Jukka-Pekka Keisala

Darren Farley, technical writer from Sitecore wrote me answers to some of my questions on upcoming features.

About 3 databases

The new version of Sitecore has significantly less databases than in previous versions. Previous versions had 7 now there are only 3. The Core, Master and Web Databases are the only databases in the latest version of Sitecore.

The “Sitecore” and “Extranet” security databases were removed as they are now handled by the .NET security model and stored in standard tables.

The “Archive” and “Recycle bin” databases were removed as each database now has its own internal archive and recycle bin storage areas. The archive and recycle bin have also been enhanced to contain a search facility similar to the content editor.

He also wrote something about “Page Editor“

The old “WebEdit” has been completely replaced with in-line editing. This feature, called the “Page Editor”, brings a whole new level of functionality and ease of use to the web site. In its simplest form it will allow users with limited It skills to directly edit text and images on a web page directly without any knowledge of Sitecore architecture, whilst in the background all the items, workflow procedures and security that goes into editing items within the Sitecore framework are all still followed. Items still get locked and unlocked, and an item will move through a workflow in the same manner as if it was being edited in the Content Editor.

Branch Templates and Command Templates, this is completely new for me.

What was referred to in Sitecore 5 as “Templates” are now called “Data Templates” in Sitecore 6. Assigning a data template to an item means that content authors will be allowed to create items directly from the assigned template. To further expand the functionality of templates and facilitate the removal of Masters Sitecore has created two new template types. The first is the Branch Template, which allows the creation of a whole series of items to create a part of a content tree when item creation is invoked. The second is Command Templates which allows a class and method to be called to invoke a programmed operation to be performed during item creation ( i.e. invoking a wizard to collect data).

More info about ASP.NET security on Sitecore six

Sitecore 6 replaces the standard Sitecore security model with the .NET security model. This provides the security infrastructure with a variety of enhancements, which are:

· The standard ASP.NET way of handling security.

· The ability to use plug and play security providers from Microsoft.

· Abstraction of data from the real data source.

· An easy option to replace or extend the default configuration with your own custom security providers.

· The possibility of using several providers simultaneously and thus keeping the accounts in identifiable storage areas.

The security model has been enhanced to allow roles in roles, a feature that is not available in the standard .NET security model.

These enhancements serve to allow the security of the Sitecore client to handle a lot more users, roles and domains than previously. Along with the new feature of roles in roles this serves to allow for scalability enhancements to support large scale security repositories.

Christopher Wojciech reveleals more details about new Page Editor in Sitecore on his blog.

The post really doesn’t tell much but definetly new inline editor is there but from screenshots I cannot really make comments if it’s good. When looking screenshots on the blog post looks like there is less changes than I though there will be. I am still looking for a comments about speed of editor rendering times and speed of changing simple things on content. I think speed in the current Sitecore is the biggest bottleneck for editors.

I have not seen V6 yet but I have been looking closely blogs and discussions on Sitecore Developer Network about the upcoming version of Sitecore 6 that will Rock every CMS developer world :O

Features known and my predections so far:

• There are only 3 databases (Core, Master and Web).
  Sitecore V5 has 7, I like this simplicity but I am curious to see solution on Sitecore Security.
• .net 2.0 to .net 3.5
  IMHO: Not a big fun on LINQ but all other updates are very welcome!
• Completely reworked webedit
  I predect this will be the biggest update of all. If they are able to roll out proper “edit in place” this product will take everyone under the table.
• New GUI
  Not really sure this will happen but I hope they have removed Vista look and goes more Office metaphor on Shell.
• No more Master templates, standard values rules.
  If you are not Sitecore developer you have no idea what the heck I am talking about but this is good.
• Security concept based on the .net membership provider.
  Makes easier implementation to LDAP’s. I have been missing that on Sitecore.
• XSLT extension controls: The WebEditRibbon and the StringUtil.
  I am not sure what are these but I am sure I will fall in love with WebEditRibbon. Please please Sitecore let me place and design my own Add/Edit/Delete buttons
• AJAX included automatically
  Not really sure which library, I hope it will be effortless to implement my own AJAX library.

ps: Just notice myself my blog URL says /v6/ that has nothing to do with Sitecore just the coincidence. This blog runs on WordPress and v6 stands for version of my website. I have had homepage since 1997 and last time I updated was in 2005 where I made Wordpress installation to to v6 folder…

John Resig (founder of jQuery) has released his JavaScript port of the Processing visualization library today using Canvas. This is an excellent addition to the world of JavaScript graphics programming, it works best on Firefox 3.0.

I am going to keep close eye on this project.

I saw this in one of the comments on Office Live Workspace vs Google Docs: Feature-by-Feature Comparison

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Hey Sarah,
If you want to focus on “everyman” features, why not to highlight the awesome GoogleLookUp function?

