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Developing Dynamic Web sites

SDL Tridion provides various features for developing dynamic Web sites, for example taxonomies, search, Dynamic Content Assembly, Linking and Dynamic Component Presentations.

The following steps provide an implementation plan for developing a Web site for SDL Tridion content.

StepNameDescription
1 Choose a scripting languageChoose the scripting environment in which you want to develop the Web site (JSP or ASP.NET).
2 Choose a Web site modelDecide which Web site model(s) you want to develop (the extent of dynamic functionality in your Web site).
3 Organize content for navigation (optional)If you want to generate navigation automatically, design a content organization that corresponds to the navigation you want to generate (otherwise uses static navigation).
4Create taxonomies for navigation (optional)If you want to generate navigation automatically, design a knowledge map of your content using Categories & Keywords from which to generate navigation and tag content with Keywords (otherwise uses static navigation).
5 Install, implement and integrate search (optional)Install and configure your third-party search engine. If you want to integrate search into SDL Tridion, you can do so by creating a custom Deployer module.
6 Develop Component Templates and Page TemplatesCreate Component Templates and Page Templates that present the Components and Pages in the way that you want them to be displayed.
7 Write queries for Dynamic Content Assembly (optional)If your Web site model requires queries for Dynamic Content Assembly, create a Page Template that executes such a query and processes the results.
8 Customize Linking (optional)SDL Tridion ships with a standard implementation of Linking. You may wish to change the default behavior.
9 Publish Dynamic Component Presentations (optional)If the Web site model requires it, make Component Templates dynamic in order to create Dynamic Component Presentations.
10 Test the Web sitePerform tests to verify that the site itself, as well as the search, hyperlinks and navigation, all work as expected.