Attention: We are retiring the ASP.NET Community Blogs. Learn more >

Community Starter Kit 2.0 - Overview

As the architecture for the CSK 2.0 continues to come to I will be posting updates here.  :)

The CSK 2.0 is being scheduled to release on the Whidbey schedule.  i.e.:  We want to have a CSK2.0 Beta ready for the VS.NET 2005 Beta anda CSK 2.0 RTM ready with the VS.NET 2005 RTM.  That being said I bet you are wondering what will be in the CSK 2.0...

The CSK 2.0 architecture team is trying to track with the changes in .NET that Whidbey has introduced as well as what has been promised for the Beta release of VS.NET 2005.  What this means is we will be throwing out a lot (nearly 100%) of the CSK 1.0 code base and replacing it with Master Pages, Data Providers, etc.  We are looking at many core changes as well:

  • Data Layer - since the CSK is a quasi portal and mainly a CMS style application, we are prototyping a RSS approach to all content that could be supplied from the system.  RSS can be extended anyway we want per the RSS 2.0 specification.  One of the definite extensions will be in the area of events.  With the Event Share Framework extension I believe we will have a stable way of handling calendar style events.
  • Middle Tier - also commonly called the Engine.  The CSK 2.0 Engine will look to be a set of Web Services.  What this means is the UI we put on top of the Engine can have the ability to directly link to the Engine -or- use a Web Services approach.  All of the RSS feeds will also be handled by the Engine.  This is one area that we have not put a lot of time into yet so it may change drastically over the next few days.  ;)
  • Presentation Layer - the UI is currently being designed using XPath queries for pretty much everything.  So far we have this working and it is promising to get really exciting!  Coupled with the use of Master Pages it makes it real simple to change the look, feel and layout of any page type very easy.
  • Modules - The term module may very well dissapear from the CSK lexicon.  Modules has too many differing definitions (though we do not have a solid replacement term yet).  So, for this, I will call them CSK Page Templates for now.  Also, with the Data Providers, each CSKPT will be able to define it's own data source (SQL, Oracle, Access, MySql, File System, RSS Aggregation, etc)  These are the CSKPTs we are expecting to release with the application:
    • Articles
    • Downloads
    • Links
    • Books
    • Events (EFS enabled)
    • Photo Gallery
    • File Directory
    • RSS Aggregation

More news as it becomes available...

No Comments