For Developers

Support for our UBCMS developers.

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Pardon the Dust

Sorry, gang, for an awkward page. It's currently a quick dumping place for what we feel may be useful tips.

Last reviewed: September 1, 2020

Permissible Activities

To maintain security and stability of the UBCMS, we have established the following guidelines for customization and development.

Site authors (developers) can do the following.

  • Add unfiltered HTML, CSS or JavaScript to individual pages using our HTML Snippet, or to every page in a site by adding the HTML snippet to the site's header or footer.
  • Customize the look and feel of an entire site with a custom CSS stylesheet and custom JavaScript. That can be added in an HTML Snippet in your site's header or footer, or instead to the main.css and main.js within the /etc/designs area for your site within CRXDE.
  • Embed custom external content in individual pages by adding JavaScript or an <iframe> to an HTML Snippet. This works well for forms, videos and maps.
  • Integrate with custom back-end applications by embedding the front-end application framework into individual pages and calling the backend APIs through JavaScript in an HTML Snippet. (See a JamStack example.)
  • Use an API to automate publishing external content into UBCMS pages (see a RestAPI example). This is a way for an external script (e.g. PHP) to manage UBCMS pages instead of using Author tools. Typically this external script would run once to create pages that would then be edited in the normal way in Author going forward (such as a migration), or it would run continuously and be the only way certain pages are maintained (perhaps from an external database).
  • Access pieces of UBCMS content via REST API, such as to download your UBCMS header and footer to an external server to extend your UBCMS look and feel to other sites. (Watch the Developer Master Class.)
  • Develop custimized sites outside the UBCMS. UBit supports additional hosting platforms (e.g. UB CaaS, Wordpress).
  • Use the UBCMS Training Server as a sandbox separate from your real site. This is a fully functional AEM environment equivalent to the main Author server, but content developed there cannot be transfered back to the Author server. (Request a sandbox on the Training Server.)

These actions are not allowed.

  • Installing custom server-side AEM code (e.g. Java, JSP, HTL):
    • On our servers.
    • On your own university server or a third party server.

Please keep in mind:

  • Any customizations must be supported by your team.
  • We run code deployments on a weekly schedule and suggest you test regularly to address any code in your site that is affected.

Akamai content delivery network

The Akamai content delivery network (CDN) delivers our Web pages through high-speed 'edge' servers physically located around the globe, instead of through the 'origin' servers directly (our UBCMS servers). The CDN helps accelerate, filter, and secure web traffic. 

Author Debugging Tools

CRXDE

Zoom image: location of CRXDE off the Start page location of CRXDE off the Start page

location of CRXDE off the Start page

The link to CRXDE is off the Start page. Look on the left for the Tools hammer icon. Click that to reveal 'General'. Click that to reveal the link to CRXDE (developers only).

Tag Admin Console

Zoom image: location of Tag Admin Console off the Start page location of Tag Admin Console off the Start page

location of Tag Admin Console off the Start page

The link to the Tag Admin Console is off the Start page. Look on the left for the Tools hammer icon. Click that to reveal 'General'. Click that to reveal the link to Tags (admins only).

User Admin / Group Manager

Zoom image: location of User and Group Manager admin tools off the Start page location of User and Group Manager admin tools off the Start page

location of User and Group Manager admin tools off the Start page

The links to the User Admin and Group Manager Tools are off the Start page. Look on the left for the Tools hammer icon. Click that to reveal Security. Click that to reveal the link to both user tools (admins only).

Emulator / Mobile Device Simulator

Display your page as it would appear in mobile phones and other size devices.

Learn more about the emulator

Copy Content to Another Page

You can copy and paste content from one browser tab to another.

Learn more about copying between pages

Compare Pages (DIFF)

Compare two versions of a page, usually the current with the last published.

Learn more about the Diff tool

Compare Two Different Pages

Use this trick to compare two different pages side by side in one window. It's similar to the Diff tool, but for any pages you specify, and without markup.

SiteImprove Known Issues (for UBCMS elements)

See the Known Issues section on the Accessibility Advanced Topic

Page Load Speed

Additional Resources

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