ModelAdmin is a tool in SilverStripe that allows managing any kind of data through a CRUD interface similar to the CMS interface. It provides search, results, and detail views for data. ModelAdmin treats all models equally and provides a consistent interface for editing data and related records. The document demonstrates how to set up ModelAdmin to manage Customer, HostingContract, and HostingType models for a CRM application.

1. ModelAdmin
SilverStripe’s great new tool for building CRMs
(and other things)
Monday, March 2, 2009

2. We develop a CMS
Monday, March 2, 2009

3. We do other stu
too!
• Most of our sites include a CMS
• But also: CRM, event management,
e-commerce, internal business
systems
• The CMS paradigm doesn’t fit all of
these
Monday, March 2, 2009

4. Let’s build a CRM!
• We’ve made CRMs for SilverStripe
... several, in fact
• Each time we had a “CRM”
customer, it seemed that they
wanted something dierent
Monday, March 2, 2009

5. Flexible Data, Fixed
UI
• Clients are very specific about data
and business logic
• But not about user interface - as
long as it’s good, they’re happy
• SilverStripe CMS exploits this by
making it easy to create new Page
Types with custom fields
Monday, March 2, 2009

6. From CMS to DMS
• Can we apply this concept to CRM?
• Don’t just manage Content
• Manage any kind of Data
Monday, March 2, 2009

7. ModelAdmin
• Data Management built into
SilverStripe
• ModelAdmin gives you a CRUD
interface around any data: Search,
Results, Detail
• Same building blocks as CMS
interface
Monday, March 2, 2009

8. ModelAdmin
• Search on fields linked by relations
• Detail record gives you a scaolded
interface for editing all relations
Monday, March 2, 2009

9. Monday, March 2, 2009

10. Monday, March 2, 2009

11. Monday, March 2, 2009

12. Code Demo
Monday, March 2, 2009

13. Random example: A small webhosting company
with products, customers and contracts
* Web2.0ified by http://
creatr.cc
Monday, March 2, 2009

14. Our Datamodel
HostingContrac
Customer HostingType
t
has_many has_one
Monday, March 2, 2009

15. HostingType
?php
class HostingType extends DataObject {
static $db = array(
'Title' = 'Text',
'Description' = 'Text',
'Price' = 'Float',
);
static $has_many = array(
'HostingContracts' = 'HostingContract',
);
}
?
mysite/code/HostingType.php
Monday, March 2, 2009

16. HostingType
Monday, March 2, 2009

17. HostingContract
?php
class HostingContract extends DataObject {
static $db = array(
'ContractNumber' = 'Varchar',
'StartDate' = 'Date',
'EndDate' = 'Date'
);
static $has_one = array(
'Customer' = 'Customer',
'HostingType' = 'HostingType',
);
}
?
mysite/code/HostingContract.php
Monday, March 2, 2009

18. HostingContract
Monday, March 2, 2009

19. Customer
?php
class Customer extends Member {
static $db = array(
'CustomerType' = quot;Enum('Private,Business','Private')quot;
);
static $has_one = array(
'Avatar' = 'Image',
);
static $has_many = array(
'HostingContracts' = 'HostingContract'
);
}
?
mysite/code/Customer.php
Monday, March 2, 2009

20. Monday, March 2, 2009

21. MyCRMAdmin
?php
class MyCRMAdmin extends ModelAdmin {
protected static $managed_models = array(
'Customer',
'HostingContract',
'HostingType'
);
static $url_segment = 'mycrm'; // will be linked as /admin/mycrm
static $menu_title = 'My CRM';
}
?
mysite/code/MyCRMAdmin.php
Monday, March 2, 2009

22. Some tweaking...
Monday, March 2, 2009

23. Summary Fields
?php
class Customer extends Member {
// ...
static $summary_fields = array(
'FirstName',
'Surname',
'CustomerType'
);
}
?
Monday, March 2, 2009

24. Searchable Fields
?php
class Customer extends Member {
// ...
static $searchable_fields = array(
'FirstName',
'Surname',
'HostingContracts.ContractNumber'
);
}
?
Monday, March 2, 2009

25. getCMSFields()
?php
class Customer extends Member {
// ...
function getCMSFields() {
$fields = parent::getCMSFields();
$fields-removeByName('Locale');
return $fields;
}
}
?
Monday, March 2, 2009

26. Using Data on
Monday, March 2, 2009

27. SilverStripe 2.4 and
beyond
• New data mapper
• Thinner, reusable
controllers
• “Intelligent data”
Monday, March 2, 2009

28. Thank you
Download this talk at:
http://www.slideshare.net/chillu/modeladmin-in-silverstripe-23
Code (requires SilverStripe 2.3+)
http://silverstripe.org/assets/presentations/2009-02-28-
modeladminpresentationmysite.zip
Ingo Schommer, SilverStripe Ltd., ingo@silverstripe.com
License: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/nz/
Monday, March 2, 2009