Auto create sub page(s) when a page is created

November Happy Hour will be moved to Thursday December 5th.

There are times when I want to make a structure of pages when one page is created. Sometimes it would be easy to just add an attributes to your page type, so each time a page of that type is created we will auto magically add a sub page.

First I made myself a attribute

Code Snippet
 [AttributeUsage(AttributeTargets.Class, AllowMultiple = true)]
public class EnsureSubPageAttribute : Attribute
{
    public Type PageType { get; set; }
    public string PageName { get; set; }
    public string URLSegment { get; set; }
    public int SortIndex { get; set; }
    public string SetReferenceToProperty { get; set; }
    public string[] SetPropertyNames { get; set; }
    public string[] SetPropertyValues { get; set; }
}
 

Then I add myself to the Created Page event. I do this stuff there since created page is only triggered once, and if I change my attributes I will ensure my sub pages on startup.

Code Snippet
 [ModuleDependency(typeof(PageTypeBuilder.Initializer))]
public class EnsureSubPages : IInitializableModule
{
    #region IInitializableModule Members
    public void Initialize(EPiServer.Framework.Initialization.InitializationEngine context)
    {
        EPiServer.DataFactory.Instance.CreatedPage += new EPiServer.PageEventHandler(Instance_CreatedPage);
        EnsureAllExistingPages();
    }
       
    public void Preload(string[] parameters) { }
 
    public void Uninitialize(EPiServer.Framework.Initialization.InitializationEngine context)
    {
        EPiServer.DataFactory.Instance.CreatedPage -= new EPiServer.PageEventHandler(Instance_CreatedPage);
    }
    #endregion
 

The method for created page looks like this

Code Snippet
 void Instance_CreatedPage(object sender, EPiServer.PageEventArgs e)
{
    EnsureSubPagesForPage(e.Page);
}
static void EnsureSubPagesForPage(PageData page)
{
    var type = page.GetType();
    PageDataCollection subPages = null;
    foreach (var attribute in type.GetCustomAttributes(true))
    {
        var myAttribute = (attribute as EnsureSubPageAttribute);
        if (myAttribute != null && !string.IsNullOrEmpty(myAttribute.URLSegment))
        {
            if (subPages == null)
                subPages = EPiServer.DataFactory.Instance.GetChildren(page.PageLink, LanguageSelector.MasterLanguage());
            var result = (from subPage in subPages where subPage.URLSegment == myAttribute.URLSegment select subPage).ToList();
            if (result.Count == 0)
                page = CreatePage(page, myAttribute);
            else
                UpdatePage(myAttribute, result[0]);
        }
    }
    if (page.IsModified)
        EPiServer.DataFactory.Instance.Save(page, EPiServer.DataAccess.SaveAction.ForceCurrentVersion | EPiServer.DataAccess.SaveAction.Publish, EPiServer.Security.AccessLevel.NoAccess);
}
 

but the cool (and dangerous ) task is the method that checks all the page types and find all that uses the attribute.Then finds all pages of that type and ensure them.

Code Snippet
 private static void EnsureAllExistingPages()
{
    foreach (var pagetype in EPiServer.DataAbstraction.PageType.List())
    {
        var typedPageType = PageTypeResolver.Instance.GetPageTypeType(pagetype.ID);
        if (typedPageType != null && typedPageType.GetCustomAttributes(typeof(EnsureSubPageAttribute), true).Length > 0)
        {
            var pages = FindPagesByPageType(typedPageType, PageReference.StartPage);
            foreach (var page in pages)
                EnsureSubPagesForPage(page);
        }
    }
}
 

So now one can in the code behind mark page types with attributes like this

Code Snippet
 [PageType(Name = "Department structur", Filename = "/Custom/Pages/Department.aspx", DefaultSortIndex = 10)]
[EnsureSubPage(
    PageType = typeof(AttachPageProviderPageType), 
    PageName = "Community pages", 
    SetPropertyNames=new string[] {"AttachChildrenFrom"},
    SetPropertyValues=new string[] {"22"},
    SetReferenceToProperty = "OneClubPage",
    URLSegment = "CommunityPages", 
    SortIndex = 10)]
[EnsureSubPage(
    PageType = typeof(UDPageType),
    PageName = "dummy page",
    URLSegment = "DummyPage",
    SortIndex=20)]
[EnsureSubPage(
    PageType = typeof(UDPageType),
    PageName = "dummy page 2",
    URLSegment = "DummyPage2", 
    SortIndex = 30)]
public class DepartmentPageType : TypedPageData, OnCreatedPage, IClubRoot
 

Feb 16, 2011

Auto create sub page(s) when a page is created

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