Highlights of Cascade Server 6.0

Cascade 6.0 contains a number of exciting, new features including two of our most popular ideas in our Idea Exchange and over 40 improvements and bug-fixes.

Among the new features in Cascade Server 6.0 are:

Sites

Sites are containers for organizing and segmenting out Home and Administration area assets. Site administrators can grant access to Site content to specific Users and Groups in Cascade Server. They can also assign Users and Groups Site-specific Roles to grant or restrict their abilities on a particular Site.

The dropdown menu of all the site a user has access too

Site Management Area

The Sites are managed in the new Site Management area.  Sites can be created, edited, deleted, and published from the Site Management area. Sites assets, like most other assets, have Access Rights to control who can and cannot manipulate them. Only Users and Groups assigned to the Site can enter the Site.

Site Migration Wizard

The Site Migration Wizard is a tool to assist moving a site out of the Global area and into its own Site.  The wizard will step through the necessary actions to move the content and administrative assets to a site.  The wizard has a "Test Migration" available to find any errors that may occur before performing the migration.

Roles

New Roles - New Roles can be created with different abilities, instead of modifying the five static roles.
Site Roles - Sites now have their own contextual roles (i.e. a user's abilities in one site can be completely different in another site).  This allows more control over the users interacting with different sites.

Site Role assignment

New System Menu

The System menu, represented by the Cascade Server logo, is located on the top left of the blue menu bar.  It is where non-site specific actions, tools, and preferences are located.  Most of what was on the Tools menu is now on the System menu, leaving the Tools menu with site-specific tools.

The System Menu dropdown

Security Fixes

Cascade 6.0 contains two important security updates:

• Fixes for XSS scripting vulnerabilities.
• Fixes for vulnerability introduced by Xalan extensions in XSLT Formats.

WYSIWYG Fixes

This release contains a number of fixes for issues related to the integration of Passthrough and Root Code Sections and TinyMCE 3. This is a recommended update for all Cascade 5.7 series users.

A complete list of the issues resolved can be found below.

Issues Resolved in 6.0

Bug

• [CSCD-3924] - Protection against Cross-Site Scripting (XSS)
• [CSCD-4272] - Foreign key columns not indexed in Oracle or SQL Server
• [CSCD-4361] - Cascade incorrectly sets width property of object element when rendering file assets
• [CSCD-4388] - Blank screen when trying to publish after sorting a folder view by Last Modified, Last Modified By
• [CSCD-4648] - Investigate Firefox 3 image stretching in file view
• [CSCD-4753] - Security vulnerability that allows execution of arbitrary Java code from Xalan's XSLT Java extensions
• [CSCD-4774] - Changing configuration name creates new copy of configuration
• [CSCD-4810] - DeleteAndUnpublish trigger fails when trying to use "SYSTEM" user
• [CSCD-4842] - TinyMCE in IE strips <param> tags from an <object>
• [CSCD-4868] - TinyMCE escaping <% within passthrough code sections
• [CSCD-4878] - Link params before anchors are treated as part of the anchor when rendered in CMS
• [CSCD-4909] - Check External Links showing external links and mailto's as broken even when turned off
• [CSCD-4942] - Insert/Edit link option in WYSIWYG fails when href="#"
• [CSCD-4944] - Code in code sections still being shown in WYSIWYG in IE
• [CSCD-4958] - NPE thrown in Layout view when Format is applied to a region without a block
• [CSCD-4978] - Publisher stops on LazyInitException when Page has page configurations not part of configuration set
• [CSCD-4987] - Copying a page - copied page has "Maintain absolute links" always unchecked
• [CSCD-4989] - Delete and Unpublish workflow trigger fails - Non-null user required to execute delete
• [CSCD-4991] - Security area abilities affect visibility of assigned users in the Access tab
• [CSCD-5036] - URL parameters rewritten as anchors
• [CSCD-5082] - Adding a page configuration to a site level page configuration set causes validation error when not final submit
• [CSCD-5086] - Turn off the auto-disappear feature in the menu bar
• [CSCD-5152] - Site Destinations can not be disabled
• [CSCD-5171] - NPE when clicking on a site from the users, groups, and roles screen
• [CSCD-5172] - Unable to delete site
• [CSCD-5173] - Windows Installer: Minor Interface Bugs
• [CSCD-5178] - Content Type index blocks created by permissions-enforced role results in 500 Error
• [CSCD-5179] - Index blocks lose index folder when that folder is the base of a site migration
• [CSCD-5180] - Error thrown after site migration if user was viewing a target that was removed
• [CSCD-5181] - Publish queue should not change depending on which site you are in
• [CSCD-5185] - Folders lose inherited workflows if former base folder is migrated to a site
• [CSCD-5195] - Site delete fails for SQL Server
• [CSCD-5196] - Unable to edit Base Folder for a Site
• [CSCD-5200] - Rename the "Upload images from the wysiwyg image upload popup" ability to include file chooser functionality.
• [CSCD-5201] - Links in 'a', 'img', 'link' tags in Template are not enriched after New Scaffold import
• [CSCD-5255] - New system menu icon causing UI problems in IE6

