Surfacing External Data Through Magnolia

Surfacing External Data Through Magnolia Sean McMains & Jeff Snider September 10, 2009

3 Approaches: JSP/Servlet Data Module RSS Module

JSP/Servlet Approach or "Teaching an Old Dog New Tricks" Photo Credit: Stephen Poff

Department Directory

Department Directory XML-RPC Methods: getDepartmentList() getResults()

Implementing a Custom Control

<jsp:scriptlet> DialogControlImpl control =

(DialogControlImpl)pageContext.getRequest().getAttribute("dialogObject");

XmlRpcClientLite client = new XmlRpcClientLite("http://apps.its.txstate.edu/people/RPC.mpl"); String method = "getDepartmentList"; Vector params = new Vector(); Vector result = (Vector)client.execute( method, params ); ListIterator i = result.listIterator();

Select selectControl = new Select( control.getName(), control.getWebsiteNode() ); selectControl.setCssClass( CssConstants.CSSCLASS_SELECT );

while (i.hasNext() ) { String department = (String)i.next(); SelectOption option = new SelectOption( department, department ); if ( department.equals( control.getValue() ) ) option.setSelected( true ); selectControl.setOptions( option ); } out.println( selectControl.getHtml() ); </jsp:scriptlet>

Presenting the Directory Info

XmlRpcClientLite client =

new XmlRpcClientLite("http://apps.its.txstate.edu/people/RPC.mpl");

String department =

Resource.getLocalContentNode(request).getNodeData("department").getString();

String filter =

Resource.getLocalContentNode(request).getNodeData("filter").getString();

String method = "getResults";

Vector params = new Vector();

String searchTerm = "department="" + department + """;

params.addElement(searchTerm);

Vector result = (Vector)client.execute( method, params );

ListIterator i = result.listIterator();

while ( i.hasNext() ) {

Hashtable person = (Hashtable)i.next();

...

String firstName = (String)person.get("firstname");

String lastName = (String)person.get("lastname"); html.append( "<div class="txst-departmentdirectory-name fn n">

<span class="given-name">" + firstName + "</span> <span class="family-name">" +

lastName + "</span> </div>" );

...

}

JSP/Servlet Approach

Pros:

Quick & easy

No additional modules needed, aside from whatever you use to actually fetch the data

Uses familiar techniques

Cons:

Page caching issues

Performance

At mercy of connection to data source

You have to write it all yourself!

The Data Module or "How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the JCR" Photo Credit: Kjunstorm

The Data Module

Info:

Data Module Docs

Footers Example

Advanced Data Module Example (?)

Requirements:

Magnolia 4.x

Scheduler Module

A Bit of Patience

Creating a New Data Type Demonstration

Import Handlers

Built on scheduler module

Provide an automated means to suck in new data

At /modules/data/config/importers

Using Import Handlers

Configuring an Import Handler

ImportTarget Code public class ImportTarget { protected String name; protected String targetPath; public void setName(String name) { this.name = name; } public void setTargetPath(String targetPath) { this.targetPath = targetPath; } public ImportTarget() { } public String getTargetPath() { return targetPath; } public String getName() { return name; } }

ImportHandler Sample

public class DateTimeImportHandler extends ImportHandler { ... protected Set doImport(ImportTarget target, Content parent, Set uuids) throws ImportException {

... String date = dateFormat.format( new Date() ); String name = "ImportedSampleData" + parent.getChildren("example").size();

// create new data node. // FYI: if the name matches existing node and "deleteExisting" is // set to true, old copy of the node will be automatically deleted. Content child = parent.createContent( name, "example" );

// set properties for newly created node NodeDataUtil.getOrCreate( child, "name").setValue(name); NodeDataUtil.getOrCreate(child, "comment").setValue("Example of data import.

Generated on " + date); NodeDataUtil.getOrCreate(child, "data").setValue(date);

parent.save();

uuids.add(child.getUUID());

... return uuids; } }

JCR Query

XPath or SQL-style

Powerful selection capabilities

Can be complicated

Additional Info:

JSR-170 Spec

Using the Node Object

<jsp:scriptlet>

final String BR = "<br/>"; HierarchyManager dataHierarchyManager =

MgnlContext.getHierarchyManager( "data" ); Content eventsNode = dataHierarchyManager.getContent( "/event" ); Iterator eventsNodeIterator = eventsNode.getChildren( "event" ).iterator(); while ( eventsNodeIterator.hasNext() ) { Content event = (Content)eventsNodeIterator.next(); out.write( event.getNodeData( "name" ).getString() + BR ); out.write( event.getNodeData( "date" ).getString() + BR + BR ); } </jsp:scriptlet>

Caveat: Bootstrapping Data