TYPO3
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 TYPO3 4.1 backend module |
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| Developed by | TYPO3 Association |
|---|---|
| Latest release | 4.2.6 / 2009-02-10 |
| Preview release | / April 17, 2008 |
| Operating system | Cross-platform |
| Platform | PHP |
| Type | Content management system |
| License | GNU General Public License |
| Website | www.typo3.com www.typo3.org (Developer Resource) |
TYPO3 is a free and open source content management system written in PHP.
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[edit] Author and availability
Initially authored by Kasper Skårhøj, it is available for free and licensed under the GNU General Public License. Today, the core of TYPO3 is developed by two teams in a maintenance tree (4.x, leader Michael Stucki) and a development tree (5.x, leader Robert Lemke). Independent authors have contributed hundreds of pluggable extensions.
TYPO3 offers full flexibility and extendability while featuring an accomplished set of ready-made interfaces, functions and modules. More than 3600 extensions are available for download under the GNU General Public License from a repository called the TYPO3 Extension Repository, or TER.
[edit] Operating modes
TYPO3 has two operating modes: a frontend (short: FE), which presents a TYPO3 based website to its users, and a backend (short: BE), used by authors and site administrators to manage content for the website. The backend is used with an ordinary web browser.
[edit] Design
The system is based on templates. People can choose an existing template and change features such as logo, colors, and fonts, or they can construct their own templates using a configuration language called TypoScript. In this simple notation, a large object tree structure of information is created with placeholders for data from the database to fill in. Preprogrammed objects are configured by changing or adding values or features. This object tree structure is saved in a text file. Various editors are available to change the content in a structured way. The PHP generator uses this data structure to drive the generation of the content. Besides conditions, TypoScript has no other control structures; if real processing must be performed, it is handed to a PHP function. The top level object is the PAGE object. There are various types of MENU objects.
[edit] Syntax of TypoScript
The basic syntax is:
[objectpath].[attribute] [operator] [value]
Operators are
- = assignment of a value
- < copy a whole object
- =< insert a reference
- > remove object
Examples:
myObject.attribute1=Hello
The content is mainly stored in two tables: one table called pages and another called tt_content, which holds the elements contained in a page. Every page object has a unique identification key (uid) and is linked to a parent page. Thus, the pages are organized in tree form, allowing the system to easily generate menus and site maps.
One key feature of TYPO3 is that it has a flexible application programming interface which enables independent developers to provide extra functionality. Modules using this API are called "extensions" and many developers provide their extensions in a publicly available repository on the TYPO3 developer portal.
[edit] TemplaVoila
TemplaVoila is an alternative template engine extension for TYPO3. A graphical mapping tool for creating templates is included, an alternative page module, the ability to create flexible content elements and an API for developers. New content element types can be created without programming. The author is engaged to provide full control over the HTML output.
Pro
- TemplaVoila facilitates more flexibility for maintaining web pages while making it possible to enforce a strict corporate design and allowing editors to work with content more intuitively.
Contra
- Slower than traditional TYPO3 templating
[edit] Requirements
Web server [1]
- Operating System: Unix (eg Linux), Windows or Mac
- Web server: Apache, IIS
- Middleware: PHP 4 or 5 (starting with TYPO3 4.2.0 all releases will require at least PHP 5.2)
- Database: Any other database system supported by the TYPO3 DBAL (e.g. MySQL,Oracle, PostgreSQL and a lot of others)
- Hardware: A normal web server setup will do, with some modern CPU and at least 256 MB RAM.
- Recommended: ImageMagick, GD Graphics Library, mod rewrite
Client (user) [1]
- Recommended: Mozilla Firefox on any OS, Internet Explorer 5+ on Windows, relatively modern computer hardware
- Required: Graphical browser, JavaScript
[edit] See also
[edit] Further reading
- Rene Fritz, Daniel Hinderink, Werner Altmann – TYPO3: Enterprise Content Management (Paperback) – ISBN 1-904811-41-8
- Michael Peacock – Building Websites with TYPO3 (Paperback) – ISBN 1-847191-11-8
