Book Image

Building Websites with Microsoft Content Management Server

Book Image

Building Websites with Microsoft Content Management Server

Overview of this book

Microsoft Content Management Server 2002 is a dynamic web publishing system with which you can build websites quickly and cost-efficiently. MCMS provides the administration, authoring, and data management functionality, and you provide the website interface, logic, and workflow. Once your website is up and running, your content contributors can add and edit content on their own, without the need to work with developers or the IT department. First time developers of Microsoft Content Management Server 2002 face a relatively steep learning curve. Not only are they expected to be conversant in the Microsoft .NET Framework, they are also required to be familiar with the concepts of MCMS 2002. Many beginners to MCMS start out by looking at the example site that ships with the product; tweaking it, dissecting it and turning it inside out using the obscure code comments as markers. However, when it comes to starting their own website from scratch, many are baffled ? where do they begin? This book exists to answer that question; teaching the essential concepts of MCMS 2002 in a clear, straightforward and practical manner. Containing answers to some of the most asked questions in developer newsgroups, this book is a treasure trove of tricks and tips for solving the problems faced by MCMS developers. This is a unique resource focused exclusively on the needs of developers using MCMS. It doesn?t waste time and pages on user or administrator level information that is well covered in other documentation. It?s a distillation of practical experience that developers need to get results, fast. The authors carefully structured example project complements and extends the knowledge gained from an initial look at the examples that ship with MCMS.
Table of Contents (28 chapters)
Building Websites with Microsoft Content Management Server
Credits
About the Authors
Introduction

Summary


This chapter has worked through the basic concepts behind MCMS 2002. We've seen that MCMS is made up of a content server, uses SQL Server 2000 as a content repository, and has modules that provide integration with Visual Studio .NET. For authors, it provides both a browser interface and integration with Word for a user-friendly authoring experience. In addition, it has website management capabilities.

Next, we discussed the main objects in MCMS: channels, postings, resource galleries, resources, template galleries, templates, rights groups, and users.

Throughout the course of the book, you will find that despite the large number of modules that make up the product, MCMS is really very easy to use. You will use the knowledge you gain from the book in virtually every MCMS project that you work on.

Now that we have covered the basic concepts, we are ready to move on and lay the foundations for the TropicalGreen website that we will build in the remaining chapters of the book.