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Version 4.x > Bug reports > Linked documents: are they supposed to work this way?

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Josh Larios - 9/25/2009 5:30:04 PM

Linked documents: are they supposed to work this way?

Is it the intended behavior that changing the Document Name of a linked document should also change the Document Name of the original document?

This is causing some problems for us. Here's why:

We have two top level pages: "apple" and "banana". Under "apple" is a page named "coconut".

We have two editors. Each editor only has permission to create documents in his or her respective top level directory. Alice works under the "apple" directory, and Bob works under the "banana" directory. They can each browse the other's directories, but not make any changes in them.

If Bob creates a linked document pointing to /apple/coconut, everything is good. Both /apple/coconut and /banana/coconut are valid URLs, and they each have the appropriate styling for their respective parent documents.

But if Bob goes to the Form tab of /banana/coconut and changes the Document Name from "coconut" to "durian", suddenly there is no longer an /apple/coconut page--it's been renamed /apple/durian.

Bob probably should have instead changed the Document Alias from the Properties -> URLs tab, but that's beside the point. The fact that he can change URLs of pages in an area of the site he should have no write access to is the problem.

Two questions: 1) is this really the desired behavior? 2) If it is, linked documents won't work for us. How else can we have editors get that functionality (including a page from a different section of the site in their own section, maintaining their section's design but not being able to edit the content of the page)?

Kentico Developer

Kentico Developer

kentico_helenag - 9/28/2009 7:07:11 AM

RE:Linked documents: are they supposed to work this way?

Hello,

it is really desired behavior (the linked documents are exactly the same incl. the document names) so it seems it is not suitable for you.

I would recommend you to use a Copy functionality which does not cause the Document name issue. The disadvantage could be that it does not synchronize the content of the original and copy once the copy action is done.

Best regards,
Helena Grulichova

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Josh Larios - 9/28/2009 10:43:54 AM

RE:Linked documents: are they supposed to work this way?

That seems like an odd choice of desired behavior, since it breaks the security model--if someone doesn't have write access to a document, they shouldn't be able to change its name, period.

But, ok. Linked documents as implemented will not work for us. But Copy won't work either. I guess we'll have to use redirects in the menu, or something, and lose the ability to have the content styled the way we want.

Can I make this a feature request, then? Linked documents should work more like unix's symbolic links. Either that, or there should be a symbolic link feature in addition to the linked document one. I should be able to insert a link in my part of the content tree to a document in a different part of the content tree, and I should be able to name it whatever I want, without affecting the original document. Ideally, there would be an option to include any child documents, without having to create individual links to them as well.

Kentico Developer

Kentico Developer

kentico_helenag - 9/29/2009 7:47:05 AM

RE:Linked documents: are they supposed to work this way?

Hello,

I would recommend you to use the mentioned menu redirection in this case. You may configure it in:

document Properties -> Menu -> Menu action -> URL redirection

You may have different styles according the site position. For example: if current alias path contains “/Asection” substring it loads a different stylesheet than it contains “/Bsection” substring.

Should you need any additional details please let me know.

Best regards,
Helena Grulichova

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dmco - 2/7/2010 11:52:19 PM

RE:Linked documents: are they supposed to work this way?

Can I add another vote for this feature request.
It makes no sense to me that alterations to a document link change the original.

What I wanted was to have different Menu Captions for the same page for different role types, and Linked Document seemed like the perfect thing. Unfortunately not, since changing the Menu Caption on the link changes it for the document itself.

And I can't use a menu redirection to a single copy of the page, because the original copy should NOT appear in the menu, whereas the others with the redirect links should.
Meaning if the menu item redirects to the real page, the highlight path in my menu is screwed up.

Looks like I will have to make a copy for every role type :(

Kentico Developer

Kentico Developer

kentico_martind - 2/10/2010 7:04:01 AM

RE:Linked documents: are they supposed to work this way?

Hello,

Well, link to document is basically some logical representation of this document for you to be able to use it in another location (in content tree). It's something like application shortcut in windows. If you want to create same document again and ensure that changes for this document won't apply to original document you can create copy of the document.

Regarding your particular issue, there will be possible to use macros in 'Menu Caption' in next version so you will be able to create custom macro, check current user and his roles there and return appropriate value to be displayed in caption. In a meantime you would need to create custom menu or manually parse RenderedHTML property of menu web part.

Best Regards,

Martin Dobsicek

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