Best Practices for Building Sites in dotCMS

Best Practices for Building Sites in dotCMS @fienen - google.com/profiles/fienen Presenters: Michael Fienen – Pittsburg State University, nuCloud LLC, .eduGuru Maria Bouza – dotCMS

What we're looking at...
Container Must-haves
Template vs. Containers
Using VTL Files, when and where
Widgets
URLMap for Detail Pages
Custom Forward Pages
Valid HTML and 508 Compliance

Functional Template Include
Inserted at the top of templates to include data and information
Loads before <html> tag
No visual elements included
Good for:
Global Variables
Macro testing
Timestamps for CSS/JS cachebusters

Example Include Container:

Meta Container
Page Title, Friendly Name and Title for Page details
HTML Page Meta tags: $!HTMLPAGE_META
Good for meta keywords, descriptions, or other things you need in the <head> per page
Include all common CSS Files
Include all common JS files
Lives inside the <head>...</head> tags

Example Meta Container:

Statistics Container
Create one container that holds your Statistics code, such as Google Analytics
Container will normally be included at the end of all templates
If multiple hosts, use Host Property to hold Account ID

Example Analytics Container:

dotCMS uses Yahoo Grids (a CSS framework) to create HTML used in templates: http://developer.yahoo.com/yui/grids/
Try to create small number of templates
Templates should be created only for different layouts, the functionality should all be handled through widgets

All reusable sections of the HTML should be created as Containers (max contents 0)
All sections of the site that are editable should be created as Containers (max contents > 0)
Doctype should be added to template
Head section (<head>) should be created in the template to allow to have specific JS and CSS files on each template

Looking at Containers

Using VTL files, when and where
Limit use of VTL files only to Simple Widgets
Should not be used as “widgets” parsed from containers, content or templates
Should be saved to a central location on the site (/application/velocity)
Limit to “application” like functionality
Good as building blocks of complex widgets
Used for source code in some macros
Don’t abuse them!

Widgets
Simple Widgets:
Use them for dynamic code that does’t need parameters
Good for generic, dynamic tools (listings, detail page bodies, etc...)
Structured Widgets (Widgets that receive parameters)
When the widget needs to be reused on different sections of the site
When we need to send parameters to the widget
As a front end for macro setup

Structured Widget for Macro

URLMaps for Detail Pages
Create URLMaps for structures (1.9)
Better for SEO purposes (human-readable): http://yoursite.com/news/some-unique-field
Easier to print and share
Make sure your structure has at least one unique field to tie to.
Example: http://1.9.demo.dotcms.org/news/dotcms-launches-1.9

Building a URLMap

Set Up Custom Forward Pages
You already do this for your home page when you set up the /cmsHomePage virtual link (Vanity URL in 1.9)
You can also do this with typical error pages with: /cms###Page
Works with 400, 401, 402, 403, and 404

Custom 404 Page Example

Valid HTML and 508 Compliance
Garbage in – garbage out. Validate templates before loading them in.
HTML Validation http ://validator.w3.org/
508 Compliance http ://www.contentquality.com/
TinyMCE won't do your job for you (even if it wants to try)
Microsoft Word hates the internet

Thanks Boys and Girls! Questions? Hunt me down: http://google.com/profiles/fienen dotCMS Cheatsheet: http://tinyurl.com/dotcmscheatsheet

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Best Practices for Building Sites in dotCMS

by Michael Fienen

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