RFI : Handelling Navigation Component Dynamically

chiksur

HI All,


Overview of the Application

We have currently implemented a new project for one of our clients using Interwoven Content Management System as the backend CMS system and
Jsp Rendering Strategy as the Front end Display Component. The current Application consists of around 7000 pages segmented into around 40 divisions
with each division having their own navigation components like Top Nav,Left Nav,Bottom Nav,Footer,Disclaimer Text etc).We have separate styling elements like
(Css files,Assets,Javascripts associated seperately with these 40 divisions).

Issues we are Facing

The current issue which we are facing is that whenever a small change needs to happen to any of the Navigation components then the whole Division
needs to be Re-generated which is a very arduous task and takes about 5 hours to complete the process. The current process we follow is that first we
make the navigation change then re-generate each and every individual page in the property.

Different Approaches in Discussion

In order to resolve this issue of Re-Generating the complete site whenever a Navigation component changes we came up with the 3 approaches mentioned below
and would like your opinion in coming up with the most preferred solution which would suite our application.
This application currently involves JSP's for dynamic components but most of the Pages in the site are static HTML pages which are TPL(Presentation Template)
generated.

1) Implementing SSI's for Navigation
2) Making all the Pages in the site as SHTML
3) Implementing IFrames for Navigation


1) Implementing SSI's for Navigation :

The Idea around this approach was to make Web Server Configuration changes so that all the HTML files will be processed as SHTML so that they may use SSI (Server side includes) .
Pro's :
i) Easy to Implement
ii) we tested this Scenario on over Development Environment and it worked fine.
iii) It was working fine with the current structure of the application where most of the pages are HTML.
Con's :
i) When we made the Web Server Configuration changes most of the Response request are hanging on the server.


2) Making all the Pages in the site as SHTML :

The Idea around this approach is to change all the HTML pages in the site to shtml.
Pro's
i) One time effort but will become easy to maintain on the long run.
ii) No Web Server Configuration Changes required.
Con's
i) All the pages in the site needs to be converted to shtml .
ii) Every page has multiple internal links pointing to .html extensions which needs to be converted to .shtml.
iii) Lot of QA effort involved in testing this approach.


3) Implementing IFrames for Navigation :

The Idea around this approach is to make all the navigation in the site as different IFrame components.
Pro's
i) No Web Server Configuration Changes required.
ii) Easy to Implement where in which the different navigation components TPL files need to be modified to generate Iframes for navigation.
Con's
i) Lot of load on the webserver when the page is being requested by the client because we have 6 navigation components on the page which get rendered when the page Load
happens and this means the client will have to make 6 different HTTP GET requests to the server which could increase load dramatically .


It would be great if you let us know which approach amongst these 3 is better and if there are any other approaches to resolve this issues which you might have implemented
in the past.

Thanks,
-Surya Kishan Chikkala