The Research And Application Of Open Content Management System

Content Management system (CMS) is a general conception used incomputing application, which includes from the news system in the homepageof the enterprise official website to individual web log. CMS can manage notonly, in functionally, text file, but picture and image file, flash animation,video-audio file and Email. There are many professional tools to deal with theCMS, such as the Content Management Server 2002 (MCMS) which is a webCMS in the enterprise level. Other software suppliers, like Vignette, RedDot,provided the web content management system and corporation contentmanagement system coinstantaneous, which realized sharing the individualfiles, managing operation flows and making them much more automatic.Content Management software can not be used no more than in PC platform,and DB2 Content Management from IBM also be operated in their ownmedium-sized computer iSeries and large-sized computer zSeries. The OpenSource Code Content Management Systems (OpenSCCMS) become muchmore popular overseas and OSCOM is an international organization to developthe standard and Open Source Code content Manager. At present, the mostpopular OpenSCCMS is Mambo whose slogan is power in simplicityinternationally, and others like Xoops, Drupal, Tikiwiki, PhpNuke, PostNuke,Tikipro have many fans from overseas, but they are strange for domestic users.For domestic OpenSCCMS, DedeCMS and KeHuiCMS and so on are limitedbecause of being complex in functions and short of stability and safety.OpenCMS studied in the paper is completed by Java Servlet and XML,can be operated on the different platform, and supported all the CMS that iscompatible with JDBC database, which has the usability and expandability.OpenCMS was published in 1999 and the most popular edtition is 7.0.3, which is a mature product. There are rarely materials about the OpenCMS, and I hadintroduced details of OpenCMS development and research based on relatedtranslation and text materials including some famous domestic website editedby OpenCMS, details see in appendix I. For deep discussing the characteristicsof OpenCMS, I produced the furniture website by OpenCMS which canexplain the expansibility and application better. Based above, I had concludeseveral means for OpenCMS applied research:1. Material resource:Official resouce is only from Alkacon file (English edition), whichone can be found after you setupping theOpenCMS(http://lcoalhost:8080/opencms/opencms/alkacon-documentation/index.html).This edition is not the primary introduction includingimportant characteristics, such as JSP, user-defined tab, user-definedstructure, OpenCMS JAVA DOC, which is useful tool for secondaryexploitation and so on. Another resource is official email list:http://www.opencms.org/en/development/mailinglist.html.All the OpenCMS users can communicate by email and benefits havebeen showed obviously. Domestic Chinese resource comes from theweblog: http://blog.csdn.net/qianxuncms/,which contains the introductioinof OpenCMS terms, user manual and secondary exploitation.2. OpenCMS user manual and secondary exploitation:OpenCMS supports several computing languages, which is realisedby ResourceBudle from JAVA. Localization function can help Chinesize inAlkacon and I used QianXun Chinesization supported from OpenCMSChinese weblog.The first impression from OpenCMS weblog is clear and abrided,which is devided into two parts: one is content management and another is system management. In OpenCMS, source is organized by VFS(virtual filesystem switch), similary with windows. On the contrary, the source inOpenCMS can be named file base, piture base, flash base and so on, whichavoided the redundant resource. When you need edit the content, you canfind it easily by interposing the relenent base. In system management view,there are user managemnet, module management and links management,which can be looked as the background processs.OpenCMS should belong to a structural CMS, not applied one, becauseit dose ot include the news, forum, blog and arithmometer, compared toother CMS. Templateone module is the only one for OpenCMS and showsthe simple sample for all users. Why do we still need OpenCMS? Becauseit creates a powerful interface, not only the module, but also the extendfunction. Through that, users can realized the self defined view in finalproduct, not the sample effect, which supplies a new applied platform fordifferent demands. Because of simple and convinient interface, OpenCMSshows a good lower layout of a secondary exploitation. By the secondaryexploitation, users can create new type of needed modules, such as newsand products, and news list and dynimic navigation through the APIinterface. Users can get a powerful OpenCMS by putting the new moduleinto more projects by planed expansibility. More understanding,mastering and suitable secondary exploitation for OpenCMS, more abridedsystem can match the critical requirment.After understanding the basement management and functionmodule(news module and product module), we should probe appliedresearch. Next, writer introduced main process to build up a OpenCMS bysetting English and Chinese furniture website as sample, showing asfollowed: 1. creating website module:module is the based conceptiton of OpenCMS, which is a kind ofcombination of relevent source for management, backup and transplantconviniently.2. organizing the structure and developing the templates of the websiteThe structure of items in OpenCMS is unlimited in catalog as the same asthe Windows in theory.The templates in OpenCMS are realized by JSP through tab andscript. Tab is easy to use but not powerful enough depending on the users'design. The template development is related simple,which can be realizedby inserting or replacing the tab and script into the existing HTML pageand designing edited erea or information list in relevent place. The mostimportant part is dealing with linkage including SRC of picture thatshould use order: or cms.link(). By this way, allthe link will be correct automatically when website published or staticuploaded.3. filling in the websitePictures and CSS can be uploaded to the catalog and page will comeinto being through the designed template. A suitable template can decidethe website structure and it is also the same with other similar page notonly one catalog.4. website publishingAfter filling in the website and purview distribution, the website canbe published. There are two states: online and offline. Online means usercan not edit the source. Offline means OpenCMS can be edit and auditing.5. website maintenance and managementOpenCMS keeps a simple way for website maintenance, which needs only basic computing knowledge to manage the editing, just like operatingthe word. OpenCMS has alternative machanism for backup, not only thecommon way, but template, database management and planned operationall together build up a pratical backup system.Above all, creation of website is a process of OpenCMS application.Certainly, this is only tinny part of OpenCMS and the key is mastering means,flows and understanding its characteristics step by step. I believe thatOpenCMS will become much more popular domestically.