Hi everyone. This is my first post and I'm deeply curious about Zope. We're planning on some major product overhauls in our company and I was wondering if Zope (at some level - even programmatically in python if necessary) can do the following... 1) Authenticate against a SAML service or other XML based authentication scheme. How about a kerberos service? 2) If I have a table of, say, 100,000 records in PostgreSQL, can I configure Zope somehow to list a particular set of columns from that table in a list, and also provide edit/add pages to modify and insert records against the table? How hard/easy is it to do something like this? Are there any frameworks or classes to aide with this kind of stuff? 3) I know Zope has workflow, but can it be configured to work with external workflow services like JBPM running on a Jboss server? 4) Would you say Zope is suitable for 'enterprise' development - i.e. building things like Human Resource apps or an inventory module? I love the python end of Zope and the GUI and interface but I'm curious about the functional 'behind the scenes' features. I'm looking to use Zope to develop a set of applications that have nice functionalities and a nice look and feel as well, and I'm wondering overall, how much Zope can be 'bent' into something that is not really content management, but more like database records management, with workflow and security, etc., via web services. I know this is a general question, but any input is greatly needed and appreciated. 5) How friendly, overall, is zope with XML and web services like SOAP? If this is just a function of Python, then that's good enough. 6) Finally, how is zope different / better than plone? They're both CMS systems that seem to have a large following and a great API. I'm very new to both but am leaning towards Zope because it 'feels' like it can do more - however true that may be, at least that's what I perceive. Thanks in advance for your help, and I apologize for the newbie questions as dumb as they may sound. Alan
On Wed, Dec 01, 2004 at 07:01:20PM -0500, Alan Snyder wrote:
1) Authenticate against a SAML service or other XML based authentication scheme. How about a kerberos service?
Authentication in zope is handled by UserFolders. Drop in a third-party UserFolder that does what you want, or write your own based on SimpleUserFolder or ExUserFolder. Dunno about whether there are UF's for SAML or kerberos, but google should answer that.
2) If I have a table of, say, 100,000 records in PostgreSQL, can I configure Zope somehow to list a particular set of columns from that table in a list,
sure
and also provide edit/add pages to modify and insert records against the table?
sure
How hard/easy is it to do something like this? Are there any frameworks or classes to aide with this kind of stuff?
Out of the box there's ZSQLMethods which let you do arbitrary SQL statements, with configurable caching for expensive results. There's also APE which promises to let you use an SQL back end (among other things) as a ZODB storage so you could treat the data as rows or as objects, whatever's convenient. But this probably takes some work to set up. Never used it myself yet. Also there's something called SQLObject but I've never used it.
3) I know Zope has workflow, but can it be configured to work with external workflow services like JBPM running on a Jboss server?
i don't know what "work with" would mean in this context. If JBPM is something that can do xmlrpc or more generally make HTTP requests, then sure you could have it control zope. No idea whether this would be advisable in practice.
management, but more like database records management, with workflow and security, etc., via web services. I know this is a general question, but any input is greatly needed and appreciated.
haven't done this myself.
5) How friendly, overall, is zope with XML and web services like SOAP? If this is just a function of Python, then that's good enough.
No SOAP AFAIK. However, Zope supports XML-RPC. You can also of course do a lot with the REST style (just using http post/get etc.)
6) Finally, how is zope different / better than plone? They're both CMS systems that seem to have a large following and a great API. I'm
You've misunderstood. Zope is an application server. Plone is a content management application written for zope. There is no plone without zope. -- Paul Winkler http://www.slinkp.com
On Thursday 02 December 2004 01:01, Alan Snyder wrote:
Hi everyone. This is my first post and I'm deeply curious about Zope. We're planning on some major product overhauls in our company and I was wondering if Zope (at some level - even programmatically in python if necessary) can do the following...
1) Authenticate against a SAML service or other XML based authentication scheme. How about a kerberos service?
Well there is a programmable interface for zope authecation. It has a no nonsense interface, allowing you to authenticate to your little hearts desire. (It would help if you had python code for kerberos though 8-) I don't know if anyone has already done kerberos.
