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

Chapter 16. Extending the Workflow

In Chapter 10, we saw how postings are routed from the author to the editor and finally to the moderator before being published. You have also seen how the basic workflow can be altered by adding or removing rights groups from channels. This basic solution may be sufficient for simple workflows. More often than not, you will find that the business processes in organizations today require more than the standard solution provides.

Common workflow extension requests include:

  • E-mail notification: You need to have the system send e-mail to inform staff that there are postings awaiting their approval.

  • Canceling an operation: You need to have the system prevent certain events from happening.

  • Preventing deletes: You need to program the system to allow only specific people to delete postings through the Web Author Console.

  • Updating property values: You may want to write values to custom properties or posting properties on behalf of a user for certain operations.

  • Cleaning...