WCM 4 is a highly flexible object-oriented framework

Configurable, extensible and pluggable architecture

The back-office is MVC level 2 compliant and comes with clear separation between pages (views), actions and model (the default business logic). Pages are composed of sub-modules (templates or sub-views) reusable throughout the back-office application and cached for fast delivery (session and application level cache - APC).

In order to provide a fully customizable back-office and save programming time, each page has a default action controller that can be easily overridden to provide specific validation and logic processes. Thus, the standard inheritance model at the controller level eases the upgradability path with upcoming releases.

RESTful distribution

"Representational State Transfer" is a style of software architecture that is well-suited to distributed hypermedia systems such as the Web. Contrary to popular belief, it is not just another Web services protocol such as SOAP, nor is its scope of application limited to HTTP and the Web.

• Client-server separation: allows for separation of concerns (distribution of components), which improves UI portability and server scalability
• Stateless interaction: improves visibility of interactions (requests are self-contained), reliability (requests are atomic in nature), scalability (resource state is not "tied down" to one particular server)
• Cacheable resources: resources are potentially cacheable, thus improving network efficiency
• A uniform interface: simplifies overall system architecture, improves visibility of interactions
• Layered components: reduces overall system complexity (a layer cannot "see" beyond the one it interacts with), improves scalability (introduction of intermediates between layers), enables full load-balancing
• Optional code on demand: simplifies client implementation and improves system extensibility, but reduces visibility of interactions

Pluggable architecture

WCM 4 introduces a new set of plug-in based interfaces at several levels in the application. Developers can create their own search plug-ins to find and acquire content from external sources (e.g. 3rd party applications, Google search API, Yahoo search API, and more).

The system also comes with a content importation plug-in to easily ingest content from other applications, that can be used to provide specific transformation and normalization processes guarantying a seamless integration of external content. Developers can combine import and search plug-ins to create value-added features.

Flexible presentation mechanisms

WCM 4's template engine is based on the popular Smarty presentation framework. WCM 4 allows you to extend the existing framework and template logic to create your own modifiers and functions (like JSP tags for JAVA developer) to expose the business logic to the template designers.

This approach allows developers to present a simplified view of the business logic and reduce the learning curve for web designers by hiding the underlying complexity that may exist in the object-oriented code or in the several databases used to store and manage content.

Templates are driven by configurable generation rules providing control on the content and even on the naming rules of files, destination folders and URL which give you full-control on your URL naming patterns (e.g. SEO optimization, permalinks management, human-readable URL, and more).

The template engine API is accessible either in native mode or through a web-service layer giving you choice and flexibility in terms of pure performance (native API mode) and scalability (distributed and cached web-service layer).

XML at the core: access, share, configure and customize

WCM 4 is strongly configuration-based to easily modify dashboards, search results, system and business configuration. The search interface and the dashboards are managed through comprehensible XML configuration files.

All system and business objects managed by WCM 4 have a native XML representation. XML is at the core of our system and provides a natural and easy way to exchange data and content making for simple integration, data migration and upgrades.

Use it, learn it, customize it and make it yours

While Nstein’s customers have full access to the application’s source code, we have designed our architecture and the organization of our source code to clearly separate the core of the business logic layer. Thus, the "core" can be easily upgraded without breaking your customized code. However, we believe that having access to the entire code helps developers to fully understand the philosophy of the product.

WCM 4 also comes with a GUI library which eases design, development and maintenance of the back-office. The library provides an important set of tools, modules and controls with dedicated JavaScript objects using AJAX/AJAJ and the famous "prototype" library.

WCM 4 goes even further; for developers who don't need or don't wish to re-think the entire business logic layer, WCM 4 allows you to extend and change the behavior of the application through simple PHP scripting. For instance, you can easily tell WCM 4 how to react on CRUD events (creation, deletion, modification including versioning or rollback), and also on workflow events (such as executing a specific transition, entering or exiting a specific state) and more.

Take control of the entire lifecycle (CRUD + Workflow + Versioning) without changing the original code; extending your BLL is as easy as that!