Jumping from MODx to Bildy

Many of MODx developers have taken an interest in Bildy lately. Both Bildy and MODx are based on the same ideology, so it doesn't seem so surprising. Quoting the MODx documentation of Core Design Philosophy: “Many Content Management Systems out currently sport hundreds of features built straight into them. This at first glance seems quite excellent; that is, until you realize you don't really need a Neon Sign Module or Automatic Farthing Converter in your website.” Well said indeed. If I'd have to choose another product, I'd most likely go with MODx.

The way these two products are built upon this ideology makes the difference. We thought it would be nice to compare how MODx features translate in to Bildy, to make comparing and learning easier. In both, most of the development happen in templates, so let’s start from there.

Writing templates

You can write Bildy templates as freely as MODx templates. In fact, templates work quite the same in both products. Any HTML code you put in a template comes out in the way you wrote it.

Template variables

In MODx you can create custom fields with "template variables". In Bildy fields are located in data models. Data model is a canvas where you can drop in any, and as many fields you want. In Bildy, every field is a custom field, or using MODx words: "template variable".

In MODx you’d place the template variable data with a syntax like: [*templatevar*]
In Bildy the same is done with <b:page.field> -tag. For example: <b:page.topic />

Some controls accept attributes that alter the output, for example the file upload control. Adding attributes to B:tags works just like in HTML: <b:page.myfile suffix=”thumbnail”/>

Links

Creating dynamic links with content ID is handy. In MODx you can get the document url with: [~123~]

In Bildy you can request any data, let it be page’s url, topic or content. There are several ways to get information from a single page, but to make it similar to MODx, let’s use the <b:id.datamodel.field/> tag. To get page's URL, you can write: <b:123.page.metadata.url/> and to get it’s topic you can write <b:123.page.topic/>

To find out page’s data model and ID, right-click on the page and view “info”.

Chunks

MODx chunks {{chunk}} are reusable pieces of code. In PHP this would be the same as require() and include() functions. The same goes with Bildy where we use <b:include file=”template”/> tag. This places the contents of the template where the tag is. Really handy when you have same code used in many places. The slight difference between MODx chunks and Bildy templates are, that chunks are stored in database, where templates are real files, and as your service builds up, you'll probably have way more chuncks than you templates.

Nice thing about MODx chunks is, that you can place them also in data fields. The same can done with B:tags... “but”. As a security measure, by default B:tags aren’t executed from control data. For example: it would be bad if one could write B:tags into blog comment and they would be executed. When you have a field you know won’t be compromised, you can switch B:tags execution on by adding run-attribute to it: <b:page.content run=”b”/>. To execute both B:tags and PHP you can use: <b:page.content run=”all”/> One thing to remember though: B:tags coming from control data aren’t cached, so this will increase little your servers workload a little.

Snippets, plugins and modules

MODx documentation says it out loud: "If you're confused about the difference between Snippets, Plugins, and Modules, you're not alone. Here's a brief description... " They are not alone with this problem. Many other products share the same problem of communicating differences between synonyms.

To prevent this (and other common) problems, a lot of time has been invested in designing and making that deeper layer of building blocks really work. We’ve been busy on this trough out the year aiming to make it powerful, understandable and as easy to work with as all the other parts of Bildy. As the metal is still hot, all we can say now is: there will be only one thing and it will be called “plugin”.

Going beyond MODx

Don’t get me wrong, there are many great MODx “plugins” that enable you to do most of these tricks (probably all). Here are few things that you can do straight out of the box (with B:tags):

Working on multiple documents

Turning away from the tech for a moment, Bildy UI is built in a way that you can work on multiple documents at the same time. Each page, datamodel and template opens in its own tab. This makes jumping between them really quick. The UI also has key shortcuts for saving. Press Ctrl+S to save, Ctrl+Alt+S to save and create new and Ctrl+Shift+S to save and open a duplicate for editing. Saving doesn't reload the page, so you can continue your work instead of waiting for the network to do it's job... and you can still undo (Ctrl+z) to a state you were before you saved.

These little things make a huge difference in everyday work. Ok, back to tech again.

Writing PHP, XML and other formats

You can freely write PHP straight in your templates. PHP is executed in the same flow with B:tags and they share the same data. You can mix and match PHP and B:tags in your templates. It's also possible to use other libraries and include your previous PHP codes. We also provide PHP API to shortcut your work and integrate with Bildy logic.

If you’d like to write something else than HTML in your templates, for example JSON, RSS or any XML, you’re free to do so. Templates can be in what ever format you want.

Listing data and creating navigations

You can list retrieve and show data with <b:get> tag. This works somewhat the same as Ditto listings, but you can write the template code inside the <b:get> tag.

To create navigations, check out <b:structure>. It works the same as <b:get> but gets information from the content structure (and deals with metadata).

Creating, editing and validating data

To create a form for inserting data –for example a blog commenting– you can use <b:form> This creates a common HTML <form> tag but inside it you can place controls for the data you want your users to insert. You can also use this tag to edit existing data. To validate the incoming data, you can use <b:rule/> to set validation rules with natural language and show these validating messages <b:validate>. These tags take the oh-so-common pain away from forms. *Phef*

Building logic

There is B:tags also for building logic. You can use <b:if> and <b:else> to change behavior when certain conditions happen. You can define and read values from <b:value/> or <b:cookie/> or see the incoming data with <b:env.get.field/> or <b:env.post.field/>.

Formatting data

To format and manipulate data, you can use <b:format.function> tags. You can convert to or clean HTML from text, set date formats, split text to substrings, search and replace and so on.

Conclusion

There are many similarities both in MODx and Bildy which make switching easy between these two. The logic is same in many thing, like the way hierarchy works. Bildy has less places to put your code into, but with the power of B:tags and flexibility of custom scripts, you won't be missing anything. Simplicity also means, that there’s less rules to learn.

The big difference is in the UI. The freedom Bildy gives you for to creating your own interface, and all the small details that have nothing to do with tech but make everyday use incredibly smooth. These are something you have to experience your self, take Bildy for a spin right now. If you don't have a host, we'll give you one.