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The Definitive Guide to Plone, Second Edition

A complete training path to get to know Plone, to learn how to manage content in your website, configure it and develop new features.

1. Using Plone

In this first part you will learn how to use Plone, a powerful Content Management System (CMS), as basic and manager user.

1.1. Chapter 1 - Introducing Plone

Plone is a content management system (CMS)—a platform that lets you build content-rich sites very quickly; it is built on top of Zope, a powerful web application server written in Python.

1.1.1. What is a Content Management System?

(this chapter will soon be available)

The History of Web Development and CMSs

What a CMS System Gives You

1.2. Chapter 2 - Installing Plone

How to install Plone and all its dependencies on a variety of platforms, and how to set the basic configuration options for Plone.

1.2.1. Installing Plone on Windows 2000/XP/Vista

(this chapter will be soon available)

1.2.2. Configuring the Server on Windows

(this chapter will be soon available)

Changing the Ports

Starting Plone in Debug Mode

1.2.3. Installing Plone on Mac OS X

(this chapter will be soon available)

1.2.4. Installing Plone on Gnu/Linux

(this chapter will be soon available)

Ubuntu and Other Debian-like Distributions

Installing on Fedora and Red Hat/CentOs

Installing with the Unified Installer

1.2.5. Installing Plone with zc.buildout

(this chapter will be soon available)

The Buildout Directory Tree

Managing Your Buildout

1.2.6. Adding a Plone Site

(this chapter will be soon available)

1.2.7. Installing an Add-on Product

(this chapter will be soon available)

Installing a Traditional Zope 2 Product

Installing a Product Packaged As an Egg with Buildout

1.3. Chapter 3 - Managing Content with Plone

In this chapter we will see how to add and manage contents and how to use all the available features. You will be able to work autonomously on your Plone website contents.

1.3.1. Logging in As a New User

(this chapter will be soon available)

1.3.2. A First Look at the Plone Interface

(this chapter will be soon available)

1.3.3. Organizing Your Site

(this chapter will be soon available)

Setting Up Your Dashboard

Setting Up Your Preferences

1.3.4. Adding and Editing Site Content

(this chapter will be soon available)

Adding and Editing Pages

Adding and Editing Images

Adding and Editing Files

Adding and Editing Events

Adding and Editing Links

Adding and Editing News Items

Inline Editing

Automatic Item Locking and Unlocking

1.3.5. Managing and Sharing Your Content

(this chapter will be soon available)

Publishing Your Documents

Restricting Content Types in a Folder

Using the Display Drop-down Menu

Tracking the History of Content and Versioning

Sharing Your Content

1.3.6. Gathering Disparate Elements into Coherent Collections

(this chapter will be soon available)

Adding a New Collection

Setting the Search Criteria

1.3.7. Finding Content in Your Site

(this chapter will be soon available)

Performing an Advanced Search

The LiveSearch Feature

1.3.8. Commenting Content

(this chapter will be soon available)

1.4. Chapter 4 - Administering a Plone Site

We will see how to add and manage users and groups, how to manage the user interface elements and the way the content is viewed, published and even managed through custom rules.

1.4.1. Main Site Setup

(this chapter will be soon available)

Managing Your Site Settings

Managing Language Settings

Managing Security Settings

Managing Theme Settings

Managing Mail Settings

Managing the Site Maintenance Options

Using the Error Log

Navigation Settings

Managing Search Settings

Adding/Removing Products in Your Site

Managing the Calendar Settings

Managing the Collection Settings

Markup Settings

Type Settings

1.4.2. Managing Users and Permissions

(this chapter will be soon available)

Users, Roles, and Groups

Managing Users Through the Web

Managing Groups Through the Web

1.4.3. Configuring the WYSIWYG Editor

(this chapter will be soon available)

Main Configuration

Library Configuration

Kupu Resource Types

Documentation

Toolbar Configuration

1.4.4. Managing HTML Filtering

(this chapter will be soon available)

Attributes

Styles

1.4.5. Managing Portlets

(this chapter will be soon available)

Managing and Adding Portlets

Using the Block/Unblock Portlets Controls .

Using Classic Portlets

1.4.6. Managing Automatic Rules

(this chapter will be soon available)

Creating a New Rule

Assigning Rules

2. Configuring Plone

In this second part we will see what lies behind Plone, we will go through some basic concepts about the structure and the logic of Plone.

2.1. Chapter 5 - Behind the Scenes

We will explain some basic concepts about the technologies behind Plone and we will see how to configure, search, and index new content types in the context of the important concepts of acquisition and the Template Attribute Language.

2.1.1. Understanding Object-Oriented Web Development

(this chapter will be soon available)

2.1.2. Doing Through-the-Web Development: The ZMI

(this chapter will be soon available)

2.1.3. Understanding Object Publishing and Acquisition

(this chapter will be soon available)

2.1.4. Managing Content Types Through the ZMI

(this chapter will be soon available)

Configuring Content Types

Changing Icons for a Content Type

Looking at Actions

Exporting Your Configuration

Creating a New Content Type from an Existing Type

2.1.5. Understanding the Portal Catalog

(this chapter will be soon available)

Indexing Content

Searching the Catalog

Using Search Results

Tying It All Together: Making a Search Form

Taking Advantage of the ZCA: Searching by Interfaces

2.2. Chapter 6 - Customizing Plone's Look and Feel

We will then learn how to change the look and feel of a Plone site, introducing Plone's skins, templates, CSS, JavaScript, KSS.

