            <li><a class="navtab" href="{vb:raw  vboptions.forumhome}.php{vb:raw session.sessionurl_q}">{vb:rawphrase  forum}</a></li>

Replace with:

<vb:else />
            <li><a class="navtab" href="{vb:raw  vboptions.forumhome}.php{vb:raw session.sessionurl_q}">[COLOR=Red]<img src="path_of_image" border="0" align="top"[/COLOR][COLOR=Red] alt=""[/COLOR][COLOR=Red] />[/COLOR] {vb:rawphrase  forum}</a></li>

Remember to press "Save" after making these changes to the template.
------------------------------

"Blogs" Tab: (2 modifications needed in only 1 template)

In your Admin Control Panel (ACP), go to:

ACP > Styles & Templates > Style Manager > Double arrows on the right of the style you want to edit (Expand Templates) > Blog Templates > blog_navbar_link

Here, look for the following code:

<vb:if condition="$vboptions['selectednavtab'] == 'vbblog'">
<li class="selected">
    <a class="navtab" href="blog.php{vb:raw  session.sessionurl_q}">{vb:rawphrase blogs}</a>

Replace this with:

<vb:if condition="$vboptions['selectednavtab'] == 'vbblog'">
<li class="selected">
    <a class="navtab" href="blog.php{vb:raw  session.sessionurl_q}">[COLOR=Red]<img src="path_of_image"  border="0" align="top"[/COLOR][COLOR=Red] alt=""[/COLOR][COLOR=Red] /> [/COLOR]{vb:rawphrase blogs}</a>

Now find:

<vb:else />
    <li><a class="navtab" href="blog.php{vb:raw  session.sessionurl_q}">{vb:rawphrase  blogs}</a></li>

Replace with:

<vb:else />
    <li><a class="navtab" href="blog.php{vb:raw  session.sessionurl_q}">[COLOR=Red]<img src="path_of_image"  border="0" align="top" [/COLOR][COLOR=Red]alt=""[/COLOR][COLOR=Red] />[/COLOR] {vb:rawphrase  blogs}</a></li>

Remember to press "Save" after making these changes to the template.
------------------------------

"What's New" Tab: (4 modifications needed in only 1 template)

In your Admin Control Panel (ACP), go to:

ACP > Styles & Templates > Style Manager > Double arrows on the right of the style you want to edit (Expand Templates) > Navigation / Breadcrumb Templates > navbar

Here, look for the following code:

<vb:if condition="$show['member']">
            <li  class="selected"><a class="navtab"  href="search.php?{vb:raw  session.sessionurl}do=getnew&amp;contenttype=vBForum_Post"  accesskey="2">{vb:rawphrase getnew_tab}</a>

Replace this with:

<vb:if condition="$show['member']">
            <li  class="selected"><a class="navtab"  href="search.php?{vb:raw  session.sessionurl}do=getnew&amp;contenttype=vBForum_Post"  accesskey="2">[COLOR=Red]<img src="path_of_image"  border="0" align="top"[/COLOR][COLOR=Red] alt=""[/COLOR][COLOR=Red] />[/COLOR] {vb:rawphrase getnew_tab}</a>

Now find:

<vb:else />
            <li  class="selected"><a class="navtab"  href="search.php?{vb:raw  session.sessionurl}do=getdaily&amp;contenttype=vBForum_Post"  accesskey="2">{vb:rawphrase getnew_tab}</a>

Replace with:

<vb:else />
            <li  class="selected"><a class="navtab"  href="search.php?{vb:raw  session.sessionurl}do=getdaily&amp;contenttype=vBForum_Post"  accesskey="2">[COLOR=Red]<img src="path_of_image"  border="0" align="top"[/COLOR][COLOR=Red] alt=""[/COLOR][COLOR=Red] />[/COLOR] {vb:rawphrase  getnew_tab}</a>

Find:

<vb:elseif condition="$show['member']" />
            <li><a class="navtab" href="search.php?{vb:raw  session.sessionurl}do=getnew&amp;contenttype=vBForum_Post"  accesskey="2">{vb:rawphrase  getnew_tab}</a></li>

Replace with:

<vb:elseif condition="$show['member']" />
            <li><a class="navtab" href="search.php?{vb:raw  session.sessionurl}do=getnew&amp;contenttype=vBForum_Post"  accesskey="2">[COLOR=Red]<img src="path_of_image"  border="0" align="top"[/COLOR][COLOR=Red] alt=""[/COLOR][COLOR=Red] />[/COLOR] {vb:rawphrase  getnew_tab}</a></li>

Finally find:

<vb:else />
            <li><a class="navtab" href="search.php?{vb:raw  session.sessionurl}do=getdaily&amp;contenttype=vBForum_Post"  accesskey="2">{vb:rawphrase  getnew_tab}</a></li>

Replace with:

<vb:else />
            <li><a class="navtab" href="search.php?{vb:raw  session.sessionurl}do=getdaily&amp;contenttype=vBForum_Post"  accesskey="2">[COLOR=Red]<img src="path_of_image"  border="0" align="top"[/COLOR][COLOR=Red] alt=""[/COLOR][COLOR=Red] /> [/COLOR]{vb:rawphrase  getnew_tab}</a></li>

Remember to press "Save" after making these changes to the template.