Connecting to MediaBin using XSL

We are switching our presentation templates from TPL to XSL, but all the examples we can find about connecting to MediaBin are TPL. Can anyone direct me to some documentation for this? Thanks.

Find more posts tagged with

Comments

gzevin

We are switching our presentation templates from TPL to XSL, but all the examples we can find about connecting to MediaBin are TPL. Can anyone direct me to some documentation for this? Thanks.

Have you asked Interwoven for their version of ECM connector for MediaBin docs? If I were you, I'd shoot this to support straightaway.

JulieT

Thanks for your response. I did contact support, and in case anyone else has this same question, here is Interwoven's reply:

'If you are trying to use an equivalent example of iwov_import_mediabin in XSL, then there is none. I will open a must have feature request, and this will be available in the next release.'

cliff1

Hi Julie,

Sorry to say that we don't have a productized replacement for the ecmconnector tags yet. It is on the roadmap. If you want to venture into your own solution, there was a good webcast (2008 webcast #12) last October that talks about XSLT templates and shows how you can use java (and javascript) to extend the XSTL functionality.

Another, much simpler option is to use the "immediate" import option in your DCT such that the file is imported at browse time and the presentation template is just dealing with TeamSite files. Unless you have some complex situation where you need to pass task parameters (other than height & width), the immediate option is often preferable because the end user knows what is causing the delay. If the import occurs during preview/generate, the user is often waiting a while without realizing the rendition from MediaBin is being generated and imported in order to render the preview.

In case you want to investigate the java option, here are some tips.

At the end of the day, the ECM Connector perl PT tag constructs a URL to call into ContentCenter to make the import occur and then writes the anchor tag with the path to the image. If you inspect the ContentCenter URL that is constructed (add a debug line to the tag to print it), you could do the same as a java extension in XSLT.

Alas, I must point out that the ContentCenter URL that is being called is not documented as a public entry point, so it is technically subject to change in future releases. The URL syntax has been stable for a couple of years, so changes are not frequent.

Sorry I didn't have an "out of the box" solution. Hope this helps in the meantime.

Regards,
Cliff

JulieT

Thanks, Cliff. This may be a solution for us.

CRB

anybody knows if the ecmconnector tags ever got updated for XSL PTs?

cliff1

This has not been implemented in the soon to be released 7.0 product. This is still on the backlog, but has not been high enough priority to out compete the other items for resources. I'm still crossing my fingers for the days when we have infinite resources and we don't have to make tradeoffs Smiley Happy

With SitePublisher (which has a generate feature similar to what a PTs does), the PTs usage seems to have dropped a bit. There are still plenty of legacy implementation using the perl based PTs, but not as many customers (that I'm aware of) using the XSL replacement solution. If others are using the XSL PTs, it would be interesting to get some data in case my understanding is not accurate.

Regards,
Cliff

PriyaArvinth

Do anyone knows if the ecmconnector tags got updated for XSL PTs in the released versions ?

cliff1

No, not much demand from the install base so out competed by higher priority items for developer resources. If you use the "immediate" import mode in your DCT, you can use regular XSLT syntax to add the image tag to your HTML.

vijayaPriya

Thanks for your valuable reply.

Murugan_P

Any updates on the availability of ecmconnector tags in TS 7.3?
This might help us in making a decision on whether to use XSL PTs or Perl based as we don't want to import any images to TeamSite.

-Murugan