Re: Managing Java applications in CMS

Hi Ethan,

I agree with Rickard that the Portlet API is probably the solution you are 
looking for. In terms of products though, you will find that there will be 
more and more that will support this upcoming standard (it is not yet 
finalized though, and there might be some small changes). You can find more 
information about the Portlet API at the JSR-168 page here : 
http://www.jcp.org/en/jsr/detail?id=168

The reference implementation of this specification will be hosted by the 
Apache Foundation if everything goes to plan, under the name "Project 
Pluto" (http://nagoya.apache.org/wiki/apachewiki.cgi?PlutoProposal)

Anyway the basic idea of the portlet is to output HTML fragments, and not a 
complete HTML page output and therefore leave all the design decisions to a 
"page aggregator" framework, which may be a CMS system integrated with a 
portlet dispatching sub-system. One way to achieve this easily is to make 
sophisticated use of CSS stylesheets within your portlet. If you work with 
a flexible CMS, you can then allow editing of the CSS stylesheets, or allow 
selection of multiple styles via a CMS interface, which will allow you to 
"skin" your web applications, along with the rest of the content on the 
page. Also note that the page may contain maybe just one portlet, in a 
"large" mode, with just the minimal content surrounding it such as 
navigation and header and footer.

<shameless-plug>
I guess I will too, talk about my own solution : Jahia. We call it an 
integrated CMS and Portal Server, so the name should tell you that we do 
aim to achieve a strong integration of CMS and portlet functionalities. 
This is a very broad field and there are lot of interesting standards that 
are emerging in the Java world such as JSR 170 
(http://www.jcp.org/en/jsr/detail?id=168) (Content API), WSRP (basically 
portlets accessible via SOAP) and the Portlet API (JSR-168). Since we 
started our work long before the Portlet API was started we chose to 
standardize on the integration of portlets through the Servlet API, which 
means that with very little modification (basically encodeURLs with the 
standard response.encodeURL method) a standard WAR web application can be 
integrated as-is as a content element. Our product is under a 
"collaborative source license", so you do get access to the full source code.
</shameless-plug>

One issue that is a little more complicated is if you want to think of 
content management on a broader scale. If you have a web application that 
handles lets say calendars, and you consider the data within your web 
application as content that you want to search, edit and manage rights 
through a standard interface, then you will find the current limitations of 
most web based systems (and I believe it's quite the same in the desktop 
world too). You can always work around these problems with specific 
solutions but unfortunately the standards are not yet there. One way to 
work towards such "knowledge" solutions is to add semantic signification to 
all content, and then build semantic relation ships between data to know 
how to manage it but this is another broad subject that is very interesting 
to me but maybe a little far fetched if you are looking for a quick solution :)

Regards,
   Serge Huber.


- -- --- -----=[ shuber2 at jahia dot com ]=---- --- -- -
www.jahia.org : A collaborative source CMS and Portal Server


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