How often does the Site Studio project file change? The first determination that needs to be made is what all affects the project file. Some examples are as follows:

• Adding a new website section (service SS_ADD_NODE)
• Switching content on a region marker in Site Studio contribution mode (service SS_SWITCH_REGION_ASSOCIATION)
• Changing the property of a website section (service SS_SET_NODE_PROPERTY)

The service SS_COMMIT_SITE_CHANGES can, “Be run at any time to commit changes on demand”. The only required parameter is siteId. “The user executing this service must have write access to the project file to execute the service.”

There is another configuration flag SSAutoCheckinBusyTimeout (integer value in seconds which defaults to 30) that is, “Used to set the minimum time duration (in seconds) before the auto check-in mechanism attempts a check-in of a project file. This configuration flag prevents two nodes from trying to check the project file in at the same time”. The auto check-in behavior appears to use service CHECKIN_ARCHIVE and with the default time of 10 minutes, this should handle any issues that might come up with the release date debacle.

The undocumented configuration flag SSOverwriteProjectsUponCheckin (boolean value which defaults to false) controls whether the latest project file revision is overwritten. So, out of the box, project file auto check-ins stack revisions one on top of the other, instead of simply overwriting the latest revision. This is, is in my opinion, a good thing.

Patch Set 5 Released!

Oracle recently released Patch Set 5 for Fusion Middleware.  This includes my primary area of interest WebCenter Content.  This technically started rolling out to Oracle eDelivery and then OTN sometime on February 22nd, 2012.  I was a little late to the blogging game so instead of “announcing” the release let’s do a quick link roundup about this release from some of my favorite community members!  While this list isn’t comprehensive, it does come from a lot of people that have taught me a lot down the years so add them to your blog roll if you haven’t already.

Link Round-Up

1. One of my friends, John Sim might have been the first to point out the release availability.  He also has a great rundown of the products included in the release
2. Ryan has some handy links and also points out that the documentation has been updated
3. Bex runs down the patch sets you may need to navigate if you plan to upgrade your now out-of-date UCM instance using his recently setup shortcuts for Oracle Patches
4. The Official WebCenter Content Blog lists a host of new features around User Engagement, Content Enabling Applications and Infrastructure
5. Webmonkey really elaborates on the new Folders Component (This one is sometimes referred to as Framework Folders while the older one was called Folders_g)
6. And finally, on a separate note, but still related to PS5 note, Shay has a really nifty video showing some of the iPad related ADF stuff that’s new in JDeveloper/ADF for PS5
7. Yannick Ongena has a good review with information on the new RIDC connection in JDeveloper
8. The folks at AMIS also have a good link roundup

Ok, so these guys are a hard act to follow.  What can I say/do that they didn’t cover?  Only thing I can think about are some screenshots!  Once we got all the final bits downloaded (caution: that part takes a while if you want it all) we got a VM put together pronto and here’s some of the things we thought were interesting.

JDeveloper

First up, JDeveloper PS5 with Site Studio for External Applications (SSXA).  Notice in the shot below there is a dedicated RIDC connection you can now add to projects.  This could be handy for all kinds of things!

Also in JDevleoper PS5 (and I think it acts this way in the 11gR2 releases as well) you can now set the default built-in WebLogic Domain password to something you know and will remember when you first start the integrated server.  It used to be that the default password for the integrated server was weblogic1 and this was a major issue for those first setting out to use the product.  New users would be very frustrated trying to find out why they couldn’t login as weblogic user to test that first site they tried to build.  Love this!

Branding

Having booted up the integrated WebLogic server we see our contribution mode banner is now updated with the new product branding (WebCenter Content).  This is also updated in the content server user interface as well.

Out-of-the-box Assets

During the setup of our sandbox we obviously enabled Site Studio and SSXA.  It appears as though those components now ship with all the sample Custom Element Forms right from the start.  No more loading up the Site Studio Samples site from OTN just to grab these Custom Element Forms!  This made my day.

Folders and Desktop Integration

Of all the updates the Framework Folders and Desktop Integration Suite (DIS) changes are my favorite so far.  As mentioned before, Webmonkey runs down a lot of the features for us, but let’s see what it looks like.  One thing I want to point out though is that DIS works with Framework Folders and that Framework Folders overcomes a lot of the performance problems people used to experience with “Folders” in the past (previously called Contribution Folders).  This bears repeating because it opens a lot of doors and numerous customers have been waiting on these two features to converge.

Once you have DIS installed you’ll see an icon on the desktop (similar to how DIS has always worked) and you’ll double click that to open Windows Explorer which now has a “WebCenter Content Servers” node.  Clicking that node will show you the list of servers you have configured for your desktop (initially it will be blank, right click the blank white area and select Add Server).

If you have Rules and Profiles (custom check-in screens, etc.) enabled you’ll be able to use them in a drag and drop fashion right from your desktop by opening the “New Check-In” node.

