dotCMS Edit Mode Anywhere

Introduction

The proliferation of headless content management systems (CMS) has benefited developers as it has freed them from the limitations of older CMS frameworks that cannot support modern, content-rich experiences. However, this freedom for developers has also had a downside as it has forced content managers and business users to rely on developers for managing anything beyond just content, similar to the way things were in the early 2000s, where progress often required developer intervention (e.g. "let's open a ticket"). Third-party solutions exist to address this issue, but they can add another technology to an already crowded digital marketing stack and bring with them the challenges of the total cost of ownership and return on investment.

In 2019 already, dotCMS introduced Edit Mode Anywhere as a native solution to this problem, and it is included in all dotCMS subscriptions. Edit Mode Anywhere enables full in-context editing for Jamstack, single-page apps (SPAs), progressive web apps (PWAs), and remote apps (JS, .Net, PHP, SpringMVC, etc.).

Key Concept Behind Edit Mode Anywhere

Edit Mode is the main tool in the dotCMS authoring environment for managing content, pages, page layouts, and page compositions. Edit Mode enables marketing teams to create, manage and optimize digital experiences and comes with a plethora of NoCode tooling that increases the independence of technology teams and higher time-to-value. 

This core capability can now run as “Edit Mode Anywhere” in cases where dotCMS runs headlessly or hybrid, and the marketing team must manage content rendered by external applications (Single Page Apps, IOT devices & the like). Running in Edit Mode Anywhere offers continued access to the digital marketing tools available when running in classic mode, and it addresses the key pain points marketers experience. Don’t just take our word for it.

Edit Mode Anywhere for Marketers

For marketers, Edit Mode Anywhere has brought a high comfort level of editor experience while executing their digital marketing ambition. More importantly, without going back in time and losing access to agile marketing tools, they have in a traditional CMS. Technology teams can leverage its latest and greatest flavor of front-end technology to drive innovation while marketing maintains agility with key digital marketing tools.

Preview

Regardless of where and how the content is exposed to your audiences, the marketing team can preview for devices, personas, and language at all times to ensure the experience is right before published. The number and layouts of preview devices is unlimited in dotCMS.

Page Layout Builder

dotCMS empowers marketing teams to create and manage page templates, even in a headless dotCMS deployment model. This offers the freedom of creation, 100% independently from developers, and no skills required around HTML/CSS or coding. This is one of the many NoCode tools in dotCMS. Page Layout Builder in action.

Drag & Drop Page Composition

For Single Page Apps, Progressive Web Apps, and many others, the marketing team can compose pages and experiences by dragging & dropping reusable widgets around to their liking. This is done seamlessly and with full control over the experience and preview visibility for personas, device types, and languages. Digital Experience Composition at its best.

Personalization

dotCMS comes with an intuitive personalization engine that allows for granular and data-driven hyper-personalization & content targeting. The rules engine is an extensible framework that allows seamless interoperability with commerce engines and marketing automation. In-session and external data, such as Marketing Automation and Customer Data Platforms, can be leveraged in the personalization strategy, whether you manage a desktop website, Single Page App, or IOT-display, all via NoCode tooling in both native and headless deployment of dotCMS.

Content Palette

The content palette allows the content editor to quickly create new content or re-use existing content while in the full preview mode of a page. This capability drives content velocity, time-to-value, and marketing agility. 

Inline Editing

The inline editing capability supports content editors who want to make small changes quickly. At the same time, they preview a page ready for publishing without having to go to the specific content object first. Inline editing is supported in hybrid headless dotCMS. 

Block Editor

The block editor is a new rich text content field that is the new standard in dotCMS for WYSIWYG content. Over time, this will be the de facto rich text editing tool and replace TinyMCE dotCMS currently ships with. The block editor provides more flexibility and also supports the nesting of other content types in a content block. This way, content editors can seamlessly alternate different content types and create engaging digital experiences.