Content Sections
part of the
ArsDigita Community System
by
Tarik Alatovic and
Sarah Ahmed
The Big Picture
This module allows the site administrator to create and manage different
content sections of the site. Administration of content sections can be
done on a site-wide level and a group level. It supports four different
types of content sections - admin, system, custom and static. System
sections correspond to one of the system modules of the site, e.g. news,
bboard etc. Custom sections serve like url directories. So if group
administrator of group travel at photo.net defines custom section sweden
(e.g. photo.net/travel/sweden), he will be able to upload files for this
section (see content_files table) in order to display the file
photo.net/groups/travel/sweeden/stockholm. Details on custom
sections can be found at
/doc/custom-sections. Static
sections serve as html pages and address of html page is specified in
section_url_stub. If you have file arsdigita in your careers
directory then section_url_stub should be /careers/arsdigita. Admin
sections are system sections that do not have associated public
pages. They only have administration pages.
After creating appropriate content sections for the site, the system allows to view/edit/enable/disable the sections. It also allows to link different content sections so as to be shown on the page navigation bar (using ad_scope_navbar).
At this stage, we only support creation and administration of system/admin/custom content sections at the group level. Site wide administrator can only create and manage static public pages.
The Medium-Sized Picture
This system consists of three tables. The content_sections table holds information about different content sections; e.g. their scope, type , pretty_name etc. A row in the table would be news,bboard etc.
create table content_sections (
section_id integer primary key,
-- if scope=public, this is the content sections for the whole system
-- if scope=group this is the content sections for particular group
-- is scope=user this is the content sections for particular user
scope varchar(20) not null,
-- if section_type=system, this section corresponds to one of the system sections
-- such as news, bboard, ...
-- if section_type=custom, this section is custom section
-- custom sections serve like url directories. so if group administrator of group travel
-- at photo.net defines custom section sweeden (e.g. photo.net/travel/sweeden), he will be
-- able to then to upload files for this section (see content_files table) in order to display
-- the file photo.net/groups/travel/sweeden/stockholm
-- if section_type=static, this section is static section
-- static sections serve as html pages and address of html page is specified in section_url_stub
-- if you have file arsdigita in your carrers directory then section_url_stub should be
-- /carrers/arsdigita
-- if section_type=admin, this section is system section but does not have associated public pages
-- it only has administration pages.
section_type varchar(20) not null,
-- does user have to be registered in order to access this page
requires_registration_p char(1) default 'f' check(requires_registration_p in ('t','f')),
-- if visibility=public this content section is viewable by everybody
-- if visibility=private this content section is viewable be a user only if scope=user
-- or by group members only if scope=group
visibility varchar(20) not null check(visibility in ('private', 'public')),
user_id references users,
group_id references user_groups,
section_key varchar(30) not null,
-- this is used only for system sections
-- each system sections is associated with an acs module
module_key references acs_modules,
section_url_stub varchar(200),
section_pretty_name varchar(200) not null,
-- if we print lists of sections, where does this go?
-- two sections with same sort_key will sort
-- by upper(section_pretty_name)
sort_key integer,
enabled_p char(1) default 't' check(enabled_p in ('t','f')),
intro_blurb varchar(4000),
help_blurb varchar(4000),
index_page_enabled_p char(1) default 'f' check (index_page_enabled_p in ('t','f')),
-- html content for customizing index page (this is used only for content sections of section_type custom)
body clob,
html_p char(1) default 'f' check(html_p in ('t','f'))
);
The content_files table holds information about different files that belong to a custom section. The files can be of type text/binary.
create table content_files (
content_file_id integer primary key,
section_id references content_sections,
-- this will be part of url; should be a-zA-Z and underscore
file_name varchar(30) not null,
-- this is a MIME type (e.g., text/html, image/jpeg)
file_type varchar(100) not null,
file_extension varchar(50), -- e.g., "jpg"
-- if file is text or html we need page_pretty_name, body and html_p
page_pretty_name varchar(200),
body clob,
html_p char(1) default 'f' check(html_p in ('t','f')),
-- if the file is attachment we need use binary_data blob( e.g. photo, image)
binary_data blob
);
The content_section_links table contains information about links between sections that is used to generate the page navigation bar.
create table content_section_links(
section_link_id integer primary key,
from_section_id references content_sections,
to_section_id references content_sections,
constraint content_section_links_unique unique(from_section_id, to_section_id)
);
Legal Transactions
From the group administration pages at
/groups/admin/$group_name/content-sections the group administrator can
- Add/View/Edit/Enable/Disable a Static Section
- Add/View/Edit/Enable/Disable a Custom Section
- Add/View/Edit/Enable/Disable a Module
- Set up Link between different sections to be shown in the navigation bar.
As mentioned before, the side wide administrator can Add/View/Edit/Enable/Disable a Static Section from /groups/admin/$group_name/content-sections.
tarik@arsdigita.com
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