TYPO3 Understanding BE Layout + Template - typo3

Question

I am new to TYPO3 and tried out a little bit so far. Now I am stucked or lets say unsure if it's the right way how I would do it.
First I created a simple HTML file and put some CSS to it. When this simple site was finished, I tried a transition to TYPO3 and created some templates + typoscript code. Now I want to work on the content, so I can create this with the integrated editor in TYPO3 and remove it from my templates.
My site would look like this:
Header
News Row (4 Columns)
Another Content Row (3 Columns)
Another Content Row (3 Columns)
Footer
Header and Footer are in partials and don't get any content from the editor. For the news section I would use a plugin. The other content rows have to be filled with content from the TYPO3 editor so my first thoughts are that my backend layout must look like this:
News Row (do I need 4 columns here or just one and let the plugin work?)
left1 center1 right1
left2 center2 right2
Would the backend layout look like this? And for the implementation with typoscript do I have to write all columns in variables e.g. center < styles.content.get... and create all elements in the columns there or can I outsource every variable in one file for example?
Hope you guys understand my problem and can give me some good hints!

Answer 1

About the news row, use just one column and then modify the EXT:news templates to arrange the list of news on four columns;
About the other two rows, you have several options, I think
1) each "cell" is defined in your backend layout, and then yes, you would need a separate colPos for each, something like (in TypoScript):
center < styles.content.get
left < styles.content.get
left.select.where = colPos = 1
2) Same as 1) but you can use the interesting approach used by Benjamin Kott on his sitepackagebuilder . To make it short, he defines a "dynamicContent" TypoScript object that can accept as parameters the colPos and even the id of a specific page. You just write in yout Fluid Template:
<f:cObject typoscriptObjectPath="lib.dynamicContent" data="{colPos: '0'}" />
And so forth for the others. If you want to discover more, visit https://www.sitepackagebuilder.com/ and create a package (that you could use as a base for your development or just "pillage" it ;) ) You will also find several videos on this topic on the Youtube TYPO3 official channel
3) same as 1) but using the EXT:vhs that adds a specific viewhelper to render the content of a colPos:
<v:content.render column="0" />
4) Last but not the least you can use EXT:gridelements to build content element that can have other content elements as children with a "backend_layout" approach. In this approach you just need one "cell" in your backend layout, and in this cell you will put a "gridelement" CE that is sub-divided into three separate columns and in each one you can put one or more content elements (same for the third row). This approach will give you the maximum flexibility
I hope I made myself clear, if I misunderstood your question, don't hesitate to write :)