Item Pages or Articles

Each item in a datastore either has its own page or does not. An item with a URL is a page (see Defining Pages): it has a template, a browser title, and the custom fields that template defines. An item without a URL has only the fields its Datastore defines (see Datastore Fields and Template Fields).

Items with pages
Choose this when each item is a destination: two or more cards that lead to similarly structured detail pages. One listing template renders the family and one detail template renders each item. The Datastore settings involved:
• Create Page For Datastore Items By Default only sets whether the option to give an item its own page starts checked when an editor creates an item. It generates no pages and enforces nothing, and it does not decide whether the Datastore itself can be a page. When it is checked, a Default Page Template for Datastore Items field appears.
• Default Page Template for Datastore Items and Default Root Path For Datastore Items pre-fill the template and the URL an editor would otherwise pick for each new item.
• Enforce Root Path For Datastore Items appears once Default Root Path has a value. When on, the CMS rejects an item whose URL does not start with that path ("URL must start with ..."); when off, the path is only a suggestion. Turn it on when the whole family should live under one root; leave it off when some items need to live elsewhere.
• Folders also carry Default Root Path and Enforce Root Path settings, though not Create Page By Default, and they are used less often. If a folder and its Datastore, Blog, or Calendar both enforce a root path, the CMS has a procedure for resolving the conflict; it matters only in unusually complex setups.
Every item that has a page still needs its own URL, template, and browser title; the settings above only supply starting values in the editor. Items may name their own template, so one family can mix page types.

Items without pages
Choose this for repeated content that is never a destination: FAQs, partner logos, testimonials, videos. Leave Create Page For Datastore Items By Default unchecked and create one item per entry. Pages select the items they show with a datastore item list field instead of storing the text again (see Reusing Content). Because an item without a URL has only the Datastore's fields, all of this datastore's fields must be defined on the Datastore. The datastore itself can still be a page; see Datastore Landing Pages.

An Article instead
An Article can display items that have no pages of their own, alone or mixed with other content, selecting or fetching them. Defining Pages covers when an Article is the better page.