Managing 150 Sites with Sitecore

1. Managing 150 Sites with Sitecore @Drexel university

2. Scope • Drexel – 300+ schools, departments, programs • Drexel College of Medicine – 100+ departments, programs • Academy of Natural Sciences

3. Development… • Sitecore development started in late 2008 with a single pilot site • 2 devs + 2 bosses + 1 conference room = 1 live website… in just a few weeks! • Then… off to the races!

4. Development… • Sitecore development started in late 2008 with a single pilot site • 2 devs + 2 bosses + 1 conference room = 1 live website… in just a few weeks! • Then… off to the races!

5. Web Project Workflow • … from a developer perspective

6. Website Structure • A typical site hierarchy • Site • Section • Section Page • Basic Page • Each site also has an “Extras” folder for component metadata items • CSS is stored in Sitecore and rendered via a custom handler “~/stylesheets/”

7. V1 -> V2 Conversion • V1 suffered from field bloat and misuse • V2 was a major shift in field allocation and design • Fewer fields – Easier for users. Avoid field misuse. Adherence to University’s new site policies • Inherited CSS • Responsive Design • UpgradeV1toV2.aspx • XML File that maps old templates to new templates • Root Item, Validate Mappings, Preview, Upgrade • Run once, Republish, and everyone is happy!

8. Import Data • Data Preservation is key when bringing a new site into Sitecore • Academy of Natural Sciences • Old XML Art Collection archive • Audubon Birds of America book plates • Drexel • Custom CMS -> V1 News, In The News, and Press Releases • -> V2 News and In The News merged with Drexel Now • College of Medicine • Faculty • News

9. PROD Environment

10. Other Environments

11. Flexible Components • Datasets and DatasetRenderers • Allows our “techie users” to quickly render lists of data • Sources of data: • Sitecore query • External SQL DB query • XML feed • Sharepoint List/View • Multiple DatasetRenderers may use the same Dataset • Supports a small set of inline functions using a custom language parser built with Irony.NET Dataset DatasetRenderers

12. Flexible Components • Active Data Calendar • Stand alone calendar system • Repository for all events at the university • Drexel.edu/Events • Hybrid of Sitecore and the Active Data Calendar app • Components to surface all calendar data in Sitecore • Parameters to control what data gets pulled from the calendar

13. Flexible Components • Custom 404 Handler • URLs that do not resolve to items are parsed and used to query our Lucene index in order to present the user with our “best guesses” of what they were looking for. • User is 301 redirected to the top matching page and presented a jQuery dialog with other matches. • Works across all sites. If no acceptable matches are found, we redirect the user to the homepage of that site. • DEMO: http://ansp.org/dinosaurs

14. Performance • Things that really helped improve performance • Adding the 2nd CD server • Updating DB cache values (/admin/cache.aspx) • Sitecore Debugger + Profiler • Component query optimization • Periodically analyzing the Sitecore log files

15. Development Practices • SVN for source control • Deployments occur via Sitecore packages • Files (except DLLs) are sync’d with DFS; DLLs copied manually to CD servers • Packages are used to deploy to TEST environments as well thus, testing the package • Conventions • We have code to dynamically generate a Field IDs DLL like Sitecores’. It contains name/GUID mappings for all our template fields so we can use strongly typed field references in our code.

16. I got this!

17. Questions? Demos? Shane Bair Paul Martin http://sitecorepm.wordpress.com @sitecorepm