Menus & Subpages

Menus & Subpages

A site’s menu organizes content so visitors can find information efficiently. On ITS Drupal sites, menus are hierarchical trees: editors place pages in navigation, define parent-child relationships, and control the primary menu bar.

Menu management and navigation trees

The main navigation across the top of your department site is structured for clarity on desktop and mobile. Keep these limits in mind when planning your information architecture.

Primary navigation structure

  • Seven top-level items maximum — An eighth root item will not appear in the main bar.

  • Home — Often included by default and counts toward the limit.

  • Disable Home — If your theme sends the logo to the homepage, removing the Home link frees one slot for another top-level item.

Adding a page to the menu

While editing a node, use the right-hand sidebar to add it to the menu.

Step-by-step instructions

  1. Edit the desired page.

  2. Expand Menu settings in the sidebar.

  3. Check Provide a menu link.

  4. Menu link title: Enter the label shown in the navigation (keep it short—one to three words). It does not have to match the page title.

  5. Parent link: Select <Main navigation> for a top-level tab, or an existing page to nest this item as a subpage.

  6. Click Save to update the live navigation.

Nesting relationships and sidebar display

Choose the correct parent to group related content (for example, nest Undergraduate degrees under Academics). The theme displays nested items as:

  • Top level — Primary navigation bar.

  • Dropdowns — Child links under a parent on desktop.

  • Right sidebar — On interior pages, siblings and children of the current section.

The URL alias connection

Menu placement is tied to automatic URL aliases. When a page is in the menu tree, the system often builds a hierarchical alias (for example, /academics/undergraduate-degrees). See URL Aliases & Redirects.

Rearranging menus via the structure overview

Read this entire section before making changes. There is no undo on the menu overview page.

The Weight field on a single page can adjust order, but reordering many items is easier in the menu interface. You can also add duplicate links to existing pages or menu links to external URLs here.

Caution: If you are unsure what changed, exit without saving and reopen the page to start fresh.

Using drag-and-drop handles

  1. Go to Structure > Menus > Main navigation.

  2. Drag items using the handle (↕) to sort or indent right to nest under a parent.

  3. Scroll down and click Save.

Best practices for navigation design

Prioritize mobile usability

Links deep in hover menus are hidden on phones until the visitor opens the mobile menu. Place critical information in the first one or two levels of the tree.

Keep menu link titles succinct

Use short labels such as Admissions, Research, or Contact us instead of long departmental titles so text fits the layout without wrapping.