BLOX Digital has decided to discontinue service for its legacy BLOX Total CMS appliance OS, effective June 1, 2024. This decision was made to focus our resources on new strategic initiatives and better serve the evolving needs of our partners.
We understand that transitioning to a different CMS environment can be complex. To help you during this period, we are providing resources and guidance for the transition to Hosted BLOX Total CMS.
BLOX Digital’s BLOX Total CMS team has been instrumental in helping legacy appliance sites make the transition to Hosted Total CMS. The Total CMS team will take care of the hosted domain’s setup once Total CMS has been enabled. All settings and configurations from the legacy appliance CMS to the Hosted BLOX Total CMS platform will be copied.
To make this transition more accessible, we've prepared documentation that includes information you’ll need to transition from the BLOX Total CMS Appliance OS to Hosted BLOX Total CMS with a local file-share server.
Hosted Transition work covered by BLOX Digital:
BLOX Total CMS - Host environment enabled
The BLOX Total CMS Host environment-enabled service will cover transferring existing Adobe InDesign settings (page creation, path configurations, preferences, and translate rulesets).
Includes replicating basic workflows.
Replicate PageTracker settings in BLOX Total CMS
Customer responsibility includes, but is not limited to:
Creating new user groups as/if needed
Adding admin users as/if needed
Replicating any BLOX Total CMS job (working with BLOX Digital CS as needed)
Creating folder hierarchy needed for non-BLOX Appliance servers.
There currently isn't a way to clone a non-hosted domain (appliance-based) to a hosted domain with BLOX Total CMS enabled. Hence, it's a matter of a lot of copy/paste (or typing) between the local and hosted domain with two browser tabs opened side by side.
Prep: in the hosted domain: Applications>Community > User; modify or create the Reporter(s) group as needed for workflows later.
Assignments: full access
PageTacker: full access
Syndication: Import Content.
For Editor(s) group:
Workflow: Change process": true; Change workflow": true
Note: If the Reporter group has workflow rights - then no group would be excluded from any workflow/process. But it is still a good way to search/organize assets.
Prep: In the local domain: Suggest creating a temporary desktop folder and
From the local domain, download rulesets.
From path configuration, if set to "%{domain}, record the domain name as you may need that to set hosted path configuration. (e.g. domainname.local = domainname_local)
From Asset > Application settings > article > Depth conversion factor, record-setting
Note in PageTracker > E-edition configuration which pubs are linked to e-edition and record job ID and domain.
Prep: Review all local-domain setting entries; some local domains support two or more hosted domains. More than likely, hosted-domain-specific pub codes and workflows will not need to be replicated in each hosted domain.
In hosted domain:
1. Applications > Assets > Application settings: add Depth conversion factor value
2. Applications > Other > Settings > Workflows
A. Create Pages workflow – using settings from the local domain
B. Create a general web-and-print workflow specific to this domain - using settings from the local domain
C. Create web-only workflow if similar existed in the local domain
D. Create print-only workflow if similar existed in the local domain
E. Creating wire workflow is similar to what exists in the local domain
Note: If the local domain was, basically, an umbrella domain, not all workflows from that local domain may be germane to the hosted domain. Cull as needed.
3. Applications > Other > Settings > InDesign > Page creation settings
A. Publications: Add relevant pubcodes/volume/publication days, etc., as set in the local domain
B. Content Types: Add content settings if/as needed.
C. Index: Add index setting from the local domain
D. Color, Sections: Defaults have rarely been changed, but check to be sure
E. Editions: Add if needed
F. Zones: Add if needed
G. Plates: Add if needed
H. Naming: Add naming convention in the local domain
I. Subfolders: Add hierarchy from the local domain
4. Applications > Other > Settings > InDesign > Path configuration
Regardless of whether the site is going to switch to an in-house file-share server or will continue using the Appliance file-share, the default path on the hosted domain will need to be modified to match the local domain path configuration.
Change all “%{domain}” tags to match the local path config. Firefox and Chrome have add-ons/extensions for Find and Replace. Chrome’s “Find & Replace for Text Editing 1.3.37” extension works well, as does Fox Replace (https://github.com/Woundorf/foxreplace) for Firefox.
