Over the past two weeks I’ve been working on a idea to demonstrate how to use Knockout.js with DNN module development. I presented the topic and demo’d a module at both the St. Louis Day of .NET and the Bay Area DotNetNuke User’s Group in the past week. The module is called SlidePresentation, and you can see it in action via the recording from the BayDug meeting earlier this week (available on youtube). The module allows you to create Slides, using HTML, and storing the data in the DotNetNuke ContentItem store. So there are no SQL scripts, and no database tables necessary for the module itself.

The code for the module is in C#, and currently being developed with DotNetNuke 6.2.2, and Visual Studio 2012 RC. The module utilizes a jquery library called JMPRESS.JS, which is included within the distribution You can download the SOURCE package for the module from the codeplex page https://slidepresentation.codeplex.com/, install the SOURCE package via the Host/Extensions page in your DNN development environment.

The module is pretty specific in its positioning, so you will likely need to modify CSS a bit to make things work within your skin. As you can see in the YouTube video linked above I am running the module in a modified version of the DNN Dark Knight skin.

Right now the module uses a web service (in the services folder) that provides a json list of Slides, and the VIEW control within the module loads this list of slides on the page using Knockout.js binding, then calls the jmpress library to configure the display of the slides. To Add slides in the module you can use the Actions menu, which will load the EDIT control, but if you want to edit an existing slide you will need to know the ContentItemId from the database and pass in ?ci=### as a querystring parameter to the edit control.

I’m working on a new version of the module that will allow for the creation, and editing, of slides all from within the View control using a webservice and Knockout binding, though that release will likely be a bit later in the month of August.

I will also be taking the code that gets developed in this module and using it, or something similar, to overhaul the Task Manager module as a new Module Development Tutorial using Knockout.js and ContentItems and the Services Framework.

For now head on over to Codeplex and grab the source for the module.