Kentico Cloud Tools for Developers
It’s been nearly a year since Kentico Cloud was released and the Headless CMS concept is beginning to be a major player for developers. As more companies start to offer these API-first models for implementing their products, the technical community may be left scratching their heads on how to best implement them. In this article, I’ll tell you about some great resources waiting for developers looking to build with Kentico Cloud.
Bryan SoltisPublished on Sep 13, 2017
When a company launches as new product, there’s always an uphill challenge of getting the world to see the value in it. Slick features and functionality can woo most people, but developers are often a bit more critical in their evaluations. Because THEY are the ones that get to figure out how to get it to work, giving them the right tools and resources is essential.
When we released Kentico Cloud last year, we knew that this was going to be a pretty big shift in the CMS industry. Companies around the world had been conditioned to think of a CMS as an all-in-one solution that provides everything for you. That’s certainly not the case with a Headless CMS as so much of the functionality is up to the developer to implement. While this may be initially seen as a daunting task, more and more companies are realizing it opens the door to some pretty amazing capabilities.
To help with that transition, we have spent a LOT of time preparing a large collection of resources for anyone looking to work with the platform. If you’re like me and go there every day (it helps because it’s kind of my job), you are certainly up to date on each new SDK and sample project we’ve released. Most people, however, may not be aware of all the great tools and announcements made about the platform. In this article, I’m going to let you know about the various tools we have on the shelves to help get your development off and going quickly.
Developer Hub
For developers, there’s no better spot to go than the Kentico Cloud Developer Hub. This area has everything you need to learn how to build your applications using the platform. Designed to guide you from start to finish, the Developer Hub is a must when starting your development and getting answers to your technical questions. We have divided the information into several subsections, to help you find what you’re looking for quickly.
Documentation
Developers consume information in a variety of ways, but they all seem to start with documentation. For Kentico Cloud, this area contains step-by-step instructions on configuring and implementing the Delivery API into your projects. This area provides screenshots, examples, and explanations on the core features of Kentico Cloud and the API.
SDKs
Along with the documentation, we have several SDKs available. These include .NET, TypeScript, and (soon to be released) PHP. These packages are a great way to jumpstart your development and implement Kentico Cloud. They are also one of the most popular areas for anyone looking to contribute to our many open source projects.
Sample Projects
If you don’t want to start from scratch, we have several sample projects ready to go, as well! Whether your flavor is .NET Core, JavaScript, React, Angluar, or even Xamarin, this area has some great projects for you to use. Along with our SDKs, the sample projects are hosted on GitHub and available for anyone to contribute.
API Reference
No matter how many samples and documentation pages there are, developers will always need to see how the API works under the hood to fully understand it. The Kentico Cloud API reference section has task-based samples, built-in testing capabilities, and a ton of great info on how the system retrieves and updates information. You can see real results from the system, which can be essential when designing your applications.
Help Center
For developers and editors alike, the Help Center is a great place to find answers to common questions. This area contains focused sections on creating and managing content structure, multilingual content, and managing projects and teams. For developers, there is a section with a great introduction article, as well as other in depth topics that can help you get going with the API. Be sure to check out the FAQs to save yourself some searching, too!
Forums
No matter how much documentation and samples we produce, developers will always have questions that no website can answer. The Kentico Cloud Forums are a perfect spot to post those challenging obstacles and get help from the community. Check out the list of categories and tags to filter the posts to what you’re looking for.
Blog
The Kentico Cloud blog is another great source of information. Covering business to technical topics, this resource is a great way to see developing trends and articles around Kentico Cloud. The Development category is especially attractive as it covers very technical topics and often includes code samples and in-depth information. We publish technical articles at least twice a month so be sure to check the feed often to see what’s new with the platform.
Case Studies
All that technical information is just great, but what about REAL solutions?!? The Case Studies section has an ever-growing list of real world success stories using the platform. These projects have been implemented by many of our cloud partners and demonstrate how to use Kentico Cloud in everyday projects. These can serve as a great reference for architecting solutions and seeing how others have successfully used Kentico Cloud.
You!
While we have created tons of resources for teams to get started with the platform, it’s their real-life experiences that are often the most beneficial. Nearly every Kentico Cloud sample project and demo is open source, allowing anyone to contribute to the development. As more developers use the platform, they have submitted best practices and proven techniques to the demos, making them better over time. We have tried to make the starter projects as good as possible, however, it’s YOU that can make them great. If you see something that could be improved or an area that isn’t quite right, submit an update! We’d love to get more contributors to our samples to ensure we have the best materials available for anyone working with the system.
Get to Coding
As this blog details, there is a lot of great information to help developers get going with Kentico Cloud. From technical articles and documentation to working samples and boilerplates, we are constantly producing new content for every major platform. We will continue to build out new SDKs with the help of the community, as well as update our existing samples with best practices and proven solutions. So, there you have it! Everything you need to develop with Kentico Cloud is waiting. Now, go build something awesome!
Feeling like your brand’s content is getting lost in the noise?
Listen to our new podcast for practical tips, tricks, and strategies to make your content shine. From AI’s magic touch to content management mastery and customer experience secrets, we’ll cover it all.
Listen now