Reusing configuration

Magnolia allows to reuse configuration items with JCR and with YAML.

include mechanism in YAML files

form:
  label: Example page properties
  tabs:
    - name: tabText
      label: Texts and categories
      fields:
        - name: title
          class: info.magnolia.ui.form.field.definition.TextFieldDefinition
          label: Title and categories
          i18n: true
        # an include within a list, here adding a field
        - !include /documentation-examples-templates/includes/categorization-field.yaml
# an include within a map, here adding a tab
actions: !include /documentation-examples-templates/includes/default-actions-block.yaml
   

extends mechanism in JCR node based configuration

You can extend a configuration by defining an extends property and setting its value to the source configuration you want it to inherit. The target configuration inherits everything from the source and adds its own exceptions. This can save time and effort as you only need to define exceptions explicitly. The mechanism is only available in the config repository. In the example below, the sportstation site definition extends the travelsite definition.

The definition inherits all configuration from the default configuration and adds its own domains, internationalization and URI-to-repository mappings. The extends property can point to the source configuration with an absolute or relative path.

Example: Generic tabs in dialogs

You can use Magnolia's extends mechanism to minimize configuration. For example, if you have a number of components that include an image, you can configure a generic image tab and use it by extension in all relevant dialogs.

This example configuration shows the use of a generic imageTab in a TextImage dialog.

Property:

Example: Extending JCR node based template definitions

You can configure one template in full and create as many extensions with slight differences as you like. The mechanism is used to minimize configuration. Only changes, exceptions and additions are configured in the extended configuration. All other configurations are taken from the original configuration.

The extends property has two possible values:

• </path to extended template>: Used to reference the template that is extended.
• override: Used to override a portion or part of the configuration that is extended.

In the example below page-template-2 extends page-template-1. The extended template uses the full configuration of the template it extends except the configurations in the extended template.