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database functionality

kylek100

Hello there,

I work with a company and we've got a few websites internally and externally that are running on teamsite, which display files that the user can download. Right now, they are updated on each page manually, and linked manually.

We're looking for a solution that would allow us to upload the files into a database, and have the webpages populate the content dynamically.

Does anybody know a way to do this with teamsite without actually doing say, a SQL databse? Or is there a way that a database can be used easily in conjunction with teamsite?

I'm new to teamsite, so my apologies if the answer to this is obvious.

- kyle

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Migrateduser

If I understand your scenario properly, you want to upload the binary files themselves in to a database, or just the paths to them? I strongly recommend against stuffing binary content into a database -- it usually doesn't make sense to do this.

Yes, this is entirely possible and just involves some custom development. For someone knowledgeable of your requirements and of the platform, it might take about a week to do.

Dave

nipper

Hello there,

I work with a company and we've got a few websites internally and externally that are running on teamsite, which display files that the user can download. Right now, they are updated on each page manually, and linked manually.

We're looking for a solution that would allow us to upload the files into a database, and have the webpages populate the content dynamically.

Does anybody know a way to do this with teamsite without actually doing say, a SQL databse? Or is there a way that a database can be used easily in conjunction with teamsite?

I'm new to teamsite, so my apologies if the answer to this is obvious.

- kyle

Your question is rather confusing. Do you not want to use an SQL db ?

If you are looking for functionality to build an index page without truly making it dynamic, there are a couple of options. You can build a static page as part of the workflow, which will (via a TPL and a non-trivial amount of perl) build a static index page each time something is updated. Second, you can write a dynamic page the reads XML (or some other files) to dynamically build the index. This could be ASP, JSP, CGI, or PHP (and I would imagine other technologies as well).

Am I even remotely close to answering the question you asked ?

Andy

kylek100

I apologize for not being clear. We have a bunch of PDF files that we post on this site often weekly, and I would like to be able to have these files dynamically sorted for the end-user. For example, I want to be able to let the user choose to display all reports from 2006 pertaining to say, quarterly financials, from a certain firm. All of which would be user chosen variables.

If you don't think stuffing PDF files in a database is a good option, what would you think is a good option? I don't even know that the files would have to go IN to the database, but rather information about the files, that point to the file's path stored on the server.

And in regard as to whether or not I want to use a database...I work at a big company and must work with IT to get things done, if I don't have access to that, then I might have to use another solution which is what I'm trying to explore.

Do you think the XML option would work? Would I run into server load issues having to parse the entire XML file in its entirety every time a page loads?

Thanks for your help...

Migrateduser

I don't even know that the files would have to go IN to the database, but rather information about the files, that point to the file's path stored on the server.

Yeah, that's typically what people do. If you can't use a database or if your company's DBA resources are that constrained, then you could have it updating an XML file, for instance, after each PDF upload. The page that lists the PDF's would need to be regenerated after each PDF upload and no, it shouldn't at all be so CPU-intensive to parse an XML file. TeamSite does this all the time.

Sorry, I just made an assumption but I recommend that you templatize the PDF listing page rather than having a dynamic page on the web server which slurps and parses the XML. Again, I don't think that having the web server crunch the XML each time this page is requested on the web server is a big deal but it's unnecessary and it should happen on the CMS side.

Dave

nipper

Yea, Dave may look young but he does not what he is talking about. Smiley Very Happy

I cannot imagine the XML approach is going to overload your server. Though I would expect instead of readying XMLs each time, I would cache the info and have a DNR statement to make the page reread the cache.

That being said, if there is no reason to make it dynamic then don't. If there won't be sorting/filtering on the fly, then building a static page each time anything changes is certainly a very reasonable approach.

Migrateduser

Okay, since you already dragged this into the realm of "off-topic", I seem to remember you a couple of years ago with a certain photo of two young kids as your avatar. Give me at least some time -- I'll eventually get over seeing that photo every time I read an old post (even seeing that photo on posts I made 5 years ago -- that's creepy). Or maybe I'll just replace it eventually.

nipper

Good use of a topic like this, talk about avatars, short ones, football, etc.

My old image is too big (100x100 pixels max) I will shrink a shot of the short ones down and change my avatar.

Andy

kylek100

Actually, the issue is that we WANT to move to dynamic sorting on the fly by the user...does that change your approach at all?

kylek100

Right now these PDF listings are done by hand, and each "sorted" page has to be created individually. That's why I've been pushing them so much to move to some sort of database so we can just drop the data in, and let the computer worry about sorting and displaying it.

nipper

Actually, the issue is that we WANT to move to dynamic sorting on the fly by the user...does that change your approach at all?

Well if you want to sort/filter on the fly, you will need to use one of the technologies that are more truly dynamic (ASP, JSP, PHP, or CGI). CGI could be rather complex, but I included it anyway.

Now how you get the data there is the question. The choices are DB, XML with caching, and XML without cache. FYI, I did a major site (consumer information for a widely recognized customer) that was PHP reading XML and caching. Performance was stellar.

For your application, I doubt you even need caching. The time to read a single large (or a bunch of small) XML file(s) will be in the milliseconds. I cannot believe you expect to have very many people hitting this at once. How many per minute ? a couple ? A couple hundred ? Thousands ?

Andy

kylek100

I'd say on a heavy load maybe 10 people at once :-)

nipper

Then use which ever approach you feel most confortable with. Any will work, which is easiest for you to implement ?

LooseCannon

Actually, the issue is that we WANT to move to dynamic sorting on the fly by the user...does that change your approach at all?

There's no need to implement a server side solution to simply sort or filter content on the fly. IMO that approach is way overkill. I've achieved this a few times using client side code, in my case JS, but you could also use VB.

For example, lets say your site displays a listing (index) of all upcoming events and the requirement is to provide the user w/the ability to sort and filter on Event Date, Location, Presenter, Event Type and Title. What you do is generate a static html page, from a TPL, containing a 5 column table, where each column represents one of the sort/filter options. At this point the html page contains all the required metadata for an effective page sort/filter. Next step is to write client side code to rewrite the DOM based on the users action, like clicking on a table heading or selecting a value from a drop down. I like to use table headings for sorting and drop downs for filtering.

I left out the details on manipulating the DOM on purpose as this thread is about concepts. You can google “ javascript table sort” for more information or post specific questions that you might have.