Improvement

• [CSCD-4332] - Add Web Services operations to create, read, update, delete Roles
• [CSCD-4936] - Don't allow jobs left in the publish queue to prevent future publishes
• [CSCD-5022] - Add Destination Containers and Site Destinations to the Java API
• [CSCD-5120] - Enable TinyMCE media plugin
• [CSCD-5145] - Add a way to disable publishing to a particular page configuration
• [CSCD-5153] - Enable the ability to base Site Roles on original Roles
• [CSCD-5170] - Add ACLs and Permissions to Roles
• [CSCD-5205] - Add fine-grained abilities for Sites
• [CSCD-5233] - Allow for selection of Blocks/Formats from across Sites
• [CSCD-5243] - Include Site column for Block and Format subscribers
• [CSCD-5263] - Temporarily have IE 8 mimic IE 7 when using Cascade

New Feature

• [CSCD-4713] - New Roles
• [CSCD-4714] - Sites
• [CSCD-4837] - Site Migration Wizard
• [CSCD-4880] - Contextual Roles in Sites
• [CSCD-4941] - NEW System Menu
• [CSCD-5294] - Site Roles

Please read to the end of this section before attempting to install Cascade 6.0.

Upgrading from 5.5.x or 5.7.x to 6.0

• Review the Site Migration Notes section for important tips and information before attempting Site Migrations in Cascade 6.0.
• Cascade 6.0 contains an important security patch for a vulnerability in the XSLT transformation engine. If you're not using Xalan JavaScript extensions in your implementation, please navigate to the Content tab in the Preferences and disable Xalan extensions in XSLT formats.
• MySQL Users: Please verify that your MySQL database is using the InnoDB storage engine before upgrading (see Database Configuration).
• The Cascade Server WSDL has changed with the release of 6.0.  It is recommended that all Web Services scripts be tested in a non-production environment before applying the upgrade to production.  Java web services scripts written using Axis should be recompiled against the latest WSDL.

Upgrading from 5.2.x (or earlier) 6.0

If you are running a version of Cascade before 5.5, you must upgrade to version 5.5 or higher before upgrading to 6.0.  Cascade Server 5.5 download links are available below:

• Windows(.EXE)
• Windows(.JAR)
• Linux/Unix(.BIN)
• Linux/Unix(.JAR)
• Linux/Unix(.SH)
• OS X(.JAR)
• Compressed Archive(.ZIP)
• ROOT.WAR

When upgrading to 5.5 or higher, you must allow Cascade to boot until you're able to access the login screen. At that point, you should see the following in the log:

INFO: Server startup in 59457 ms

After the login screen is accessible, you can stop the server and install the 6.0 software.

Transition Concepts - 5.x to 6.x

Global Area for Backwards Compatibility

To maintain backwards compatibility, we added a Global area that is outside the scope of any particular Site. Upon upgrade all of the existing content appears in the Global area. In the Global area, everything functions exactly as it did in 5.x with Targets and all Home and Administration area assets contained within a single base container. It is up to users to adopt our new Site methodology.

