Authoring - the Environment and Tools

Last update: April 17, 2024

CREATED FOR:

  • User

The authoring environment of AEM provides various mechanisms for organizing and editing your content. The tools provided are accessed from the various consoles and page editors.

Site Administration

The Websites console lets you manage and navigate your website. Using the two panes the structure of your website can be expanded and actions taken on the required element:

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Editing your Page Content

There is a separate page editor with the classic UI, using the content finder and the sidekick:

https://localhost:4502/cf#/content/geometrixx/en/products/triangle.html

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Accessing Help

Various Help resources can be directly accessed from within AEM:

As well as accessing help from the console toolbars, you can also access the help from the sidekick (using the ? icon) when editing a page:

Sidekick Collapsed

Or by using the Help button in the edit dialog of specific components; this will show context sensitive help.

Sidekick

The Components tab of the sidekick lets you browse the components available to be added to the current page. The required group can be expanded, then a component dragged to the required location on the page.

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The Content Finder

The Content Finder is a quick and easy way to find assets and/or content within the repository when editing a page.

You can use the content finder to locate a range of resources. Where appropriate you can drag an item and drop it into a paragraph on your page:

With all options you can search for specific items.

Finding Images

This tab lists any images in the repository.

After you have created an Image paragraph on your page, you can drag an item and drop it into the paragraph.

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Finding Documents

This tab lists any documents in the repository.

After you have created a Download paragraph on your page, you can drag an item and drop it into the paragraph.

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Finding Movies

This tab lists any movies (for example, Flash items) in the repository.

After you have created an appropriate paragraph (for example, Flash) on your page, you can drag an item and drop it into the paragraph.

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Products

This tab lists any products. After you have created an appropriate paragraph (for example, Product) on your page, you can drag an item and drop it into the paragraph.

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Finding Pages

This tab shows all pages. Double-click any page to open it for editing.

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Referencing Paragraphs from other Pages

This tab lets you search for another page. All paragraphs from that page will be listed. You can then drag a paragraph to your current page, this will create a reference to the original paragraph.

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Using the Full Repository View

This tab shows all the resources in the repository.

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Using Search with the Content Browser

On all options you can search for specific items. Any tags and any resources that match the search pattern are listed:

screen_shot_2012-02-08at100746am

You can also use wildcards for search. Supported wildcards are:

  • *
    matches a sequence of zero or more characters.

  • ?
    matches a single character.

NOTE
There’s a pseudo property “name” which must be used to perform a wildcard search.

For example, if there is an image available with the name:

ad-nmvtis.jpg

the following search patterns will find it (and any other images matching the pattern):

  • name:*nmv*

  • name:AD*
    the character matching is not case sensitive.

  • name:ad?nm??is.*
    you can use any number of wildcards in a query.

NOTE
You can also use SQL2 search.

Showing References

AEM lets you view which pages are linked to the page you are currently working on.

To show direct page references:

  1. In the sidekick, select the Page tab icon.

    screen_shot_2012-02-16at83127pm

  2. Select Show References… AEM opens the References window and displays which pages refer to the selected page, including their paths.

    screen_shot_2012-02-16at83311pm

In certain situations further actions are available from Sidekick, including:

Other inter-page relationships can be seen in the Websites console.

Audit Log

The Audit Log can be accessed from the Information tab of the sidekick. It lists the recent actions taken on the current page; for example:

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Page Information

The Website console also provides information about the current status of the page such as publication, modification, locked, livecopy, and so on.

Page Modes

When editing a page with the classic UI there are various modes that can be accessed using the icons at the bottom of the sidekick:

Page Modes

The row of icons at the bottom of the Sidekick are used to switch modes for working with the pages:

  • Edit
    This is the default mode and lets you edit the page, adding or deleting components and making other changes.

  • Preview
    This mode lets you preview the page as if it were appearing on your website in its final form.

  • Design
    In this mode, you have the possibility to edit the design of the page by configuring the components accessible.

NOTE
Other options are also available:

Keyboard Shortcuts

Various keyboard shortcuts are available.

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