Help with Announcement Block with CCK and Views

Using Drupal 5, I am creating a site that requires a block on the sidebar that contains a list of latest announcements with short summaries. Each item in the list then links to the Announcement Node where the site visitor can read the full text.

I was able to create this functionality by creating a block with just the basic “teaser list” settings but was not quiet satisfied with the results. The output just needed some additional refinement and also would like to have a little mere flexibility with regards to the content. Styling the output with CSS is not an issue as I am well versed in this area. I need some help with the content data.

So here is the challenge, I would like to have a new content type as follows:

Content type: Announcements with the following fields
• Content default field 1: Title
• Content default field 1: Body
• CCK Content Field 1: Attention Grabber
• CCK Content Field 1: Summary

For node/page view I would like to output the following in full view:
• Title
• Body
But omit the “Attention Grabber” and “Summary” content.

For the Block which simply appears on every page, I would like to output the following for each item in the list:
• “Attention Grabber” as a link to the node.
• “Summary”
• A read more link to the node.
But omit the title and the body.
Finally the block should also contain a “View All” link pointing to the announcements teaser page containing all the announcements in teaser form.

The reason I am structuring the content this way is to attain greater flexibility how the announcements are displayed in the sidebar. Since space is limited in the sidebar, I wanted to be able to specify the attention grabber and not use the actual title as this may be too long for the space available in the block. Also since the teaser view simply grabs the first x number of characters from the body, I wanted to be able to specify a new summary with my Summary CCK field. This way I would be able to control the summary detail to entice the reader to click on the link.

Another challenge I am facing is the fact that the “Attention Grabber” must be a link to the node. This must be done automatically since the people editing the site are not tech savvy nor they are web programmers. They must be able to enter a new announcement, fill in the form fields and press the publish button.

As you can see the functionality is almost the same as what is provided by the default view settings. I just want to replace some of the content with my own and provide the same functionality.

Any Ideas how to achieve my end goal? I would appreciate your comments.

I have tried and tested the following without success:

• I tried using two different views, one for the block and another for the page but was not able to tie them together.

• I was not able to create a CCK link to node for the Attention Grabber

• I was only able to show all the fields on both page and block views but could not omit some from the page view and omit others from the block view independently of each other.

• I have not been able to find a solution to control the teaser length for the block other than the global settings provided by Drupal.

I appreciate all your help.

Thanks,

Sandro