Telerik Sitefinity 4.0 – Content Management revisited

Telerik Sitefinity 4.0 –
Content Management
revisited
Tervel Peykov
ex-Telerik ASP.NET Team Leader
5/25/2010


Who am I?
• Tervel Peykov
– with Telerik since 2002, until Feb
2010
– Headed the team responsible for
13 of the RadControls for ASP.NET
AJAX suite
– Last months focused on working
with Sitefinity team


About Telerik
• Leading vendor of MS Web technology


About Telerik (cont’d)
• ... as well as a state-of-the-art Content
Management system –


About Sitefinity
•

Current version 3.7

•

Version 4.0 - a CMS for the new decade

– Development started in 2008
– Uses latest technology from Microsoft such
as
• Web services (WFS)
• Workflow
– As well as award-winning Telerik’s suite
RadControls for ASP.NET AJAX


NEW
• CMS – Sitefinity –
– Use RadControls? Like it?
– Need CMS? Sitefinity is for you!

• Why now? What is special about this 4.0, and
about this time (summer 2010)
– CMS similar to controls, but dev cycle is much
longer – 2-3 years
– SF 3.x – built on 2004 technology
– SF 4.x – still in dev, started in 2008, built on
2010 technology. How come? (Asp.NET 4.0
etc). Will be as main platform till 2015 or so (at
least)

CMS
•

So, what is it that devs want from a CMS

–
–
–
–
•

Page creation
Localization
Clean semantic markup
.. ..

and how does Sitefinity deliver?


NEW
•

OK, let’s see how SF 3.x and 4.x compare in this areas. Several little demos

– No AJAX – postbacks
– No webservices – most operations tied to
particular UI interface (no silverlight, no
mobile)
– Lack of functionality, does not use

RadControls and their super cool features
enough!
– Some things can CLEARLY be made better
for the developer, and/or the end user. SF
4.0 steps in!


Sitefinity 4.0
•

SF 4.0

– Built from scratch, however
• by the same team with years of experience
• Using RadControls extensively – reliable set of
tools, focus on architecture itself!
• Use MS provided packages to replace customdeveloped ones.
– Goal: deliver a platform that is UP TO IT
(todo:clarify)
– To “deliver more than expected”.


Page Builder
•

PageBuilder – ok, it is the first demo, cause I wrote it, and the whole idea and concept is mine ;)

•

Compare to 3.x

– No AJAX - slow
– Toolbox in 3.x not flexible (show new one)
– No layots, no way to change a layout from
UI


SharePoint vs Sitefinity - SP2010


Free CMS-es vs Sitefinity
•

Somewhat chaotic development

– No clear roadmap
– Modules written by various developers use
different approaches, no common
organizing principles
– Community support – often means no
support
– CMS performance degrades easily by addons written badly


Page Builder - DEMO
•

TODO: Screenshot

Built-in modules in Sitefinity 4.0
•

All use the Content concept.

•

Currently: News, Images, Blogs

•

Soon – Forum and more…

•

All based on concept of Content – essential concept for understanding Sitefinity


Content
• Form builder – missing from CTP, coming for official
release
– Exposed UI to visualize CONTENT
– Similar to the page builder - allow you to visually
define presentation of Content items.

• Which leads us to.. Content. What is it?
–
–
–
–

–

A collection of named fields
Permissions
Workflow
Versioning
Taxonomy support (organize in hierarchy or other
organization)
– Multilingual support


Taxonomies
• Simple idea, complex implementation
– Good for developer – all complexity handled
by Telerik
– Taxonomies allow for flexible structuring
and organizing of large quantities of data
– Allow multiple ways of structuring the
same data (can simulate Views)
– Allow for access, sorting and searching
combining multiple criteria.
– TODO: EXAMPLE with Categories & News


Sitefinity Taxonomies at Work
•

UI for managing Categories

•

UI for managing Tags

•

Any Content supports Tags and Categories

•

All modules in Sitefinity build using Content


Taxonomies - Demo
•

Content – News – Create New…

– Categories


Web Services
•

Communication between client and server based on Windows Communication Foundation

•

RESTFul web services (run directly on HTTP, no SOAP)

•

WCF –first introduced in .NET 3.0 framework


Permissions
•

How is it different from SF 3.x?

– In 3.x permissions apply to Page or Module
• Basically, define whether a user has the right to
access it or not
– IN 4.x Permissions are on the Content and
Control level. Allow total control
– Demo – Permissions 1-3. – On the control
level. Example – if you are authenticated,
and if not – you might see different home
page.


Permissions – Content Level
•

Demo using News module


Permissions – Widget (control) Level


Workflow

• In 3.x – custom implementation
– If turned on (through Web.config) – always go
through 5 steps to publish a page, no shortcut!
• Save(page), Send for approval, Approve – Decline or Publish

– TODO: Quick Demo + SCRNSHOT–
demo.sitefinity.com

• In Sitefinity 4.0 Based on Microsoft Workflow
Foundation
– MWF in ASP.NET 4.0
– MS first introduced workflow in ASP.NET 3.5 and
then it was totally rewritten and redesigned. New
API, different from orignal version in 3.5.


Workflow in SiteFinity 4.0 (cont’d)
•

New workflow module written in Silverlight

– Not in the CTP – currently under
development
– Dragdrop from toolbox
– Zoom and thumbnail view
– Conditions
– Clickable nodes with properties
•

Etc, etc..

Configuration
•

In 3.x – all configuration in Web.config

– Not flexible enough
•

In 4.0 – Configuration UI

– As well as (multiple) configuration policies
support
– TODO: Screenshot