WebSphere Commerce DeveloperFeature Pack 7 or later

Creating Commerce Composer widgets

You can create a custom Commerce Composer widget that Management Center users can use to compose store pages. You must define your widget functionality, content, and presentation. Then, you must register your widget in the Commerce Composer framework, and subscribe one or more stores to use the widget.

Before you begin

Ensure that you are familiar with the terms and concepts that are described in the following topics:
Note: Widgets that are created with the Page Layout tool cannot be migrated to the Commerce Composer tool. You must recreate these widgets after you upgrade to Feature Pack 7 (or Feature Pack 8) and enable the Commerce Composer tool.
Ensure that you complete the following prerequisite tasks:
  • Publish a store that is based on the Feature Pack 7 or later Aurora starter store.
  • Install the Java Emitter Template (JET) package
  • Determine the functionality and behavior of the widget that you want to create. By default WebSphere Commerce provides various widgets to display store content, and marketing activities. Review the available Commerce Composer widgets before you begin creating your own widget so that you are not creating a widget that duplicates the functionality of an existing widget. For more information about the widgets that are available by default, see Commerce Composer widget library.
  • Determine whether you must create a widget from scratch, or if you can base your widget on the definition of an existing widget. If your custom widget is similar to an existing widget, use the existing widget definition to help you modify the generated code to meet your requirements.
  • Determine whether you require a site-level or store-level widget. For more information about each type of widget, see Commerce Composer widget architecture.
  • Add support for managing the page with the Commerce Composer framework if your widget is for a page that is not managed with the Commerce Composer tool. For more information see, Pages and page creation

Best Practices

When you are creating a widget, ensure that you follow the best practices for creating a Commerce Composer widget. For more information about these tips and guidelines, see Best practices for developing Commerce Composer assets.

Feature Pack 8Note: If you need to copy a Commerce Composer widget from one instance to another instance, you can use the Data Extract and Data Load utilities. Use the Data Extract utility to extract the widget registration and subscription data and then use the Data Load utility to load the extracted data into the target instance. For more information, see Extracting Commerce Composer data with the Data Extract utility.

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