Developer’s intro to the alfresco platform
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This document provides a high-level overview of the Alfresco content management platform in 3 sentences: Alfresco is an open source enterprise content management platform that can manage files and metadata, provides search and security features, and includes a workflow engine and APIs to build custom applications. It discusses Alfresco's architecture, developer setup process, development model using APIs and extensions, and demos the platform's capabilities. The document is intended to introduce developers to building applications and customizing Alfresco.
Developer’s intro to the alfresco platform
- 1. A Developer’s Intro to the Alfresco Platform Jeff Potts July 2011
- 2. Agenda • Extremely High-Level Overview • Alfresco Architecture • Developer Setup • Alfresco Development Model • Demo • Q & A
- 4. Alfresco Overview • Open source platform for Enterprise Content Management • Can manage any kind/size of file • Stores the file and metadata about the file o Files live on the file system, metadata in the db o Metadata model is extensible • Indexes all content and metadata for search
- 5. Alfresco Overview (Cont’d) • Secures files to specific users and groups • Transforms many types of documents • Provides versioning and check-in/ check-out • Has a built-in workflow engine • Can be accessed through a browser or from desktop applications via CIFS, WebDAV, FTP, SMTP, IMAP, SharePoint
- 6. Origins • Founded in 2005 o John Newton • Founding developer of Ingres • Co-founded Documentum o John Powell • COO of Business Objects • President of Oracle UK o Lots of Engineers from Documentum, Interwoven, Vignette • Assembled from Open Source components
- 7. Core Products • Repository • Explorer Client • Share Client • Web Content Management • Records Management
- 8. Add-Ons • Web Quick Start • SharePoint integration • Google Docs integration • Facebook integration • Plus many add-ons and extensions available from the community o Alfresco Forge o Google Code o SourceForge.net o Github o Alfresco Wiki
- 9. Available in 3 Editions • Enterprise o Commercial support available from Alfresco o Clustering, JMX, commercial DB & app server support • Team o Same software as Enterprise, with a lower price point o Meant for departmental and SMB deployments o User- and content volume-limited license • Community o Community- or self-supported
- 10. What can I do with Alfresco? • Out-of-the-box o Document Management o Web Content Management o Team/Project Collaboration o Records Management Source: craig rodway o Imaging/Digital Asset Management o SharePoint Replacement • Custom content-centric applications o Lots of options here o API’s discussed later
- 11. Obtaining Alfresco • Requirements o An operating system that can run Java o A servlet container such as Tomcat or JBoss o A JDBC-compliant database • Where to get it o Alfresco home page o Public SVN for Community source o Alfresco Customer/Partner site for Enterprise binaries o Private SVN for Enterprise source
- 12. Obtaining Alfresco (cont’d) • Distribution o Repository (binary installer or WAR-only) • Includes Alfresco Explorer and Alfresco Share o SDK (includes most source) o WCM • Web Quick Start • “AVM” style 100% of the source code is available in SVN. Not necessarily needed for your project, though.
- 13. Installing Alfresco • Alfresco deploys as a web application • Binary installer o Available for all operating systems o Linux installer does not require a GUI o Uses PostgeSQL if you do not already have a db • Alfresco WAR file o Deploys like any other WAR o By default, looks for MySQL db alfresco/alfresco
- 14. ALFRESCO ARCHITECTURE source: phil romans
- 15. High-level Architecture Major Browsers Alfresco WAR Share WAR CIFS Surf Workflow Search Frame WebDAV Engine Engine work JSON, XML FTP Transfor Web Web mation Script Script SMTP Engine Engine Engine Thick Clients IMAP Library Forms Forms Services Engine Engine SharePoint DB LDAP Files
- 16. High-level Custom Front-End Custom App Users Drupal SSO SOAP HTTP/S Web Services Web Scripts LDAP Web Client CIFS Content Managers & Administrators
- 17. The Beauty of Presentation Fast, flexible, modular Tier user interface REST SOAP Open, scalable Content Services Tier ? repository, metadata, versioning, workflow Enterprise Apps Tier ?
