Accepted talks

WFQBE - DB Integration

Mauro Lorenzutti

The "DB Integration", ex "Webformat Query-by-Example", (wfqbe) extension extension is a plugin that allows you to connect to any DBMS, to construct a query with a visual wizard tool and to display the results in the FrontEnd. The results layout is template-based, i.e. you can define a particular layout for every query you make, and every field you retrive can be customized via TypoScript. The extension also provides the possibility to display your results in a default table template and to export your results in a CSV file. With a simple customization of your results template, you can reproduce a news-like functionality: you can have a list of records and, for each , a detail page too.

Further this extension allows you to create a search form to restrict your query results. In this way you can provide your FrontEnd user with a search module to search inside your database. The extension provides you a visual tool that drives you at the search form construction.

Finally, the extension allows you to insert new records inside your custom database. In this case too, the construction of the insert form is possible via a simple wizard tool. At the moment it's not possible to modify existing records: this is a future feature that will be implemented as soon as possible.
I'll be glad to describe this extension during T3DD07 and to show other developers how to use it. I think this extension will be very useful for everyone who needs to import data from an external database and can't (or don't want to) use DBAL. I hope that after my presentation some developers will be interested in helping me coding the new functionalities or, at least, to sponsor me. I already planned the future developments in a detailed roadmap that I can modify if someone needs to include different features.

At the moment the extension is available for download in the ER in a beta state with a manual (which contains a detailed tutorial). I'm using it in a lot of our new projects and I have received positive feedbacks from some of the almost 100 developers that have just downloaded and used it. Actually, I'm improving the base features and completing the new ones required for releasing the 1.0 version in a stable state.

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Mauro Lorenzutti is a software engineer for WEBFORMAT srl, an Italian web-agency. He works with TYPO3 since 2003 and has developed a lot of extensions. Two of his extensions are available in the Extension Repository and are "extendedshop" (an e-commerce extension) and "wfqbe" (a db-integration extension). He also has a lot of experience in TYPO3 teaching and consulting.