using existing DW templates into PowerCMS?

Hi, I think I misunderstood a sales support reply or they misunderstood me. I have a client with an existing site whom I want to allow to edit and add pages. I created the site with DW using templates. Sales said I could use my templates with PowerCMS. I installed PowerCMS2 and I have the current versions of the WA suite. So I also have PowerCMS builder... But I don't see a way in the tutorials to import or use the existing DW templates...

Am I missing something here? If I turned the site into a framework, would that make it easier?

You would add the CMS Content areas into the pages that you have created based on your template.

With Power CMS, you need to create a page based on the template.

then in the power CMS Admin, create the content area, find the developer notes code for the content, then add that developer notes code to your page. Adding the developer notes code to the page address the editable content to the page.

to edit the content at a later date, you log into the Power CMS admin, select the content area and make your changes. this will change the content t that displays on the page.

Something is not clear: I need to create a blank page in DW based upon the Template and insert custom content areas in the editable areas of the new page with the developer notes? , or I need to try and duplicate the template page layout in PowerCMS that I created in DW, which could be difficult... ?

If the first idea is correct, then the template I use in PWCMS is merely a template of editable areas that I then apply to the DW template page newly created???

Yes, you create a page from the template and add the CMS developer notes to the page to add the content.


the template concept with in power cams is not to be confused with the DW Template concept which is where i think you are getting confused.

okay, so say I am creating 3 new pages in DW using its Templates, I then create 3 templates in PCMS with the same "names"
then I open the 3 new pages in DW and paste the developer notes in each of the editable areas of the DW pages? I.e., for the database to keep the content separate, I need to create unique PCMS pages with unique content? ... Or does creating the PCMS pages from the template automatically set up unique content for each page, from which I paste the developer code into the new DW pages?

And is there an advantage/recommended to upgrade my PowerCMS 2 install to the Design Extender version? I did that this morning.

FYI: I just watched the Power Builder tutorial https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGUP3-BnVfU And there is a major confusion in the tutorial about using DW Templates. In her example, she is selecting editable areas of a template, but then a note comes on the screen that says DO NOT select editable areas in a template... in a child page it is okay....

SO, the whole workflow for installing CMS into an existing site is VERY VERY confusing. If you insert a Content area for PCMS in a template's editable area, I suspect that every page is going to have the same content when you update a pages based upon the template because that area will be governed by a single PCMS content area?? What it sounds like you should do is create a child page based upon the DW template, then go into that child page (either in a Web Browser in the PCMS admin or in DW, or only using a the pcms admin in browser?), and create content areas for it? Then you should never use a PCMS template in a DW page because you will have to create a content area for each child page as an individual item... So, am I correct in thinking that you cannot really (or should not) add PCMS content areas to a DW Template? It was also confusing as to how/why she created a template in PCMS for the Logo area. How does that change or get added to each page?


Secondly, how can you edit SEO content on pages that are created using DW Templates. I see that that feature is available if you create a site in PCMS from scratch, but not sure it exists for adding it to an already existing site like my client's. Should I then create a PCMS template for SEO areas in the header as well??? Will that work since the code area is not visible in a browser!

What I see happening is for every page I create in DW as a child of a template, I need a corresponding PCMS template or content areas and I'm going to have to have a parallel naming convention like: burmese_rubies.php (for DW) burmese_rubiesPCMS.php to keep straight what I'm doing...

Look, I have a post-Master Degree, have studied Hebrew and Greek, and been coding since 1994, and when I say these tutorials are inexplicably confusing, it isn't because I have no brain. I think very basic concepts are being taken for granted by the trainer, not realizing that she has skipped some very essential steps....

I think you are over thinking things a bit.

There really is no difference in adding Power CMS to an existing site versus a new site.