A. Modify %{domain} for all settings, all tabs
B. Windows: modify “Windows Base Path:” as needed (Note: if switching to in-house server, they may opt to have a root share of “tcms” in which tcms_data, tcms_indesign, and tcms_purged are located. Add that root here (e.g.,//dnsname/tcms)
I. Modify Advertising, Ads, Ads Alternate paths as needed.
II. Verify Ads Reports and PCAB paths
C. MacOS: modify “MacOS Base Path:” as needed (Note:if switching to an in-house server, they may opt to have a root share of “tcms” in which tcms_data, tcms_indesign, and tcms_purged are located. Add that root here (e.g.,//volumes/tcms)
I. Modify Advertising, Ads, Ads Alternate paths as needed.
II. Verify Ads Reports and PCAB paths
5. Applications > Other > Settings > InDesign > Translate Rulesets
A. With hosted domains, the site may use one location link to rulesets
B. Or, upload the ruleset exported from the local domain
I. Check rulesets for instances where section tags are referenced; share that info with the site.
II. For sure, add a section tag for ap/sports/agate and add that to the channel category map.
Additional Tips
Instead of copying/pasting between local and hosted domains, you can use the browser Dev Tool for networks and capture/save the JSON file settings. Firefox does a nice job of making those readable — and there are a few browser functions to make those even more readable.
Chrome tends to have more readable Dev Tool results than Firefox, but both return the same information.
Not tested in Bing or Safari
In Chrome, open the local domain, launch Dev Tool (Windows) CTRL + SHIFT + I, and select NetWork>Fetch/XHR. (Firefox (Windows) CTRL + SHIFT + E)
Switch focus to the local domain and start fetching:
Application > Settings > InDesign
Page creation settings
Look for:
main?_dc=1677702465232
/domainname.local/tncms/admin/action/indesign/page_creation
Path configuration
Look for:
main?_dc=1677702474225
/domainname.local/tncms/admin/action/indesign/path_configuration
Workflows
Look for:
workflowList?_dc=1677702481277
/domainname.local/tncms/admin/action/main/settings_workflow
at least one "news" specific workflow for reference
Look for:
workflowGet?_dc=1677702484465&id=85158bd0-2d01-11e3-940b-00163ec2aa77
/domainname.local/tncms/admin/action/main/settings_workflow
Site tags (although, more than likely, not needed in hosted)
Look for:
tagList?_dc=1677702490561&start=0&limit=50&query=&status=active
/domainname.local/tncms/admin/action/main/settings_tag_site
Jobs (list of existing jobs for the site's reference if they want to work with CS in recreating the same.)
Look for:
jobList?_dc=1677702501435
/domainname.local/tncms/admin/action/main/settings_jobs
Individual active jobs (if/as needed)
XHRjobGet?_dc=1677702531423&id=341
/domainname.local/tncms/admin/action/main/settings_jobs
Close Settings.
Open Editorial / Page Tracker > Application settings
Just the one fetch in DevTool will be an expandable drop-down named similarly:
Look for:
getSettings
/domainname.local/tncms/admin/action/indesign/pagetracker
Can I continue to use the Appliance(s) as a file-share server? What do I need to do?
1. Under Settings>Site tags, remove any listed site tags.
- This prevents BLOX Total CMS from pushing content to hosted assets.
- Assets so tagged will lose the site tag
- Workflows will not automatically be updated; it is a good idea to remove them manually.
2. Under syndication, remove all channels. This will remove any importers that might be active
3. Under settings > jobs, remove all jobs (it may be a good idea to screenshot settings to recreate the jobs in the hosted
4. Under assets > application settings > importers: remove any scheduled jobs; screenshot settings to use in the hosted environment
5. Under assets > application settings > Automated article export: disable if needed
6. Under PageTracker > Application settings > e_Edition Configuration, clear out the settings of each publication. Be sure to to click "Save".
7. Under Settings > Linked sites: disconnect any outgoing links.