Technical
Digest
Sites are containers for organizing all Home and Administration area assets for a website. Site administrators can grant access to Site content for specific Users and Groups in Cascade Server. Users and Groups can also be assigned Site-specific Roles to grant or restrict their abilities on a particular Site.
Users can switch Sites by using the dropdown menu at the top of the screen.
Sites dropdown menu
Concept
More Insight into the addition of Sites to the system
Before Cascade Server 6.0, Targets were used to organize content as a website. Since Cascade Server 6.0, Targets have been deprecated in favor of Sites. For more insight into migrating from Targets to Sites, visit our Site Migration Wizard documentation.Top 5 Site-Related Things to Note
- Sites contain their own Home area Assets and Administration area Components. The Adminstration Area has some changes.
- Targets are no longer are available in Sites. Target properties are redistributed to Sites and Configuration Sets (see the "Target properties mapping in Sites" table below). All Destinations publish all Configurations.
- Site Roles are assigned to Users and Groups for specific abilities in the context of a Site.
- Many Components and Assets can be shared across sites (see the "Component and Asset sharing Site-to-Site" table below). As of Cascade Server 6.2, cross-site linking is available for all Assets.
- Changes to the user interface include:
Target properties mapping in Sites
| Target property | Location in Sites |
|---|---|
| Output File Extension | Configuration Set |
| CSS Classes | Site |
| CSS File | Site |
| Type of Data | Configuration Set |
| XML Declaration | Configuration Set |
| Include Target Path | N/A |
| Remove Base Folder | N/A |
| Scheduled Publishing | Site |
Component and Asset sharing Site-to-Site
| Type | Cascade 6.0 | Cascade 6.2+ |
|---|---|---|
| Asset Factories | No | No |
| Configuration Sets | No | Yes |
| Content Types | No | Yes |
| Data Definitions | Yes | Yes |
| Metadata Sets | Yes | Yes |
| Publish Sets | No | No |
| Destinations | No | No |
| Transports | Yes | Yes |
| Workflow Definitions | Yes | Yes |
| Block | Yes | Yes |
| Format | Yes | Yes |
| Template | No | Yes |
Site Properties
Site objects have the following properties:
- URL - The URL to which the Site will ultimately be published.
- CSS Classes - List of CSS classes available in the WYSIWYG editor's "Styles" dropdown. Requires "CSS File" to be set.
- CSS File - The CSS file with styles and classes for the WYSIWYG editor. Overrides the Global CSS file from Content Options.
- Default Metadata Set - The Metadata Set that is used for every asset by default.
- Asset Factory Container - Asset Factories that appear in the New Content Wizards on the Dashboard of the Site.
- Starting Page - Page that populates the Starting Page on the Dashboard.
- Un-publish Assets - Whether assets which are expired to an Expiration Folder should be unpublished from all available Destinations.
- Scheduled Publishing - Settings for publishing the entire Site on a schedule.
Site Publishing
The entire Site can be published by the Publish tab. Sites can also publish automatically with scheduled publishing.
Site Copy
To copy a site, a user must have a role that grants them the "Access the Site Management Area" and "Create Sites" abilities and read access to the Site being copied:
- Navigate to the Site Management area
- Select the Site to copy
- Click the Copy tab
- Enter the new name of the copied Site and click Submit.
Copying a Site will copy the Site object itself as well as all of its contents from both the Home Area and the Administration Area. Any links or relationships between copied assets are updated to the newly copied versions of those assets. For example, if a Page in the original Site uses a Content Type that is also in the original Site; then after the Site gets copied, the Page in the copied Site will use the Content Type located in the copied Site.
The Site copy process takes place in the background. After the process is started, the user who initiated the process can continue using Cascade Server. During that time, the new Site asset will be visible in the Site Management Area with an "In Progress" label next to its name. This means that the Site is not ready and it is impossible to switch to. It will not appear in the Site-switch drop down.
At the time when the Site copy process finishes, a Site copy report message will be sent to the user who initiated the copy process. Any problems that occur during the copy will be listed in the report.
Site Deletion
In order to delete an entire Site, the User must have the following permissions and abilities:- Access to the Site Management area
- Write access to the Site object itself
- Write access to all assets in the Site's Home area
- Write access to all assets in the Site's Administration area
Technical
Create a Site
- To create a new Site, click the Global System Menu and select "Site Management."
- In the Site Management interface, select "Create a new site."
- Complete the Name, URL, and CSS Classes fields.
- Select any neccessary CSS Files and/or Metadata Sets, or leave the Default Metadata Set blank to have a default Metadata Set automatically created inside the site.
- Choose if, when, and how often to schedule Site publishing. See Scheduled Publishing concept for more information.
- Click Submit.
Set Site Asset Factory Containers and Starting Page
- Go the the Site Management interface
- Select a particular Site and click "Edit"
- Select the desired default Asset Factory Containers and starting page to associate with the Site
- Click "Submit" to save the changes
Users of that Site will now have the selected Asset Factories and Starting Page on the Dashboard.
Site Migration Wizard
Cascade Server 6.0 has a Site Migration Wizard to guide Administrators through the process of migrating from Targets to Sites.
Site Import and Export
Sites can be exported and imported for backup or for moving Site between instances of Cascade.Cross-Site Relationships
For more information on Cross-Site relationships for Sites, check out our Cross-Site relationship rules page.