To try to avoid confusion I Will refer to the Dreamweaver Template as the "DW Tempalte", nd the Power CMS Tempalte as the "CMS Template" going forward

you don't add CMS Content to the DW Template. only to the pages that are based on a the DW template

the use of the CMS Template allows you to create one page in the site, that will change the content displayed on it by use of a URL variable. The CMS Template concept allows you to create one physical page on the site that acts as multiple pages. This gives the user the ability to "create a new page" by creating a new page from the template. So for example:

In the CMS Admin, you create a new Content named "Blog" and you mark that to be used as a template.

In the "Blog" Content, you create 2 Content Areas, "Content" and "Title".

Now in DW Create a new page, for examples sake, we can call it blog.php. you can apply the DW Tempalte to this page if you like. In an editable region add the developer Notes code for the Blog Title and Blog Content content areas where you would like them to display.

So at this point, the CMS Template content is configured and the physical page that will show the content is configured. if you browse to this page in a browser, you will see the content that you entered for the Title and Content areas.

Now in the CMS Admin, Hover over the blog template, and click the green plus button to create a new page from the template. Give this a name such as "one" For this new template page, there will be a set of the same content areas, "Content" and "Tiltle". if you look at the developer notes for this new Template page, there will be a section to display it using a URL variable "?blog=1"

the idea being that if you browse to the page as:
blog.php

you see the original content for the Title and Content areas.

if you then browse to the page as:
blog.php?blog=1

you will see the new content for the template page you named One. the user can continue to "create new pages" based on this CMS Template in the CMS Admin, and you can see those new pages by using the corresponding URL variable.

Now you don't need to use a CMS Template for every page. lets say you want the home page to have editable content on it. in the CMS Admin, create a new Content named home, for this one we won't check the option to use it as a template. Create the desired content areas, then add the developer notes code to the index.php page.



as for SEO content, for your content pages, create the following content areas:
meta-keywords
meta-descripton
meta-title

the in your page, add the CMS to the meta tags, for example:

<meta name="keywords" content="<?php echo WA_getCMSContent($database_PowerCMSConnection, $PowerCMSConnection, 'content name', 'meta-keywords'); ?>">
<meta name="description" content="<?php echo WA_getCMSContent($database_PowerCMSConnection, $PowerCMSConnection, 'content name', 'meta-description'); ?>">
<title><?php echo WA_getCMSContent($database_PowerCMSConnection, $PowerCMSConnection, 'content name', 'meta-title'); ?></title>

You should have done the tutorial :-) Thanks. Part of the confusion is indeed the two uses of Template. But also, that video is done WRONG. She was using a DW template .dwt to add content areas...

Which video where you watching?

In this one:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbplAlzNexI&feature=youtu.be&hd=1

she uses Blog-Results.php, Blog-Details.php and Blog-All.php

Originally Said By: Jason Byrnes

  Which video where you watching?

In this one:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kbplAlzNexI&feature=youtu.be&hd=1

she uses Blog-Results.php, Blog-Details.php and Blog-All.php  

http://youtu.be/tGUP3-BnVfU?t=10m21s
Creating a Content Management System with Design Extender

She is using DW Templates which the note says she shouldn't do.

Also, I am not seeing the Properties manager that shows PowerCMS "edit in Dreamweaver"

When I try to choose Insert PowerCMS to the page I get the error in the attached image.

Also, I started with a PCMS 2 site and upgraded it to a Builder Site using the upgrade zip. I did not receive any option to set up a DB connection either when trying to insert content from DW using the CMS menu. Since the connection already exists I'm not sure how / if I can use the insert and add CMS menu within DW.

Jason, i am making the client's staff a superuser. Let me understand the sequence here. Since he does not have DW, am I going to have to add all the content areas via developer notes to the new DW child pages? What I'm saying is that powerCMS sees the content templates but not the actual pages, and so, once he navigates to a page on the site with the content areas added, he can edit it right there? But he can or cannot add the developer note from a web browser?

I was thinking that since he has an ftp program like Transmit, if I put up a blank child page (with layout and content areas but no content), he could duplicate the page and then add new developer link notes to that page, but I am thinking that might not be possible...