How to store data that relates to a channel?

Question

I have a site with a large number of blog channels (literal blogs in this case).

Each channel has a number of pieces of information I need to associate with it - a summary of the channel, an image that displays as a header, a feedburner link, and a couple other text fields.

Currently, I'm storing that information in a matrix in a low variable, and tying it to the channel manually with a text field containing the shortname of the channel.

The problem is that when I use this matrix a lot (for example on a page that outputs entries from every one of my channels) this matrix ends up being hugely inefficient and boosts my memory usage significantly.

So my question is this - how would you store this type of information that relates to a channel as a whole, not an entry?

Answer 1

I would create separate channel for channel metadata and store all data related to blogs as entries in that channel. That will give you a lot of flexibility (as usually with channels).

To associate entries with actual blogs you will need a custom field that will store blog channel name or ID. That can be text field - in that case, you will need to enter name/ID manually. Or, if you're familiar with add-on development, you can create dropdown select fieldtype that would present list of channels (you can develop it using similar existing fieldtype as a base, like this)