Chapter 2 Getting Started with PowerDynamo

Looking at the sample Web site

In this tutorial you connect to the Dynamo sample Web site using Sybase Central, and survey the structure and content of that Web site. After completing this tutorial, you should understand the components that make up a PowerDynamo Web site.

Connecting from Sybase Central to the sample Web site

Locating Sybase Central on your desktop

If you are using Windows 95 or Windows NT 4.0, select Start | Programs | Sybase. You can also start Sybase Central from within the PowerDynamo program group by selecting Manage PowerDynamo .

If you are using Windows NT 3.51, Sybase Central is installed into a program group with the other software in this package. For example, if you are using PowerDynamo as part of Sybase Adaptive Server Anywhere Professional, you will find Sybase Central in the Sybase Adaptive Server Anywhere Professional program group.

To connect to the sample Web site:

1. Start Sybase Central.
   
   
2. Select Tools | Connection Profiles.
   
   
3. Select Dynamo Demo from the list of connection profiles, then click Connect to connect to the Web site.
   
   
4. If you have previously connected to this Web site, the Web site is listed in the left pane of the Sybase Central window under the PowerDynamo icon.
   
   If you have not previously connected to this Web site, you are prompted to create a new site. Click Yes. Enter Site for the name of the main contents folder, and check the boxes to import the samples and documentation. Click OK to create the Web site.
   
   

Navigating the sample Web site

Sybase Central has an Explorer-like interface. The left pane is a tree view of containers. The top-level containers are the various products that Sybase Central can manage (Adaptive Server Anywhere, Adaptive Server Enterprise, PowerDynamo, and so on). Within each of these product containers is a set of database servers or Web sites. The contents of each of these servers or sites is contained hierarchically within the container.

To display the structure and contents of the sample Web site:

1. Open your Web site container in the left pane. You can do this by clicking the + icon next to the folder or double-clicking the folder itself.
   
   Two folders are displayed: Connections and Site. The Site folder is also called the main contents folder.
   
   
2. Open the Site folder to explore the contents of the Web site.
   
   

The contents of the sample Web site

The Site folder contains the HTML templates and scripts for the Web site. Although this main content folder is named Site in the sample site, it may have a different name for each site.

If you open the main content folder (in this case Site), you will see folders named app, doc, images, and system.

• The app folder contains a sample application, which contains many examples of useful techniques for using PowerDynamo.
• The doc folder contains HTML documentation for PowerDynamo.
• The images folder contains the images for PowerDynamo.
• The system folder contains a set of PowerDynamo scripts that are automatically built into each new Web site to control the Sybase Central environment. Do not alter system scripts unless you are an advanced user wanting to customize your Web site administration environment.

The contents of the Connections folder are used to provide access to the database data that is queried or accessed from the Web clients. In some cases, and in this set of tutorials, the database containing the site is the same as that containing the data.

In summary, a Web site consists of documents, held in a main content folder, and data that may be in the same or different data sources, which is accessed using the connections in the Connections folder.

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