In this blog I will lay out some Administration Tips and Tricks around Digital Experience, WebSphere Portal and Web Content Manager:

IBM JDK 8 can be used with version 8.5

With version 8.5 of Digital Experience during install WebSphere Application Server 8.5.5.x and JDK 7.0.0.x are deployed as prerequisites for Digital Experience.

Starting with WebSphere Application Server 8.5.5.2 Java 7.1.0.x was provided with the Application Server fix pack. Starting with WebSphere Application Server 8.5.5.9 Java 8 was provided with the Application Server fix pack.

Starting with 8.5 CF12 Digital Experience supports Java 8.

Java version 8 can be installed via the Installation Manager. After installing the JDK the command managesdk can be leveraged to switch the JDK used with the Digital Experience profile to 8.

E.g. for Linux the process is described here in the InfoCenter: http://www.ibm.com/support/knowledgecenter/SSHRKX_8.5.0/mp/install/sdk_upgrade-Linux.html

Publishing a project on a subscriber

By default, syndicated projects can be published only on the server the project is created on, and cannot be published on downstream servers. In case a Preview server is part of the topology it can be difficult to preview projects within the project context. This new option allows to publish the project on e.g. a preview environment, test it and then publish it on Authoring. This also requires leveraging mirror syndication to reset the target environment to the right state.

Additional details can be found here: http://www.ibm.com/support/knowledgecenter/SSDK36_8.5.0/wcm/wcm_dev_projects_syndication.html

How to add WCM to a Portal 8.5 server install

Multiple Editions of the Digital Experience software exist. The Portal server offering does not include the WCM license and so some functionalities like creating content are disabled. It is possible to add WCM to a Portal server offering if needed. This can be done via the Installation Manager. The detailed steps are described here: http://www.ibm.com/support/knowledgecenter/en/SSHRKX_8.5.0/mp/install/inst_upsell.html

Disable Caching for WCM servlet URLs

In case caching of results of a server side WCM servlet URL is not desired the following URL parameters can be added:

&CACHE=NONE&CONTENTCACHE=NONE&CONNECTORCACHE=NONE

CACHE=NONE disables WCM basic caching.

CONTENTCACHE=NONE disables WCM advanced caching.

CONNECTORCACHE=NONE disables WCM caching of static responses.

Note though that this will have a performance impact as more database calls will be triggered.

Escaping rich text for JSON for WCM servlet URLs

If delivering content in form of JSON from WCM, rich text can be escaped to allow JSON formatting via the Plugin:CopyText tag with escape set to json.

The following example escapes the "Body" element of a piece of content for JSON:

"richtext":"[Plugin:CopyText count="1" format="trim" escape="json" text="[Element context='current' type='content' key='Body']"]"

Enabling fragment caching for IBM API portlets via XMLAccess

It is possible to enable fragment caching for existing IBM API portlets via XMLAccess tag portlet.

In the example below a public cache scope and timeout of 300 seconds is configured:

<portlet action="update" active="true" defaultlocale="en" domain="rel" name="Welcome to WebSphere Portal" objectid="Z3_00000000000000A0BR2B300S64" provided="false" servletref="ZV_00000000000000A0BR2B300SK0" uniquename="wps.p.Welcome To WebSphere Portal" remote-cache-scope-private="false" cache-expiration="300">
<access-control externalized="false" owner="undefined" private="false">
<role actionset="Editor" update="set">
<mapping subjectid="cn=wpsadmins,o=defaultwimfilebasedrealm" subjecttype="user_group" update="set"/>
</role>
</access-control>
</portlet>