2) If I have a table of, say, 100,000 records in PostgreSQL, can I configure Zope somehow to list a particular set of columns from that table in a list, and also provide edit/add pages to modify and insert records against the table? How hard/easy is it to do something like this? Are there any frameworks or classes to aide with this kind of stuff?
Yes, this quite straight forward, and very simple.
3) I know Zope has workflow, but can it be configured to work with external workflow services like JBPM running on a Jboss server?
Zope it self doesn't have a workflow. there are several you can add on but personally I use zope as a web front end to postgress relational database. I've never used the workflow nor the CMF stuff. For me zope is used as an application server.
4) Would you say Zope is suitable for 'enterprise' development - i.e. building things like Human Resource apps or an inventory module? I love the python end of Zope and the GUI and interface but I'm curious about the functional 'behind the scenes' features. I'm looking to use Zope to develop a set of applications that have nice functionalities and a nice look and feel as well, and I'm wondering overall, how much Zope can be 'bent' into something that is not really content management, but more like database records management, with workflow and security, etc., via web services. I know this is a general question, but any input is greatly needed and appreciated.
Zope is an application server. The content management is just one of the applications it can server. (It's the most popular/successfull application).
5) How friendly, overall, is zope with XML and web services like SOAP? If this is just a function of Python, then that's good enough.
I don't know.
6) Finally, how is zope different / better than plone? They're both CMS systems that seem to have a large following and a great API. I'm very new to both but am leaning towards Zope because it 'feels' like it can do more - however true that may be, at least that's what I perceive.
Plone is the most successfull application run on Zope 8-). plone has alot more CMF/workflow stuff built on top of zope.
Thanks in advance for your help, and I apologize for the newbie questions as dumb as they may sound.
A few tips from my expirience with a huge database (small code) application: - I found zope to be fantastic web application server. It provides me with user authentication and storage, session support/storage, Transaction support/storage. In short what we used to call a transaction monitor. - I ended up avoiding data storage in zope objects. Used the tried and true age old code vs data split. All data in postgres, including my users as they are created dynamically (via web). The ZODB is some kind of object database, but as databases go, I still find the advantages of relational DB's to far outweigh the advantages of Objective DB's... on the other hand, it does wonders for the code 8-)... - Avoid the versions, they simply do not work, and by using them you run a high risk of corrupting your code database, 8-( Jerry
Alan _______________________________________________ Zope maillist - Zope@zope.org http://mail.zope.org/mailman/listinfo/zope ** No cross posts or HTML encoding! ** (Related lists - http://mail.zope.org/mailman/listinfo/zope-announce http://mail.zope.org/mailman/listinfo/zope-dev )
Ok - I apologize for that plone vs. zope question. I totally forgot that plone was built on top of zope. My experience with app servers is only with J2EE and JBoss -- a wonderful application, but a lot of overkill at times. However, when you need heavy duty stuff - transactions, object persistence, etc., it's a blessing. My real questions about zope were supposed to be from an application server point of view, but I was under the impression that it was a CMS system and it could be used as an app server - my fault. I'm going to research more into this, but from what I've read here, Zope is an application server and framework. Now, with that said, just installing Zope, in and of itself, doesn't give you anything that you could tinker with say in apache (like Plone). Zope is nothing until something else is built on top of it. So, I'm kinda at square 1 when it comes to designing an interface and CSS, etc. My hope is that I can start with what Plone offers and start to mold both Plone and Zope to suit my needs. I do need CMS functions in the apps I'll be developing (file upload/download, Wiki, etc.), so if I could get a consistent look and feel from Plone and still have the power and functionality of Zope, that would be good. Is this likely / possible, or, am I totally off here? Thanks again - and thanks for the super quick response! Alan On Thu, 2 Dec 2004 01:49:17 +0100, Jerry Westrick <jerry@westrick.com> wrote:
On Thursday 02 December 2004 01:01, Alan Snyder wrote:
Hi everyone. This is my first post and I'm deeply curious about Zope. We're planning on some major product overhauls in our company and I was wondering if Zope (at some level - even programmatically in python if necessary) can do the following...
1) Authenticate against a SAML service or other XML based authentication scheme. How about a kerberos service?