Recently, I had a need to parse a String which contained a date returned from running a UCM search. The field in question was stored as an Oracle Database TIMESTAMP datatype (in the format 2010-02-04 06:00:00Z). I spent a while trying to parse it using the usual Java approaches (java.text.SimpleDateFormat,  java.sql.Time, javax.xml.bind.DatatypeConverter). After getting nowhere but receiving several parsing exceptions, a co-worker (thanks Wes Keppy) suggested I try using oracle.stellent.ridc.model.impl.DataObjectEncodingUtils.decodeDate to transform the String (in format 2010-02-04 06:00:00Z) to a Java Calendar object and it worked perfectly.

A question was once asked in the forums about how to stop WYSIWYG content from being wrapped in HTML p tags. Below are the steps to solve this problem.

1. Using JDeveloper (for 11g SSXA) or Site Studio Designer, open the element definition for the WYSIWYG in question.

2. Check the box for “Do Not Enclose Text in Editor”.

The 10gR4 Site Studio Designer Guide has this to say about the topic:

Do Not Enclose Text in Editor: Used to define how carriage returns are handled in HTML. If text is enclosed, each time the contributor enters a return, a paragraph is created. If not enclosed, a line break is inserted for each return.

When contributing various assets in Site Studio Designer the Assign Info form will be presented. By default, the buttons to commit are at the bottom of the screen. This is not such an issue the first time I save/commit the content. However, as I continue editing/saving the content I get annoyed by the fact that I have to scroll to the bottom of the page and click Assign Info each time.

I have finally broke down and created a new component that adds the Assign Info button to the top of the page as well.

Download the sample component from the Downloads page.

I am starting to release some of the example components demonstrated at my session this year at Oracle OpenWorld 2009. In the demo I briefly showed the Web Sites menu and talked about filtering the sites in this menu based on UCM Roles. This component demonstrates how one might accomplish such a task. As other articles related to my session come on line I will inter-link them together.

You know that Web Sites menu Site Studio adds to Content Server? Can I limit the links in that list somehow? This question is asked fairly regularly. I wanted to get a sample of how one might accomplish just that out for general consumption. Once you see an example accomplishing the filtering of that list you’ll be able to apply your own specific business logic as well.

In this example we’re going to use Roles to control what web sites are listed in the menu for any given user. I’ve seen this list controlled by Roles, Accounts, Custom User Metadata and every combination of those aspects and more. This is a LOT less about securing sites away from the users (as it doesn’t do that AT ALL) and more about thinning the sites list to something more context appropriate for individuals attempting to do their everyday job.

How to do this? Override the custom_finish_layout_init dynamic html include. Here’s the important snippet (don’t worry, there is an example component!):

<$c=" STARTING EDIT HERE, JS"$>
   <$if UserIsAdmin OR userHasRole("SSMENU" & siteId)$>
  navBuilder.addChildNodeTo('SS_DISPLAY_WEBSITES'
, 'item'
, 'id==SS_WEBSITE_<$n$>'
, 'label==<$js(label)$>'
, 'url==<$js(siteRef)$>'
, 'icon==WebItem.gif');
   <$endif$>
<$c=" ENDING EDIT HERE, JS"$>

So, sysadmin has the admin role, so s/he can see our three site samples in the web sites list:

Now, pretend we’ve created a new user named SingleSiteGuy (stay on task here, this is not a dating site side story…). We’ll give SingleSiteGuy our new SSMENUPayPalDemo Role.

And TA DA! Now SingleSiteGuy can only see the menu we gave him a role to access.

Grab the Websites Menu Filter Sample Component.

Last Tuesday, 9/15/2009, Scott Gutherie of Microsoft broke the news about jQuery on the Microsoft CDN. Now, whichever side of the fence you sit on in the Google vs. Microsoft religious fervor you will still enjoy being able to use jQuery on their dime! Happy, happy, joy joy!

The official ASP.NET Page about the CDN:
http://www.asp.net/ajax/cdn/

An in action sample:
http://stephenwalther.com/blog/archive/2009/09/16/microsoft-ajax-cdn-and-the-jquery-validation-library.aspx

Which should you use?
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1447184/microsoft-cdn-for-jquery-or-google-cdn

Those of us using jQuery in our Oracle Web Content Management initiatives need to be aware of this and the Google AJAX APIs. I always like to have options. This is just one more option for us.

You can also check out the Google jQuery hosting options here.

When users create new datafiles through Site Studio Contributor the Primary File (primaryFile) field can be the source of some questions or confusion. This field is usually pre-populated with ?default.xml?. Sometimes users will ask what this field is and/or why they see it. One of the easiest ways to deal with this issue or answer this problem is to hide that field! Add the following field to the server's config.cfg and restart. It looks like this setting may have been added in the may releases, so this may or may not work for you depending on your version and when this new feature was added.

SSHidePrimaryFileInContributor=true

Use can use the following configuration setting to disable contribution on a content server:

DisableSiteStudioContribution=true

Over on John's Blog you can find even more information about disabling and/or "enhancing" the contributor key-stroke

Component: Site Studio – Consumption to Contribution Ctrl Shift F5 redirect

Guide: Disable ctrl + shift + f5 Site Studio contributor option

Updated: Consumption to Contribution Ctrl Shift F5 redirect.

The Oracle Technology Network has a page with samples, viewlets and material on using Site Studio 10gR4.  Specfically, there is a nice PDF About Using 10gR4 From External Applications.