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Creating new Web site layouts

SDL Digital Experience Accelerator comes with a set of Page Layouts and Region Layouts which allow you to build a variety of Pages. It is likely, however, that you will need to create your own page and/or region layouts to provide additional options for your editors when creating pages for the Web sites.

Before you begin

Set up your Web application in Visual Studio to allow you to add and test new code, including creating a custom Area to work in.

About this task

A Page Layout describes the high level structure of a Page. In the Content Manager, it is represented by a Page Template that an author can select or change when creating and editing Pages, and in the Web application by a Page View that contains the HTML markup that renders the high level elements of the Page. SDL Digital Experience Accelerator comes with the following Page Layouts:
  • Homepage (no additional tools or navigational elements)
  • Section Page (basically the same as the homepage, but allows for future differences)
  • Content Page (contains breadcrumb, social share toolbar, and left navigation)
  • Content Page Without Navigation (same as Content Page, but without left navigation)

The relationship between Page Templates and MVC Views is managed using metadata on the Page Template. Page Template metadata also specifies several Includes that define common elements found on all Pages using that Page Layout, for example the Header, Footer, Left Navigation, and Content Tools (breadcrumb and social sharing toolbar).

A Page Layout can render content into different Regions on the Page. Regions are container elements for content or widgets and are represented in the Web application by a Region View which contains the HTML markup for the container. For example, there are default column regions available (2-Column, 3-Column, and 4-Column) that place the elements added to them in the corresponding column layout. Regions do not have a dedicated representation in the Content Manager, instead when Editors add content to the page, they select a Component Template which matches a certain region (typically you will see the region name in the Component Template name, for example Teaser [2-Column])