I am busy trying to customize Joomla's Menu Parameters so that in the administrator area when you create a new menu item, You have an additional option of "1 Column" or "2 Column", And this has to be both accessible by the index file of the template and also Joomla! Update Friendly..
And this is basically just to give the user the freedom of selecting the layout style of a particular page.
What Would be the Best way to go about this?
Any Help Greatly Appreciated.
UPDATE
what i am trying to achieve is similar to when you select a category for a menu item in Joomla!, I want to append it to the url exactly like a category, so you select 1 of 2 columns when creating a menu item and then in the url it should say: &col=1 or &col=2.
Joomla already has a built in parameter for selecting the layout used for a menu item which is the concept of an alternative menu layout. You add the layout to your template html folder with the appropriate xml file. Then that layout will show up in the list of menu options when you select a menu type.
I have two simple solutions without core haking and that are update friendly.
SOLUTION 1 :
Make 2 different templates with the 2 different layouts call them 1 column and 2 columns. When you make your menu link you can choose between them (Template style dropdown).
SOLUTION 2 : (the one I would recomend)
In your css file make your 2 different layouts based on 2 different css Classes. For example class="1_column" and class="2_columns".
When you make your menu link , under "page display options" you can choose a class for the page it links to. And there you are you can choose between your two layouts.
Hope this helps!