Upcoming Classes

CommonSpot for Developers

Course Prerequisites

Students should have completed the following courses or have equivalent experience:

• Attend Adobe's Fast Track to ColdFusion course or equivalent
• Attend Paperthin's CommonSpot for Content Contributors course or equivalent
• Minimum of 3 months ColdFusion development experience

Course Objectives

Upon completion of this course, student should be able to:

• Build a custom login page
• Configure a custom color pallette
• Use CommonSpot environment variables effectively
• Understand the nuances of the "Base Template"
• Create custom rendering handlers for CommonSpot Elements
• Create Page Rendering Handlers using Metadat
• Create a facility for "Print Versions" of Pages
• Use CommonSpot Metadata facilities to link pages to relational databases
• Create CommonSpot extensions that reference the CommonSpot relational data schema
• Creating custom objects
• Understanding Clustering and Replication
• Export CommonSpot data to other programs

Course Outline

Unit 1: Introducing the Course

• Understanding the Course
• Course Objectives
• Course prerequisites
• Course Format
• Course Content
• Introducing CommonSpot

Unit 2: Getting Started

• Configuring the ColdFusion Server
• Configuring the JVM
• Configuring Settings that Affect Scalability
• Deploying CommonSpot
• Creating a New CommonSpot Site
• Understanding the CommonSpot Data Schema
• Cloning a Site

Unit 3: Buidling Templates

• Defining your template architecture
• Building a Base Template
• Implementing your Graphical Design as a CFML Custom Tag
• Implementing CSS-based designs
• Making CSS Styles Available to Contributors
• Implementing a Printer Friendly Format

Unit 4: Metadata and Element Render Handlers

• Using Metadata
• Implementing Page Render Handlers using Metadata
• Creating and Deploying Element Render Handlers
• Using Metadata and the Taxonomy systems to categorize pages
• Using Taxonomy to drive navigation
  

Unit 5: Custom Elements

• Creating and Defining a Custom Element
• Creating Display Templates
• Using Field masks
• Building Custom Field Types
• Using Custom Elements for Personalization
• Syndicating Content with RSS
  

Unit 6: CommonSpot Security and Simplifying the Authoring Experience

• Setting permissions at the site/subsite levels
• Applying security to templates
• Applying security to elements
• Securing the ColdFusion Administrator
• Securing the CommonSpot Upgrade utility
• Customizing Security Messages
• Implementing single sign-on with LDAP / Active Directory
• Streamlining the Page Creation Process
• Using JavaScript to alter the CommonSpot UI and set defaults for form fields

Unit 7: Approving Content

• Establishing an approval process
• Navigating the approval process
  

Unit 8: Extending and Troubleshooting CommonSpot with ColdFusion

• Datasheet Column Render Handlers
  
• The CommonSpot Event Model
  
• Extending CommonSpot with ColdFusion
• Exporting Custom Element Data
• Using iFrames
• Using loader.cfm
• Using the CommonSpot Web Services API
• Techniques for Identifying and Rectifying Performance Bottlenecks

Unit 9: Using the Application Development Framework

• Building Applications for Distribution
• Packaging Applications for Distribution
• Deploying the CommonSpot Blog
• Deploying the CommonSpot Wiki

Fig Leaf has provided training in the following cities: