Overall, SWMenu is a good tool. There are quite a few parameters to set up but once you do, the menu looks good.

The one failing (and also with extended menu) is that it only gives an option for Blog or table listings of all articles under a category in the Category description page. I may be thinking of this wrong as I am a Joomla newbie but I want a simple extended menu to display SECTION headings (and when the user clicks on that they see just the text in the SECTION DESCRIPTION) and similary for the CATEGORY's.
So instead of being able to click on a category sub menu item and seeing just a summary text, I get the summary text and either a Blog or Table entry of all the articles!!
It would be very nice if this feature was provided.
I tried using the SWmenufree forum and have had no reply.
Still a good menu despite it's limitations.

very usefull component, did help me at many pages to realize customers desires. Easy to use at all. Would be great when once there where no page reload at admin when apply settings and no overwrite to my modified css when using admin settings. Thank you.

Very easy to use and very complete. With SWmenuFree you can create the exact menu you dream. Everything is not automatic and you have to work to reach your ideal menu but you can change easily everything you want: font, boarder, pading, effect, ...

So easy to use right out of the box. This component has a wysiwig system for styling your menu as well so if you don't want to figure out the css to style your menu this menu is for you.

I have been using this extension for quite some while now, and I find that it is absolutely superb.

The instructions in the component itself are very clear, and it is very easy to create a menu that looks like what you want it to look like. Kind of like what you click and type is what you get, WYCATIWYG... very nice.

This menu extension lacks very little, and I am sure Pro would provide whatever you are missing.

It's a very nice extension, makes the menu making a real fun. The best in its class. The submenus are working very well, all the options are clearly described.

I'm upgrading a site from Joomla! 1.0 to 1.5. this is my first upgrade, and someone else built the original site using D4J TransMenu v1.3 - D4J only works in legacy mode which i don't want to enable, so i was prepared to compromise on having an identical menu system. but it only took me half an hour to match the old menu exactly. thanks!

I have been searching high and low for a drop-down menu.

The installation was so easy, just install the zip file with extensions/install and that is it, installation done.

I have downloaded the manual for version 4 as well. It is still a great help.

Thanks for the great extension.

I will definitely recomended it to other users as well.

I normally don't bother to rate these things, but I had to say something about this one. I downloaded SWmenuFree and I had the menu up and running within 15 minutes. DONE.

I monkeyed around with a bunch of other menu extensions, none of which were simple, and still required too much mickey-mousing around with code to fix for IE6, etc. I wasted 3 days with those things.

This extension was fully customizable from it's component backend. It worked with every browser I tested it on immediately. Awesome! And it's FREE!

Luckily, my client only needed a couple of drop downs for this site, but if I ever need a lot, I know I can always pony up for the Pro version. To me, it's worth money to save time...which IS money...

Anyway, thanks, Sean!

I was looking for a drop down menu system and tried a few others which were way too complicated as they required messing around with code.

Setting this up and using it was not an easy task partly due to the fact that I did not use the instructions and when I finally got around to it, it did not tell me any thing new except to CHMOD some directories to 777; which I do not like for security reasons.

Based on my experience using it, I would like to leave some tips.

1) In order for the drop down to work, you need to have a menu (could be mainmenu) with main menu items and each menu item having sub menus items under it. This can be created in menu manager.

2) Before installing SW Menu Free, make sure you CHMOD the following directories to 777 or the installation will fail.

a) modules
b) components
c) administrator/components

After installing, go to components and select SW Menu Free.

Menu source should be your main menu.

Play around.

Remember to CHMOD the 777 directories back to original after playing.

It is a great component, but most of all I'd like to say great support! Sean is taking a lot of his time to help people get it right since the menu needs a little CSS adjustments on most sites. He really goes the extra mile. Excellent!

Good interface. Excellent forum. Reliable. Took a little time to sort out some of the finer tweakings like having borders only on one side etc. But this is a great module that I will definitely use again and I would be happy to buy a license for the additional features when needed.

Thanks for this Sean

One mistake I made was over-zealously clicking the 'save' button, though; for some reason it created another SWmenu module, which of course conflicted and gave me fatal PHP errors. Easy enough to fix, just had to turn one off in the Module Manager, but thought I should mention it anyway in case anyone else does the same by mistake!

Thanks again though

Not only the extension - which is very elaborate and customizable- is great, but also the immediate help I got when I posted a problem on his forum.

thanks, great work!

This is an amazing extension. Incredibly flexible, works cross-browser, and has a superb backend management interface.

That's the menu component then.

The most amazing thing is Sean's devotion. Check out the forum and you'll see what I mean. Send him some cash, or buy the "pro" version, and tell your mates about his stuff too.

(Am not affiliated with the owner in anyway)

I can't speak well enough about this component. It's been a huge time saver for me. Perhaps what I like best is how professional the developer has been in the design of the interface, functionality and documentation. It's components like this that lead to me use Joomla. A Big Thank You to Sean White.

Go to his homepage and grab the version FOR J1.5. Otherwise you're GOING to have errors. This is a great system; i use it in MOST of my sites! Great work Sean!

Got two "Undefined Variable" error messages as soon as I tried to create a new menu. Ignored them, created the menu anyway, those errors then showed up on my front page as well. Both errors were in the SWmenuFree files.

My guess would be that SWmenuFree depends on the some other aspect of Joomla to define variables that it uses. If they're not defined, SWmenyFree bombs out.

After all the struggle, SWmenuFree was a blow of simplicity and efectiveness.

Thank you.

Support emailed me within minutes when I contacted them for help and went out of their way to provide me with support. I've installed the pro version. Being a newbie, I had to work out about Joomla sections and categories first but now I've sussed the system, I'm delighted with the result and with the simplicity and effectiveness of the user interface.