Build a CMS -- Project dScribe
Today is a big event for me. I decide to launch a new
initiative on my blog.
I hope it will work as planned
;-)
OK, here we go.
For my project
Scoilnet, using my personal experience on CMS(Content
Management System just in case you still don't know;-)), I
was confronted with many options.
Because I
still don't believe (don't flame me ;-)) in the big CMS
tools for medium websites, I decided after a long
brainstorming session (with myself, easier to make
decisions) to jump in the DIY CMS on my own.
Don't
misunderstand the project. I am not going to compete with
Vignette or other big cheeses !
Well it's not
really a premiere for me, but in .Net, surely yes.
I
studied and read a lot of books, websites, of course and
analyzed all the aspects of the project.
Because
so many marvelous things around us were created by some
talented folks, I decided to follow their footsteps, and
to develop my solution based on the excellent book
Building a
Content Management System
written by Stephen R.G. Fraser.
As I said
already this is an excellent reading. Because I am also
more comfortable with VB, I had to rewrite a lot of things
from C#.
I say rewrite because I am not
interested by just 'copy and paste', I really want to do
my own stuff.
So this CMS is loosely based on
the book content.
The other different thing is
that I like the concept of N-tier architecture, and for
that I included in my project the
Data Access Application Block from Microsoft.
I will have the presentation layer and the business
rules separated from the data layer
Using this, it's surely more job, but much
more readable code at the end of the day.
So
now, this is working smoothly, and I am now at the moment
where everything start to be clear in my mind about what I
can achieve with the tool.
Rather than just
publishing a big zip file with all the codes, I want to
innovate and I am going to publish dScribe (Ok OK not
great name but I like to name things) brick by brick.
I'm
going to start talking about the Workflow, followed by the
Content creation, and so on.
I have no clue
about the number of stories I will have at the end, but
it's surely an exciting project (for me! And I hope for
you too).
Of course, feel free to comment and
if you have some ideas or resources to improve dScribe,
let me know.
So the first part in a couple of
hours, about building a nice expandable menu for the
Workflow part.