Well there is a programmable interface for zope authecation. It has a no nonsense interface, allowing you to authenticate to your little hearts desire. (It would help if you had python code for kerberos though 8-)
I don't know if anyone has already done kerberos.
2) If I have a table of, say, 100,000 records in PostgreSQL, can I configure Zope somehow to list a particular set of columns from that table in a list, and also provide edit/add pages to modify and insert records against the table? How hard/easy is it to do something like this? Are there any frameworks or classes to aide with this kind of stuff?
Yes, this quite straight forward, and very simple.
3) I know Zope has workflow, but can it be configured to work with external workflow services like JBPM running on a Jboss server?
Zope it self doesn't have a workflow. there are several you can add on but personally I use zope as a web front end to postgress relational database. I've never used the workflow nor the CMF stuff. For me zope is used as an application server.
4) Would you say Zope is suitable for 'enterprise' development - i.e. building things like Human Resource apps or an inventory module? I love the python end of Zope and the GUI and interface but I'm curious about the functional 'behind the scenes' features. I'm looking to use Zope to develop a set of applications that have nice functionalities and a nice look and feel as well, and I'm wondering overall, how much Zope can be 'bent' into something that is not really content management, but more like database records management, with workflow and security, etc., via web services. I know this is a general question, but any input is greatly needed and appreciated.
Zope is an application server. The content management is just one of the applications it can server. (It's the most popular/successfull application).
5) How friendly, overall, is zope with XML and web services like SOAP? If this is just a function of Python, then that's good enough.
I don't know.
6) Finally, how is zope different / better than plone? They're both CMS systems that seem to have a large following and a great API. I'm very new to both but am leaning towards Zope because it 'feels' like it can do more - however true that may be, at least that's what I perceive.
Plone is the most successfull application run on Zope 8-). plone has alot more CMF/workflow stuff built on top of zope.
Thanks in advance for your help, and I apologize for the newbie questions as dumb as they may sound.
A few tips from my expirience with a huge database (small code) application:
- I found zope to be fantastic web application server. It provides me with user authentication and storage, session support/storage, Transaction support/storage. In short what we used to call a transaction monitor.
- I ended up avoiding data storage in zope objects. Used the tried and true age old code vs data split. All data in postgres, including my users as they are created dynamically (via web).
The ZODB is some kind of object database, but as databases go, I still find the advantages of relational DB's to far outweigh the advantages of Objective DB's... on the other hand, it does wonders for the code 8-)...
- Avoid the versions, they simply do not work, and by using them you run a high risk of corrupting your code database, 8-(
Jerry
Alan
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On Wed, Dec 01, 2004 at 08:27:23PM -0500, Alan Snyder wrote:
... My experience with app servers is only with J2EE and JBoss -- a wonderful application, but a lot of overkill at times. However, when you need heavy duty stuff - transactions, object persistence, etc., it's a blessing.
"heavy duty"? You get object persistence and transactions from zope almost without paying any attention to what you're doing ;-) FWIW, where I work we run zope as well as a jboss app. The zope server is typically up for weeks until we restart it for software updates. The jboss server is down frequently. We've got it to the point where it's not down every day, but there's still no comparison in terms of which server is more stable *with our apps*. YMMV.
suit my needs. I do need CMS functions in the apps I'll be developing (file upload/download, Wiki, etc.), so if I could get a consistent look and feel from Plone and still have the power and functionality of Zope, that would be good. Is this likely / possible, or, am I totally off here?
You're not off, you're on :-) Note that Plone is not the only option - there's also Nuxeo CPS worth a look, as well as Silva, and you could always build a CMS yourself on top of CMFDefault if the more polished apps have more framework than you feel like dealing with. -- Paul Winkler http://www.slinkp.com
Hi,
Zope is nothing until something else is built on top of it. Just an objection here: with only zope you can still develop great products and don't need even CMF, Plone, Silva, etc. You can have nice websites with some powerful functionality. But for end users, this may be a little bit complicate ;-)
Regards, Josef
Alan Snyder wrote: (snip)
I'm going to research more into this, but from what I've read here, Zope is an application server and framework. Now, with that said, just installing Zope, in and of itself, doesn't give you anything that you could tinker with say in apache (like Plone). Zope is nothing until something else is built on top of it. So, I'm kinda at square 1 when it comes to designing an interface and CSS, etc. My hope is that I can start with what Plone offers and start to mold both Plone and Zope to suit my needs. I do need CMS functions in the apps I'll be developing (file upload/download, Wiki, etc.), so if I could get a consistent look and feel from Plone and still have the power and functionality of Zope, that would be good. Is this likely / possible, or, am I totally off here?