- 18. Major Sub-systems • Authentication • Workflow o JBoss jBPM • Scheduler • Auditing • Renditions o ImageMagick o OpenOffice • Email
- 19. DEVELOPER SETUP Source: thomas hawk
- 20. Extensions Mechanism • Don’t touch Alfresco’s files Source: Martin Deutsch • Use “extension” directory for alfresco WAR • Use “web-extension” directory for share WAR • Both must live on classpath o I prefer copying into an exploded WAR o Some prefer using Tomcat shared dir
- 21. Development Environment • Any IDE o Eclipse or SpringSource Tool Suite most common • Ant-based builds o Maven archetypes exist for Community edition • Sun JDK 1.6 • Alfresco SDK
- 22. Optional Tools • Apache Directory Studio (LDAP) • Apache Chemistry Workbench (CMIS) • Apache James (SMTP) • Workflow modeler Eclipse plug-in (JBoss GPD, Activiti) • cURL • Firebug Firefox Add-on • Tamper Data Firefox Add-on
- 24. Data Modeling • Repository is a collection of nodes • Everything is a node, nodes are typed • Content Model is expressed in XML o Cold-deploy most common, hot deploy possible • Types, aspects, properties, associations, constraints • Hierarchical o Types inherit from super types
- 25. Forms/UI Config • Forms are modeled in XML o Explorer: web-client-config-custom.xml o Share: share-config-custom.xml • Form Service o Processes and persists form data o Filters for intercepting form data before and after form submit o RESTful API for retrieving form model as JSON
- 26. Form Config Example <field id=”sc:itemShortDescription" label- id="label.shortDescription" description- id="description.shortDescription" set="header" mandatory="true”> <control template="controls/textfield.ftl”> <control-param name="maxLength">100</control-param> </control> </field> <field id=”sc:itemSku" label-id="label.sku" description- id="description.sku" set="header" /> <field id=”sc:solutionSections" label-id="label.solutionSections” description-id="description.solutionSections" set="sections”> <control template="/org/alfresco/components/form/controls/sc- association.ftl”> <control-param name="showTargetLink">true</control-param> <control-param name="allowOtherAssocs">false</control- param> </control> </field>
- 27. Queries • Alfresco isn't relational o So don’t try to build highly-relational systems using only the Alfresco repo • Lucene • Alfresco FTS • CMIS queries (SQL-like) • Xpath • Apache Solr o Coming with the next major release (“Swift”)
- 28. Security - Authentication • Spring Security Framework (ACEGI) under the covers • Alfresco can handle it or pass it off to others • ActiveDirectory • LDAP • Kerberos • NTLM • SSO • Custom Source: roo reynolds
- 29. Security - Authorization • Users & Groups • Access Control Lists • Permissions • Hierarchical o By default, child nodes inherit ACL of their parent o Inheritance can be turned off for a given node
- 30. Alfresco APIs (1 of 2) • Java Foundation API o Explorer client, actions, behaviors, web script controllers, workflow logic • Server-side JavaScript API o Web script controllers, utility scripts, workflow logic • Freemarker o Web script views, Surf templates, email templates • Client-side JavaScript API o Share client-side logic
- 31. Alfresco APIs (2 of 2) • RESTful API (Web Script Framework) o Remote clients, Share customizations • Web Services API (SOAP) o Remote clients • CMIS API o Remote clients (Both ATOM Pub and SOAP) • JCR API o Embedded repo, remote clients via RMI
- 32. What is the Web Script Framework? • Web Script Framework used to declare a URL, bind it to logic, provide views o Model-View-Controller pattern o Controller implemented in JavaScript or Java o Views implemented in FreeMarker • Deployed to the repository or the classpath • Part of the Spring Surf Project http://springsurf.org/
- 33. What is Spring Surf? • Web application development framework built on web scripts • Essentially web scripts++ o Page definition o Declarative handshakes to HTTP end points o Page, page type, and object dispatching • Includes built-in hooks for talking to Alfresco and loading objects from the repository
- 34. What is CMIS? • OASIS standard o Alfresco, IBM, Microsoft, Oracle, FileNet support o Alfresco was first to production with CMIS • Two parts o Interoperability through standard SOAP and Atom Pub bindings o SQL-based query language for rich content repositories • New JSON binding coming soon
- 35. What is CMIS? (Cont’d) • Think of it as a language-independent, repository-independent API for content management o CRUD functions for nodes o Check-in/check-out o Associations o Permissions (Access Control Lists) o Policies o Queries o Repository traversal
- 36. Alfresco & Apache Chemistry • Chemistry is the home of several client- side CMIS libraries as well as server-side reference implementations • Alfresco employs the Chemistry project chair and multiple committers • OpenCMIS, the Java API for CMIS, is used within the product • Chemistry lets you access your Alfresco repo from Java, PHP, Python, & .NET
- 37. Demo/Code
- 38. Much More to Explore on Your Own • Alfresco Explorer & • Authentication Share Customization against LDAP • Behaviors • Web Services API • Metadata • AMPs Extractors • Import/Export • Transformers • Web Content • Advanced Management Workflow (JBoss • Share Forms jBPM, Activiti) • Share Themes • Permissions • Share Dashlets
- 39. For More Information… • Alfresco Community • Documentation http://www.alfresco.org http://docs.alfresco.com • Alfresco Forums • Freenode IRC http://forums.alfresco.com #alfresco • Alfresco Wiki • Twitter http://wiki.alfresco.com @alfresco • Alfresco Blogs • Code Examples http://blogs.alfresco.com/ http://code.google.com/p/ planet/ share-extras • ECM Architect http://code.google.com/p/ alfresco-developer-guide http://ecmarchitect.com
- 40. Tweet me with questions/feedback @jeffpotts01 THANK YOU!