dotnetnuke doubts

Question

hi guys, i want to build a website in dnn 5. i have studied dnn5, its installation, starter-kit installation, built-in modules (both of Host and Admin), installing a custom module (from module extension), creating packages.

I had rather still some doubts left in my mind.

1.How should i progress if i need to built my custom module in some new website (& not in dotnetnuke.com website)

2.How is deployment done at client side? Is it done by creating packages or what, i dont know.please suggest some possible solution

3.I want to create a document module to satisfy my client requirements. This module is already built by dotnetnuke.com as an extra module. What should be done to include this module in my new website so that only my requirements could be reflected instead of creating the module entirely from scratch?

thanks

Answer 1

I'm not entirely sure about what you're looking to do, but I'll answer as much as I can.

I would suggest setting up a DotNetNuke website on your local machine, using the Source package. You can then create a new module (starting it either through the website itself, or by using a Visual Studio template). I strongly suggest using a Web Application Project for the module, keeping it in the website's DesktopModules folder (so that you're only dealing with the module's code, and don't have the entire website open in your project). Also, make sure you use the module and any other extension points to implement your functionality, rather than making changes to the actual DNN core code (since any changes to the core will make it that much more difficult to upgrade to newer versions of DNN).

I strongly suggest getting some automated packaging in place (the template that I linked to has a NAnt build script with it that you can use to package your module). It is so much easier to deploy modules as installable packages than trying to migrate individual files.

You can get the source version of the Documents module from its Codeplex project. It's licensed under the MIT license (like DNN itself), so you're free to use it as a starting point for your own module. Just download the source package and install it into your development site. The install will include all of the source and also includes a Visual Studio project that you can use. After installing, I would suggest that your first step be to rename the namespace (so that you're differentiated from the core module).

UPDATE
To deploy the website, I would suggest installing DNN on the server using the main DNN Install package. Then, once that is installed, you can install the module into the website using the package that you have created. A default installation of DNN will only have the Text/HTML module, in addition to administrative modules, so you shouldn't have very many extra, unused functionality present in the site.

Leave me a comment & update your question (or start a new question) if there's anything else you need to know.