Important Information Regarding Site Migrations

Organizations should read over each of the following items carefully before performing a Site Migration:

Include Target Path and Remove Base Folder options no longer available

The options to Include Target Path and Remove Base Folder do not exist in the context of a Site.  Previously, if an organization was publishing two outputs - HTML and XML - and the XML target was configured to use the Include Target Path option, an asset would be published to the live site(s) in two separate locations.  Consider the following example:

Asset name: test
Published HTML path: /pathTo/test.html
Published XML path: /pathTo/XML/test.xml

In Cascade Server 6, different outputs for an asset will publish to the exact same location.  The only difference between the two will be their file extensions:

Asset name: test
Published HTML path: /pathTo/test.html
Published XML path: /pathTo/test.xml

This can cause a problem if the organization was previously publishing two outputs that used the same file extension. In this scenario, the last asset to publish will overwrite the first one (since the assets are being published to the same location).

For example, consider the following scenario in a Cascade Server 5 configuration:

Asset name: test2
Outputs: HTML, Lite HTML
Published HTML path: /pathTo/test.html
Published Lite HTML path: /pathTo/lite/test.html

To prevent Cascade Server 6 from publishing two different test.html files to the same location, the organization should change the file extension for the Lite HTML configuration to '-lite.html'. This modification will produce the following results:

Asset name: test2
Outputs: HTML, Lite HTML
Published HTML path: /pathTo/test.html
Published Lite HTML path: /pathTo/test-lite.html


Additionally, targets being migrated which did not have the Remove Base Folder option checked will result in the site publishing to a slightly different path.  Transports and/or destinations should be modified to deal with this scenario accordingly.

Links to Other Sites

Links to assets outside of the Site's original Base Folder will not be rewritten as expected.  Organizations making heavy use of this practice should wait to perform any Site Migration until the feature to link across sites has been implemented.  It is highly recommended that users make use of the Test Migration functionality which will notify users of any potential problems during the migration.

Migration Process Can Not Be Reversed

Once a site from the Global Area has been migrated to a Site object, those changes can not be reversed.  It is highly recommended that administrators create database backups on a regular schedule in case a Site must be reverted back to the state it was in before the migration.

Site-Based Roles

Before any Roles can be assigned to a Site, a minimum of one Site Role must be created in the Global Administration area.  Once a Site Role has been created, administrators can browse to the Site Management section and associate the Role with users and/or groups.

Moving Site Content

Once content is migrated to a Site it can not be moved to a different Site. 

References

Organizations should not separate References from their associated assets during the Site Migration process.  Scenarios to avoid include:

• Migrating References that reference assets outside the context of a migrated Site
• Migrating assets that are associated with references outside the context of the migrated Site

Index Blocks

Organizations should not separate Index Blocks from their associated assets during the Site Migration process.  Scenarios to avoid include:

• Migrating Index Blocks that reference assets outside the context of the migrated Site
• Migrating assets that are referenced by Index Blocks outside the context of the migrated Site

Administration Area Containers

If the Site Migration Wizard moves all components within a specific container during a migration, that container will be left empty.  An Administrator should manually remove the container from the Administration area.

Site-Specific Search

Limiting searches for assets within specific Sites will not be available in the initial release of Cascade Server 6.0.  All searches are considered to be global at this time.

Duplicate Destinations

During the Site Migration process, any duplicate destination names will have a 1 (or 2, 3, ...) appended to them.  This is due to the fact that all destinations are now contained under one Site object whereas previously they may have lived under separate targets/sub-targets.

[ system-asset ] Tags

Links using [ system-asset ] tags will not be updated automatically.  This is due to the fact that the links are necessarily broken when the base folder is removed during the migration.  Organizations will need to identify where these tags are used and update them accordingly.  It is most common for these types of links to be used within CSS and Javascript files.

[ system-asset:page:target ] Tags

Links using [ system-asset:page:target ] tags will not be updated automatically.  This is due to the fact that they previously linked to targets (which no longer exist in the Sites perspective). Migrated Sites using this tag may need to be fixed manually after a migration.

Publishing Configurations

Each Configuration in a Configuration Set now contains a Configuration can be published checkbox.  During a Site Migration, this setting pulls its value from the old target's destination.  If the old destination was not enabled, the configuration will not be marked as publishable.  Also, if no destination was available to the target previously, the configuration will not be enabled by default after the Site Migration.

Dashboard in Site Context

While in the context of a Site, users' dashboards will not contain a starting page or any asset factories under the Create/Manage Content section.  Improvements to this functionality are currently under consideration.