Some may disagree, but wrt/ the needs you seems to have, I'd rather leave Plone alone and stick with plain Zope. file [up|down]loadz, Wiki and like functionnalities are available outside of Plone, and building simple content management is quite easy (have a look as EpozDocument for a simple WYSWYG editable page base componant). My 2 cents -- Bruno Desthuilliers - Analyste-programmeur bruno@modulix.org www.modulix.com
Ok - I think I'll play with Zope 2 - I have a book on it and can flip through that. I'll play with the base Zope packages first and then hop onto Plone. I love the layout and look and feel of Plone and I'm curious about the visuals of naked zope. There's no better way to find out than to play so I'm hopefully able to dedicate today to that task. Thanks again everyone for your input. Much appreciated. On Thu, 02 Dec 2004 13:59:06 +0100, bruno modulix <bruno@modulix.org> wrote:
Alan Snyder wrote: (snip)
I'm going to research more into this, but from what I've read here, Zope is an application server and framework. Now, with that said, just installing Zope, in and of itself, doesn't give you anything that you could tinker with say in apache (like Plone). Zope is nothing until something else is built on top of it. So, I'm kinda at square 1 when it comes to designing an interface and CSS, etc. My hope is that I can start with what Plone offers and start to mold both Plone and Zope to suit my needs. I do need CMS functions in the apps I'll be developing (file upload/download, Wiki, etc.), so if I could get a consistent look and feel from Plone and still have the power and functionality of Zope, that would be good. Is this likely / possible, or, am I totally off here?
Some may disagree, but wrt/ the needs you seems to have, I'd rather leave Plone alone and stick with plain Zope. file [up|down]loadz, Wiki and like functionnalities are available outside of Plone, and building simple content management is quite easy (have a look as EpozDocument for a simple WYSWYG editable page base componant).
My 2 cents -- Bruno Desthuilliers - Analyste-programmeur bruno@modulix.org www.modulix.com
Alan Snyder wrote:
Ok - I think I'll play with Zope 2 - I have a book on it and can flip through that. I'll play with the base Zope packages first and then hop onto Plone. I love the layout and look and feel of Plone and I'm curious about the visuals of naked zope.
'naked' Zope doesn't have much visuals - unless you're talking about the ZMI !-)
There's no better way to find out than to play so I'm hopefully able to dedicate today to that task.
Have fun, and don't despair : beginning with Zope is known to be somewhat difficult, but the reward is worth the time invested. Bruno -- Bruno Desthuilliers - Analyste-programmeur bruno@modulix.org www.modulix.com
If you want to quickly get a feel for what zope does and how, run the ZopeZoo tutorial at http://zope.org/Members/jwhitener/zopeZoo_2_6 Regards, Roland
-----Original Message----- From: zope-bounces@zope.org [mailto:zope-bounces@zope.org] On Behalf Of bruno modulix Sent: 02 December 2004 18:40 To: Alan Snyder Cc: zope@zope.org Subject: Re: [Zope] Can Zope Do....?
Alan Snyder wrote:
Ok - I think I'll play with Zope 2 - I have a book on it and can flip through that. I'll play with the base Zope packages first and then hop onto Plone. I love the layout and look and feel of Plone and I'm curious about the visuals of naked zope.
'naked' Zope doesn't have much visuals - unless you're talking about the ZMI !-)
There's no better way to find out than to play so I'm hopefully able to dedicate today to that task.
Have fun, and don't despair : beginning with Zope is known to be somewhat difficult, but the reward is worth the time invested.
Bruno -- Bruno Desthuilliers - Analyste-programmeur bruno@modulix.org www.modulix.com
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participants (6)
-
Alan Snyder -
bruno modulix -
Jerry Westrick -
Josef Meile -
Paul Winkler -
Roland Giesler