2.2.1. Changing the Entire Site’s Look Quickly

(this chapter will be soon available)

2.2.2. Introducing Plone Skins

(this chapter will be soon available)

Using Layers Within a Skin

Your First Customization

2.2.3. Templates and CSS: Customizing Your Plone Skin

(this chapter will be soon available)

DTML and ZPT

Managing Viewlets

Editing CSS

Examining Example Customization Snippets

2.2.4. Working with JavaScript

(this chapter will be soon available)

2.2.5. KSS: Ajax Made Easy

(this chapter will be soon available)

What Can You Do with KSS?

How to Disable KSS in Plone

2.3. Chapter 7 - Managing Security and Workflows

This chapter shows how security settings are handled in the Zope application server, how to use and manage workflows, and how to use and manage the Plone Policy Support.

2.3.1. Implementing Security in Zope

(this chapter will be soon available)

Adding New Roles

Understanding the Way Zope Stores Users’ Information

2.3.2. Using Plone Workflows

(this chapter will be soon available)

Using the portal_workflow Tool

Managing an Existing Workflow

2.3.3. Adding Plone Policy Support

(this chapter will be soon available)

2.3.4. Creating and Customizing Plone Workflows

(this chapter will be soon available)

Customizing an Existing Workflow

Duplicating and Creating New Workflows

2.4. Chapter 8 - Advanced User Management

We will introduce some basic concepts about how the authentication service works in Plone and we will see how it is possible to attach Plone to LDAP or relational databases.

2.4.1. The Pluggable Authentication Service (PAS)

(this chapter will be soon available)

The PAS in Plone

The Plug-in Types

Managing Users Through the acl_users Tool

2.4.2. Authentication with LDAP

(this chapter will be soon available)

Installing Plone.app.ldap

Configuring Your LDAP Connection

Configuring Your LDAP Connection Through the ZMI

2.4.3. Authentication with Relational Databases

(this chapter will be soon available)

3. Developing Plone

How to write an add-on product for Plone, to integrate Plone with other systems and frameworks, and how to access Plone without a browser. Finally, some use cases.

3.1. Chapter 9 - Writing an Add-On Product

We’ll try to make you understand the anatomy of a typical Plone product, walking through a series of tasks that will take you into the deeper workings of Plone and Zope.

3.1.1. Structure of a Plone Product

(this chapter will be soon available)

Building a Regional News Reader: Requirements and Discussion

3.1.2. Building a Plone Product the Easy Way

(this chapter will be soon available)

3.1.3. Writing a Custom Content Type

(this chapter will be soon available)

3.1.4. Theming

(this chapter will be soon available)

3.1.5. Forms

(this chapter will be soon available)

Getting and Using z3c.form

Understanding the Plone Catalog

3.1.6. Viewlets and Portlets

(this chapter will be soon available)

3.1.7. Plone Configuration

(this chapter will be soon available)

3.1.8. Tools and Utilities

(this chapter will be soon available)

3.2. Chapter 10 - Integrating Plone with Other Systems

We will see how to link Plone with a file system, both through Plone’s web interface and as a network share.

3.2.1. Publishing the File System

(this chapter will be soon available)

3.2.2. Relational Databases

(this chapter will be soon available)

ZODB vs. Relational Databases

Adopting a Relational Database in Zope

SQLAlchemy and Plone

3.2.3. Accessing Plone Without a Web Browser

(this chapter will be soon available)

Accessing Plone over FTP

Using Plone Through the WebDAV Protocol

3.2.4. Integrating Plone with Other Frameworks

(this chapter will be soon available)

RSS Integration into Plone

XML-RPC and Plone

And Now for Something Completely Different: Plone on WSGI

3.3. Chapter 11 - System Architectures and Deployment Configurations

We will see how to build and manage a system architecture that will allow you to get the best performance for your web site, even in mission-critical cases.

3.3.1. Optimizing Storage Configurations

(this chapter will be soon available)

Configuring BLOB Storage

Configuring RelStorage

3.3.2. Asynchronous Indexing

(this chapter will be soon available)

3.3.3. Plone Behind a Web Server

(this chapter will be soon available)

3.3.4. Caching, Clustering, and Load Balancing

(this chapter will be soon available)

Zope Clustering with ZEO

Installing a Load-Balancing ZEO Cluster with buildout

Caching Proxies and Your Plone Site

Installing a Proxy Cache Server with buildout

3.3.5. Multiple ZODBs

(this chapter will be soon available)

Speeding Up Plone by Putting portal_catalog on a Different ZODB with a Stand-Alone Zope Instance

Speeding Up Plone by Putting portal_catalog on a Different ZODB with a ZEO Cluster

3.3.6. Automatic ZODB Packing

(this chapter will be soon available)

3.4. Chapter 12 - Case Studies

We will present some of the most common use cases you might encounter as a web developer, considering requirements and possible solutions, in order to give you a further overview of what you can do with Plone.