WIX's Confusing Dynamic Pages

TLDR:

If you are trying to connect from one gallery to another gallery....

• Duplicate a non-dynamic page gallery and test that out. It helps to understand the waters first.

• Create two databases: One that will function as your gallery "Front", and another with at least one sample of what each gallery will have for page previews. For each database, have at least Title, Date of Creation (of the piece), Description and maybe an order number, in case you want to organize them differently later on.

• Create two separate Dynamic Pages, or turn the non-dynamic to one, add the elements you want, design, etc.

• Datasets are not the Databases! Also referred to as Content Management System (CMS), Databases are the sheets of information while Datasets is a tool that helps you organize your galleries based on that information.

• Create 3 Separate Datasets: On the Dynamic Page for the "Front", create one dataset using the "Front" database and connect the gallery element to it. Decide what you want to show on the gallery connection settings and organize as you wish through the dataset settings. On the second Dynamic Page, create a new dataset, connect to the database with your samples, and a separate new one for your page elements. Connect the title of the page with the Title property, descriptions to the Description property, etc.

• All pages need to be Dynamic to redirect to each other! I'm still keeping my original "Front" gallery non-dynamic, so I can't use the Slug /artwork for my Dynamic galleries and made them with the /art Slug. However, I found that I can still connect Dynamic Pages. For example, when you create a Dynamic Page, that page already has a link set as mysite.com/slug/{Title}. So the Dynamic Page you have for landing (the "Front") you delete the {Title} Property in the page settings while keeping that same property for the second Dynamic Page.

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With the CMS making my life so much easier(-ish), I'll finally be able to mass-transfer everything from my deviantArt storage to the website. At least having figured half of this out, I can finally focus on making a submission bot for my Monthly Art Trades server |||orz

Wix can't transfer this site to a Wix Studio type website (for ease of screen size layout adaptability) yet, at least this will make uploading and organizing art and pages so much easier! Some of that content WILL stay behind subscription, as much of it is pretty old stuff and I'm planning on only keeping the most recent work on the public gallery. So if you want to see all of what I have made, even as further back as pre 2010s, Subscribe here to access all of it!

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The longer, agonising version of this mess:

For the longest time now, Wix has integrated a new system called Dynamic Pages and a Content Management System (CMS) to the building side of the platform. I had often avoided using it, as it relied heavily on syncing and re-syncing (CPU maybe?), and it would've been too much additional waiting on top of how already long it took to update any changes to the website.

Don't get me wrong, it's really useful. Especially when you are trying to keep the website layout consistent. Let's say for art galleries and all the pages you want to create that can easily become overwhelming, it's a great time saver! As long as you have all your work on a database..... but who actually does that? As a freelance artist, why would there be a reason to keep track of any and all info about a single fanart piece? Apparently, I do because there has yet to be a platform that can even remotely come up with something that Tumblr has - mass managing posts.

However, the thing that irks me to this day, like with any other online article-solutions database, is the blanket articles this website often provides for any questions. By blanket explanation I mean the article is always written in a way where it isn't beginner friendly, too vague or forcing you to use unwanted or unuseful presets - either using a lot of interchangeable jargon or making it sound like the solution 'is right there! It's so simple!' until you get to the 11th article elsewhere to see you need to pay for a higher subscription for the tool you thought was free. Even closed/locked forum questions often don't get answered without a cited blanket article along an air of 'it's right there! It's so simple!'

So when it came to figuring out connecting galleries to galleries to individual piece pages - as in a set of gallery option to go to art but also have one or two leading to another separation of gallery options - there was no direct, concrete answer anywhere. I had to keep messing around with the datasets and URL properties to even get an idea how any of it worked and connected. Only the past few weeks and about 20 hours of messing around was I able to figure out that last bullet point of the TLDR, because no article was explaining or making obvious exactly that.

The only other complaint I have about these that I have yet to resolve is to be able to add date information of any other info just like with the title and description on the 'click to popup image'. The lack of customizability is what made me default to just keeping my old gallery for years. However, now that I've figured that out, I can decidedly start transferring all the info in my galleries into the database and start making the subscriber-only galleries with better understanding - and for Wix to stop pestering me about having too many pages, after so many years.