Professional Alfresco: Practical Solutions for Enterprise Content Management

Chapter 8. Introducing Web Scripts

WHAT'S IN THIS CHAPTER?

• Understanding Web scripts

• Developing a Hello World Web script

• Exploring pre-built Web scripts

• Invoking Web scripts

• Working with client limitations

Alfresco Web scripts provide a unique way to programmatically interact with the Alfresco Content Application Server. Unlike other interfaces exposed by Alfresco, Web scripts offer a RESTful API for the content residing in the content repository. REST (Representational State Transfer) is an architectural style of which the Web architecture is the most prominent example, one based on HTTP requests and responses, URIs (Uniform Resource Identifiers), and document types.

The most exciting feature of Alfresco Web scripts is that they allow you to implement your own RESTful API. You do not need tooling or Java knowledge to create Web scripts; you simply need your favorite text editor or the Alfresco Explorer Web client: No compilation, generators, server restarts, or complex installs are required. This approach to developing an Alfresco API means that Web scripts offer many advantages over existing technologies, such as SOAP, including ease and speed of development, and flexibility in API design.

By focusing on the RESTful architectural style and ease of development, Web scripts allow you to simply build your own custom URI-identified and HTTP-accessible content management Web services backed by the Alfresco Content Application Server. It's like having an HTTP server with a built-in content ...