Branding a MOSS Corporate Intranet Portal, Part 3: LAYOUTS Pages

Artikel
11/12/2007

Introduction

In order to get a consistent look and feel across all the pages, we had to brand the LAYOUTS pages as well. Since we needed webapp-specific branding and didn’t want to deal with the additional effort involved in branding & testing SSPAdmin pages, I started out following what eventually came to be known as Method 2 from KB944105. After a bit of prototyping, it looks like we’ll be going with the HttpModule-based approach, plus a few exceptions handled by Method 1 from KB944105. Performance testing is coming up in the next couple of weeks, so I’ll be sure to share how that shakes out (Method 2 is our fallback if performance is a big drag).

Thanks to Liam Cleary, whose code gave me a huge kickstart on this solution.

BrandingModule Project

The BrandingModule project consists of three components:

· ResourceRedirect Class – HTTPModule used to execute master page and other resource redirects

· RedirectSectionHandler Class – Configuration file section handler for processing ResourceRediect configuration settings

· Redirect Structure – Structure used to capture individual configuration setting elements for ResourceRedirect

Redirect Structure

The Redirect Structure is a simple structure for capturing configuration settings for all five types of redirects. Usage by type is detailed in the description.

Public Members

Member	Type	Inheritance	Description
pattern	Property	n/a	· pageRedirects -Captures the CONTAINS pattern-match filter · destinationRedirects - Captures the CONTAINS pattern-match filter · pathRedirects - Captures the STARTS WITH pattern-match filter · comboRedirects - Captures the STARTS WITH pattern-match filter · masterRedirects – not used
masterPageUrl	Property	n/a	· pageRedirects -identifies replacement master page · destinationRedirects – not used · pathRedirects - identifies replacement master page · comboRedirects - identifies replacement master page · masterRedirects – identifies replacement master page
originalMaster	Property	n/a	· pageRedirects - identifies original master page used to identify a class of pages · destinationRedirects – not used · pathRedirects - not used · comboRedirects - not used · masterRedirects – identifies original master page used to identify a class of pages
destinationPageUrl	Property	n/a	· pageRedirects - not used · destinationRedirects – identifies redirect page · pathRedirects - not used · comboRedirects - not used · masterRedirects – not used

RedirectSectionHandler class

The RedirectSectionHandler is a custom implementation of the System.Configuration.IConfigurationSectionHandler class.

Public Members

Member

Type

Inheritance

Description

Create

Object

IConfigurationSectionHandler

Returns a collection of Redirect objects and performs minimal validation on entries. Throws a ConfigurationErrorsException if either of the following conditions is true:

· masterPageUrl and destinationPageUrl are blank/missing

· pattern and originalMaster are blank/missing

ResourceRedirect Class

RecourceRedirect is a custom implementation of System.Web.IHttpModule.

Public Members

Member	Type	Inheritance	Description
Init	Method	IHttpModule	Adds the context_PreRequestHandlerExecute event handler to the PreRequestHandlerExecute event handler.
Dispose	Method	IHttpModule	Non-implemented stub.
context_PreRequestHandlerExecute	Method	n/a	Adds the page_PreInit event handler to the PreInit event handler if the current handler is a page.
page_PreInit	Method	n/a	Processes redirect instructions as specified in the configuration file. Redirects are processed in the following order: 1. Destination Redirects identified in the Branding/destinationRedirects configuration section. 2. Combination Redirects identified in the Branding/comboRedirects configuration section. 3. Path Redirects identified in the Branding/pathRedirects configuration section. 4. PageRedirects identified in the Branding/pageRedirects configuration section. 5. Master Page Redirects identified in the Branding/masterRedirects configuration section.

Private Members

Member	Type	Inheritance	Description
UpdateLog	Method	n/a	Writes event log entries. Not used – intended for diagnostic purposes only.

Configuration Settings

The ResourceRedirect requires three sets of configuration settings to be registered in a web application:

· SectionGroup configuration

· HttpModule configuration

· Branding configuration

SectionGroup Configuration

The custom section group and sections for the Branding configuration require registration in the web.config file. The <configSection/> element REQUIRES the following:

<section name="pageRedirects"