EVO 104 Data Model needed to enable iterative site development/production cycles

Dear all,

I’m developing a website for my son and we decided to publish it as fast as possible: he needs it. So we start with a full content but regarding layout and behavior very basic implementation and will continue with stepwise improvements with all MODx-possibilities.
My son will in the meantime use the site and change the content frequently (like concert agenda’s).

BTW: I have 25 years IT-experience (my job), but this is my 1st attempt to build a website, so I had to learn XHTML, CSS, the GIMP (for photo’s) and MODx and am starting now.

Each time a development cycle is done I want to copy the newest developments to his site while keeping all the content. This is mainly stored in TV’s of course, but probably some settings in "system variables" or otherwise. The only "upgrade" I want to copy from development is layout, colors and behavior, so mainly the XHTML/CSS templates and some other settings.
Even the USER-Friendly URL’s and and SEO-stuff will be in the 2nd round.

I bought (and read!!) Antano Solar John’s book "MODx Web Development" and think I understand the deployment process. The first "go live" looks easy and pretty straight forward.

I think to realize this continuous development approach by:
1. each time copying all the file from the development MODx root directory to his site (and update the /manager/includes/confic.inc.php)
2. do an export/import from a the database, while excluding the tables containing the content (of the TV’s and possibly of some page/system variables).

To achieve this and make the right choices here, I obviously need the data model of Evo 1.0.4, most preferably with a good description/explanation.

Question:
Can one of you please direct me to such a data model and explanation?

(BTW I’m experienced in reading data models and when it is self explanatory enough, just the model does..)

Thanks in advance,

Hans Troost

NB. I think I have to move later to REVO, but due to the lacking (Quick) Front-end Editor and a hard to understand security model (even with the explanation on BOB’s Guide), having the book I mentioned before etc., I decided to start with EVO and later-on possibly move to REVO (for a multi-language implementation of the site)

The best way would be to simply upload the files/folders you change, and export/import the tables you change. No need to upgrade the whole site if all you’re changing is a few css files and such.

I would strongly recommend that you install the BkupMODx module and back the remote site up first every time you want to make a change.

As far as multi-language goes, you might want to take a look at YAMS. It’s very interesting. I have a series of articles on it in progress. http://sottwell.com/yams1.html

Thanks for your reply Susan,

Also thanks for pointing me to YAMS, I for sure will take a serious look to that in a later stage! To the Bkup-MODx module I will not wait that long: thanks for that too: I wasn’t aware of it.

Regarding my question you wrote
Quote from: sottwell at Oct 04, 2010, 01:59 AM

The best way would be to simply upload the files/folders you change, and export/import the tables you change.

and that is exactly what I intend to do.
However: not knowing the data-model makes this very difficult. E.g. when I change the XHTML-template, how do I know in which table it is stored (copy/paste possibly works as well for this example, but it is just an example)? For other changes, e.g. a new TV or changed setting: in which table are they stored?
Is the only way: using PHPMyAdmin to browse through the tables (hopefully they have self-explanatory names) and view their content followed by a guess which tables are involved and which ones not to touch?

Point is: the data model should tell me which tables I have changed with my continued development.
I assume that the data-model is well-documented and available somewhere in the MODx-development community. How can they develop without? I hoped to find this documentation for this open-source software.....

NB. The only thing I want to do for my website development is a stripped version of a normal software development environment: Development, Test, Acceptance, and Production. Stripped: I only use Dev and Prod.