Website Content Management

Website Content Management Michael Tucker DBA / Webmaster Forsyth County Public Library

Where to Begin • Many Open Source Options such as Joomla • Retail Options Are Also Available • Build Your Own!

DATABASE-DRIVEN Staff members type information ONCE. Information displays MULTIPLE places.

What We Use Content Management Tools (CMT’s) For • Programs • Publications (Bookmarks and Brochures) • Jobs • General News • Construction News • Service Outages • Menu / Links Pages • Online Resources • Featured Items • Teen Events • Fun Stuff (children’s crosswords, etc.)

The Tools FCPL Used To Get There • IIS on Windows Server • Access Databases • ASP • Microsoft Expression Web • Vbscript

Pros of Using Access Databases • Anyone with Access can edit the databases without SQL knowledge. • Cheap (check SRS, formerly MSD)! No new licenses or servers required.

ASP • Plays nice with Windows Servers / IIS. • Code can be generated from web design software.

Microsoft Expression Web • Standards based. • Allows for asp master pages to control look of website throughout. • Excellent ASP tools for database connections and displaying data.

Different Ideas For Content Management • Edit the database directly. • Use Microsoft Expression Web to create an asp page that edits your database. • Create your own system.

Editing Access Database Directly Tip: Make a copy of the database and edit the copy. Otherwise the lock will stop your WebPages from displaying correctly.

Asp Page Option • Create a new aspx page on your site. • Create a new datasource pointing to the database you want to control.

Asp Page Option • Configure the Datasource to select the primary key for the table and if needed a column that you could select from a drop down menu that would be unique to each entry.

Asp Page Option • Add a drop down list to your page and configure it to point to your datasource. Select a display and data field. The datafield should be assigned to the tables primary key.

Asp Page Option • Add an ASP button to the page.

ASP Page Option • Add a second datasource to the page making sure to select all of the columns or *

ASP Page Option • Click on the “Where” button and make your query use the value of the drop down list.

Asp Page Option • Click on the “Advanced” button and have it create insert, update, and delete statements.

ASP Page Option • Insert a Form View to your page and assign the second datasource to it.

ASP Page Option • Adjust permissions on your webserver to allow modify access in the directory where your access database file resides. • Highly recommend then putting some form of authentication on the new webpage you have created. In IIS you can use Windows Authentication, or I have also done this through ASP by hiding visibility of the dropdown and button until a username and password is entered.

ASP Page Option

Create Your Own Option At FCPL, we designed our system so that everyone who is approved to contribute to our website is given Remote Desktop rights to a system we call our Portal machine. This is the only system that has access into the DMZ in which our webserver lives. Once on this machine, the login used determines which Content Management Tools (CMTs) can be accessed. The CMTs are .hta files (written in vbscript) which allow staff to edit the approved databases.

Create Your Own Option Warning the follow slides will contain some code. Also this is just one of many ways to go about the creation of such a tool. For those wanting to get this custom with your solution, I hope this will provide a great start and give you a few ideas.

Create Your Own Option Main Screen for our Programs CMT

Create Your Own Option The Edit and add new screen

Create Your Own Option The Category Link screen

Create Your Own Option The HTML Section of the hta file <head> <title>Online programs</title> <HTA:APPLICATION APPLICATIONNAME="Admin online Programs" SCROLL="yes" SINGLEINSTANCE="yes" WINDOWSTATE="maximize" > </head> <body bgcolor="gray"> <center> <H1>Programs Content Management Tool</h1><br><br> <a href=“LINKTOSHAREONWEBSERVER">Put programs here!</a> <br><br> </table> <span id = "DataArea"></span> <br><br> Check your Work: <a target="_blank" href="http://www.forsythpl.org/aboutFCPL/programsAndServices.aspx">http://www.forsythpl.org/aboutFCPL/programsAndServices.aspx</a> </center> </body>

Create Your Own Option DataArea.InnerHTML = Is used in the vbscript to update the div DataArea in the HTML html = "<table><tr><td>" programDropDown html = html &programString &"</td></tr>" html = html &"<tr><td><input type=""button"" value=""Edit program"" name=""editprogram"" onClick=""fillprogram""></td></tr>" html = html &"<tr><td><input type=""button"" value=""Add New program"" name=""addNewprogram"" onClick=""emptyForm""></td></tr>" html = html &"<tr><td><input type=""button"" value=""Add/Remove Link to program"" name=""addLink"" onClick=""linkPage""></td></tr>" html = html &"</table>" DataArea.InnerHTML = html

Create Your Own Option Example Database Connection and Query driver = "Microsoft.Jet.OLEDB.4.0“ dataSource = "Data Source=programs.mdb“ Query = "select branchNum, branch from branch order by branch“ set con = createobject("ADODB.connection") con.Provider = driver con.ConnectionString = dataSource con.open set rs = CreateObject("ADODB.Recordset") rs.ActiveConnection = con rs.Open Query

Create Your Own Option rs.movefirst Used to access the first record rs.movenext To move to the next record returned rs.fields(0).value Will access the first column of the record

Create Your Own Option Full source code for our Program CMT can be found at http://www.forsythpl.org/test/demo/programs.txt

Programs Database in Action

Contact Information Michael Tucker Forsyth County Public Library tuckerm@forsythpl.org 678-513-9380

Website Content Management