Here are the few steps:
1. Create a Google Spreadsheet
2. Tape “bmw” in A2, “mercedes” in A3 and “nissan” in A4
3. Select A2:A4 and, while holdind the Ctrl key, expand your selection until A50.
4. Say “wow”
5. Tape “employees” from B2 to B50.
6. Enter “=googlelookup(A2; B2)” in C2 and expand the formula until C50
7. “wow”, again

Here are some of the types of entities you can access using GoogleLookup, and a few popular attribute names:

Countries and Territories (like “Burkina Faso”): population, capital, largest city, gdp
U.S. States (like “Tennessee”): area, governor, nickname, flower
Rivers (like “Amazon River”): origin, length
Cities and Towns (like “Chicago”): state, mayor, elevation
Musicians (like “John Lennon”): date of birth, place of birth, nationality
Actors (like “Audrey Hepburn”): date of birth, place of birth, nationality
Politicians (like “Anwar Al-Sadat”): date of birth, place of birth, nationality
U.S. Presidents (like “Zachary Taylor”): date of birth, place of birth, political party
Baseball Players (like “Wade Boggs”): games, at bats, earned run average, position
Chemical Elements (like “Helium”): atomic number, discovered by, atomic weight
Chemical Compounds (like “Isopropyl Alcohol”): chemical formula, melting point, boiling point, density
Stars (like “Betelgeuse”): constellation, distance, mass, temperature
Planets (like “Saturn”): number of moons, length of day, distance from sun, atmosphere
Dinosaurs (like “Velociraptor”): height, weight, when it lived
Ships (like “USS Chesapeake”): length, displacement, complement, commissioned
Companies (like “Hewlett-Packard”): employees, ceo, ticker

9. Take a look at other Google functions in the “Google” tab of this page: http://documents.google.com/support/spreadsheets/bin/answer.py?answer=82712&ctx=
10. “wow”, again and again

These are the reasons why web-based apps are far more superior than desktop-based ones. And with more and more microformats, I bet this funtion will definitely improve the way we organize information. That could make a pretty corporate goal

Posted by: Jrome | March 4, 2008 2:23 PM

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Damn you Microsoft! How I am suppose to keep up with all this cool stuff you realize (heh, funny typo) release?

This one I had missed somehow but while I bump to it via some Rails article. Microsoft Labs has announced a new project called Volta that looks like GWT for .NET. But Volta seems to be more advanced than GWT since it uses .NET enviroment to generate JavaScript directly from its preferred programming language. But Volta is really about developing an application and deciding later where the code executes. That’s very ambitious. It looks very appealing for a developer that doesn’t fancy JavaScript. Though, I am not really seeing a big picture on this for example how does Volta fit to MVC, Silverlight and AJAX.NET.

Thanks to Google and Firefox, the browser is the platform and if you are a .NET developer, keep an eye on Volta, it is certainly a keystone of Microsoft web strategy.

Not sure what should I write here… This is great as well

I just read an article in PC Magazine site Leopard is the New Vista, and It’s Pissing Me Off ” by Oliver Rist. Funny how he is stating that Leopard can be bad as Vista. Has Vista come synonym for bad OS release?

I have to say, I haven’t used Vista yet for real. I have clicked around with it in others computers but I haven’t been comfortable to install it to my laptop yet. Party because only machine in my household that can run Vista in MacBook Pro (Tiger). My two PC laptops are “just” centiro duo’s so no Vista there. Anyway, I am still running happily XP and Tiger both work fine. In my other laptop I have the latest Ubuntu Linux which works like Rist says in the column: “From the start, Vista crashed noticeably less than XP Pro with SP2; it just doesn’t work with 50 percent of new software”

Back in 2001 I was in TechEd Barcelona where Microsoft unveiled Sharepoint and .NET 1.o. I remember like yesterday when Don Box was demoing WebServices from bathtub (SOAP) and coding c# from MacBook in Microsoft event!.

Anyway, after seeing Microsoft’s plan for following years I decided fully focus on Microsoft Technology. I saw first SharePoint which I think sucked. WebServices weren’t interesting either it just felt a bit too hairy for doing simple things. But what I loved was the whole concept of ASP.NET, C# and XML. After seeing XSLT in action I knew this is going to be my language, and it was. Well at least until now. XSLT is really great for templating websites, I gone through many tempalting engines but nothing beats good old XML/XSLT transformations. It is simple and fast. Well, it can get complex sometimes but usually when XSLT gets complex it means you are doing something wrong. Then it’s time to stop and think. Maybe, this is faster in code-behind or perhaps maybe it’s a good idea to write XSL -helper in code-behind for this.

I have to say, I have never come comfortable building sites from .NET controls basically because it was producing bad html markup-up and I don’t have full control how to build html on it but Microsoft has made it better over the time and nowadays it even produces valid mark-up. But still, I have to compile a DLL when making small updates. This is where XSLT rocks!

Because of this, I have waited (.NET 1.1)… and I have waited (.NET 2.0-3.5)… but there hasn’t been XSLT 2.0. Recently I read blog post in XML.com from M. David Peterson Question: Is Microsoft Working On An XSLT 2.0 Processor? Answer I am quoting him who quotes Microsoft XML Team’s WebLog : Chris Lovett Interview

“As for XSLT 2.0 - we’ve heard from customers and understand the improvements in XSLT 2.0 over XSLT 1.0, but right now we’re in the middle of a big strategic investment in LINQ and EDM for the future of the data programming platform which we think will create major improvements in programming against all types of data.”

DAMN!

Bad news for me… Now with all MVC/LINQ/WEB2.0 stuff… Isn’t XML cool anymore?