Migrating an existing site with InContext Editing to this system

In this article, you'll learn how to register as a free partner and migrate your existing ICE-enabled website to the hosted servers. You'll learn everything you need to set up the site so that your clients can continue editing the site content using any browser with an Internet connection. You'll also upload the provided JavaScript file to your site to enable InContext Editing functionality with your online business.

Sample files

To follow along with these instructions, download the provided sample files:

Download the sample file. (ZIP, 8K)

Click the link above to download the ZIP file. Uncompress the archive and save the ice.js file to your desktop. Later, you'll use the File Manager to upload this file to your site.

When you sign up, you'll get a Partner Account and access to the Partner Portal, which enables you to create online businesses and manage your web clients.

Follow these steps to register as a free Partner:

Launch a browser and visit the System's home page.

Click the Free Sign Up link to register as a free partner.

Complete the registration form to create your Free Business Catalyst account.

Check your email to get the confirmation email that contains links to the Partner Portal and the connection information for your free trial site.

Import an InContext Editing site as a trial site inside the Partner Portal

Click on the Go to Partner Portal link in the confirmation email. In the Partner Portal, click the Create Site link to launch the Online Business Builder.

The Online Business Builder appears.

In the Online Business Builder, choose the third option: Import your current website.

Note: The process of importing does not interrupt the operation of your existing website.

When you choose the Import option, the interface displays a field so that you can enter the URL of your existing live site. The system will download the site's assets in order to repurpose them as the basis of the new online business. Click Finish to proceed to the next section quickly.

If you prefer, you can click Next and enable the specific functionality desired--the remaining screens of the Online Business Builder take you through the following optional features. On each screen, you can choose to enable or disable the following functionality:

• Online store catalogs
• Email campaigns
• Lead tracking
• Blogs
• Forums
• Secure areas (password protected areas for sensitive content)
• Site search

After choosing to enable or disable each feature, click Next until you've selected the desired settings for each category. Generally speaking, it is a best practice to use the full solution. Click Finish and fill in your details set up the site:

Choose the address for your new site and choose the local time zone.

The name you choose for your site will become the beginning of the site's address:

http://my-site.worldsecuresystems.com

After entering your site details and accepting the end user license agreement, click Finish.

Your new trial site is live and available to view online. Click the Preview option to see it displayed in a new browser window.

Accessing the Admin Console to manage your site

The Admin Console is the online interface that enables you to update your account settings and maintain your site. To use the Admin Console and begin editing your online business, use a browser to visit the Admin page for your website. For example, enter the following URL into the address field:

http://my-site.worldsecuresystems.com/admin

Note: Replace "my-site" in the URL above with the address you entered in the site settings of the Online Business Builder.

Enter your name and password into the registration window that appears.

Note: Since the Admin Console loads in a browser, no additional software is required to use it. However, always remember to click Save after making your selections. If you click the Back button or close the browser window before saving your changes, they will be discarded.

Accessing the InContext Editing interface

To access the InContext Editing user interface, choose Website > InContext Editing.

The InContext Editing interface appears. Click Start Editing, and then click the Follow Link icons that appear over links to navigate to the desired page and begin making changes.

At this point, the InContext Editing user interface is functional, all the previously defined editable regions are active and you can fully use the editor to update web content.

There's just one more thing left to do before delivering the site to your customer--set up the keyboard shortcut functionality. This next step will enable your clients to invoke InContext Editing by pressing Control-E (or Command-E).

Configuring the site to launch InContext Editing with keyboard shortcuts

After importing the existing site to the Business Catalyst Platform, the keyboard shortcut that invokes the InContext Editing user interface does not work. This occurs because the JavaScript file that is triggered when you press Control-E (Windows) or Command-E (Mac) is still linked to the standalone service. To fix that, you'll replace the JavaScript file on your site with the one provided in the Sample Files provided at the top of this article.

After logging in to the Admin Console, click the File Manager link on the right side:

During the import process, the Online Business Builder imported the includes folder that exists in the root of the site. Use the File Manager to navigate to the includes folder (Root > includes).

In the list of folders in the File Manager page, double-click on the includes folder to expand it. Then, double-click on the ice folder. This folder contains the following files:

• ice.js
• ice.conf.js
• ide.html

Click Upload File(s) to see the upload interface appear. Click the Select button next to the top field and browse to select the file named ice.js that you saved to your desktop. 

After adding this updated JavaScript file to your site, you and your web clients can now work with ICE when editing the Business Catalyst site.

Your clients can access the site in a browser, by following these steps:

Tip: If you want to edit a page using InContext Editing that is not linked from the main site (an orphaned page) you can enter the page's name in the address field of the browser while ICE is enabled:

For example:

This is the home page link:

http://my-site.worldsecuresystems.com/Admin/Editing.aspx#page=%2Fhome

Edit the URL (after the equal sign) to access the about page:

http://my-site.worldsecuresystems.com/Admin/Editing.aspx#page=about.html

The site content is displayed. Dashed lines around the defined areas represent the editable regions that you can change.

Make the desired changes, and then click the Admin Console link on the left side to return to the Admin Console interface.

It is a best practice to always preview the edited pages in a browser, to check their appearance on the live site.

To learn more about working with InContext Editing, see these articles:

• How Ice defines editable regions if none have been applied
• How to define editable regions using Dreamweaver
• How to hand code editable regions
  
  

Once you have set up the trial site and defined the ICE editable regions, you can send this link to your web clients to help them understand how to edit their site content with ICE:

Using InContext Editing to edit site content in a browser