Using Views To Create A Block

Blocks and Views

At it's core a view has two main components: 1) a query to the database that returns items specified by the user; 2) instructions on how to display the results of the query. The most common choices to display the view are probably: a) on a page; b) in a block; and c) via an RSS feed.

My thought process goes like this. I want a page that displays only cck and views posts. So I add a view that includes a query that will return x number of cck and views nodes. I select a display type of page and provide a system path of /cckandviews. So now I've got a page that I can then link to in the menu items.

At some point later (or maybe right then) I decide that I want to have a block available to put a list of recent cck and views posts. I can do that two ways. I can either add an entirely new view from the admin/build/views screen or I can add a block display to my existing query. I chose to do the latter for organizational purposes. But either way would work.

Once I've created my block I can put it anywhere blocks could normally be placed on my site. It really doesn't matter what process I used to create the block at that point.

So there are options when it comes to creating different elements with the current views interface. I can add a particular view query and then configure multiple displays (page, block, feed, slideshow) on a single screen. Or I can add a new query and display for each page, block, etc. from the admin/build/views screen.