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Install CMS 11 and Commerce 13

Describes a first-time installation of Optimizely Content Management System (CMS) and Optimizely Customized Commerce websites with the latest updates, with or without sample templates, and Optimizely Search & Navigation, and other platform components.

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Note

This topic is only applicable to versions Optimizely Content Management System (CMS 11) or Optimizely Customized Commerce version 13 and earlier, which are based on ASP.NET Framework.

For versions CMS 12 and Commerce 14 and higher, based on ASP.NET Core, see Installing Optimizely.

Prerequisites

You can install the desired Optimizely products individually, with or without sample templates. This is useful if you want to explore each product and its components in more detail, or build a site from scratch with more control. You can also use the Optimizely Foundation reference architecture to get a solution with multiple products quickly up and running.

Before installing, check the System requirements for Optimizely to ensure that your installation environment has the required components and versions.

The following components are needed to follow the instructions described here:

  • Microsoft Visual Studio for installing and updating Optimizely. (Community, Professional, or Enterprise)
  • Optimizely Visual Studio extension, which is a full set of templates for MVC to get a jump-start when developing websites. To install the Optimizely extension:
    1. In Visual Studio, select Tools > Extensions and Updates.
    2. In the extensions window, select Online, and type episerver in the search box.
    3. Select CMS Visual Studio Extension and click Download (or Update if already installed).
    4. Restart Visual Studio.
  • The Optimizely NuGet feed source <http://nuget.optimizely.com/feed/packages.svc/> added to your Visual Studio. Needed to add Optimizely Customized Commerce, Optimizely Search & Navigation and other add-ons to your solution, and to upgrade your project with the latest. See Installing Optimizely updates (CMS 11 and Commerce 13) on how to add the NuGet feed.
  • If your solution will be running in the cloud, follow the steps below to install the desired Optimizely components, and see Cloud deployment how to proceed to deploy the solution to cloud environments.

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Note

You can order a time-limited demo license for evaluation purposes—see Optimizely License Center (a license is not required when using IIS Express). You need a commercial Optimizely license for testing and production environments.

Install through reference architecture

The Optimizely Foundation reference architecture is an open source option to install an Optimizely solution with multiple products. Foundation offers a structured and modular starting point, allowing you to select products as projects to include or exclude from the solution. See Optimizely Foundation to learn how to install and get started.

Install CMS

Install an CMS website, empty or with the "Alloy" sample templates.

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Note

The description below applies to Visual Studio 2019. The steps are similar in Visual Studio 2017 and 2015. See Installing Optimizely for a video illustrating the procedure.

  1. Open Visual Studio and select File > New > Project.

  2. Search for the Episerver Web Site project template, select it, and click Next.

  3. Provide a name for your project and click Create.

  4. Select Alloy (MVC/WebForms) to create a site with sample content, or Empty for a site without templates. It is recommended to use MVC for new projects, as WebForms is deprecated.

  5. Select a search option:

    • For an Alloy site, select Episerver Find to use Optimizely Search & Navigation, or Episerver Search to use a basic search.
    • For an empty site, the Configure Search option is disabled, and no search will be installed. You can add Optimizely Search & Navigation or Episerver Search later if desired.
  6. Click OK. The project is created. When finalized, build and open the website in a browser.

  7. Log in to the site:

    • For an empty site, add /episerver to the site URL, and log in using your Windows credentials. For more information on how to configure your empty project further, see Creating a starter project. 
    • For Alloy MVC, you will be prompted to create an administrator account (site is using ASP.NET Identity). Provide the account credentials, click Register and you will be logged in. See also Installing a sample site.  
    • For Alloy WebForms, select the Log in link at the bottom of the start page, and log in using your Windows credentials. Note that you must be local admin on the server you are running Optimizely on. If not, create a new local user with admin rights under Control panel > Local Users and Groups, and log in using that account.

Install Optimizely Customized Commerce

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Note

The description below applies to Visual Studio 2019. The steps are similar in Visual Studio 2017 and 2015. See Installing Optimizely Customized Commerce for a video illustrating the procedure.

Empty Commerce site

These steps install an empty website locally with CMS and Optimizely Customized Commerce. Note that a Commerce installation has two sites; a front-end site with CMS and Optimizely Customized Commerce, and a back-end site with Commerce Manager.

Part 1: Create the front-end site with CMS

  1. Open Visual Studio and select File > New > Project.
  2. Search for the Episerver Web Site project template, select it and click Next.
  3. Provide a name for your project, make sure .NET Framework is set to 4.6.1 or higher.
  4. Click Create.
  5. In the Select a template dialog, select Empty and click OK. Visual Studio creates the project.

Part 2: Install Optimizely Customized Commerce components on the front-end site

  1. In Solution Explorer (CTRL + ALT + L), expand the project you just created, right-click on References and select Manage NuGet Packages.
  2. In the Package source dropdown, select Episerver.
  3. Click Browse and enter Commerce in the search field.
  4. Select the EPiServer.Commerce (main) package and click Install.
  5. When the installation completes, a Readme.txt file appears.
  6. Close the Readme.txt file, select EPiServer.Commerce.UI.ManagerIntegration and click Install. This adds the Commerce front-end components.
  7. When the installation completes, a Readme.txt file appears.

Part 3: Create the back-end site

  1. In the Solution Explorer, right click the solution you created in part 1 and select Add > New Project.

  2. Select ASP.NET Web Application (.NET Framework) as the project type and click Next.

  3. Give the project a name and click Create.

  4. Select Empty and click Create.

Part 4: Install Commerce Manager on the back-end site

  1. Right click on the back-end site that you created in part 3 and select Manage NuGet Packages.

  2. In the Package source dropdown, select Episerver.

  3. Click Browse and enter Commerce in the search field.

  4. Select the EPiServer.CommerceManager package and click Install.

  5. When installation completes, a Readme.txt file appears.

  6. Close the Readme.txt file and select the EPiServer.ServiceLocation.StructureMap package and click Install. This adds an implementation of the ServiceLocation / Dependency Injection framework.

Part 5: Final steps

  1. Update the database.
    a. Go to Tools > NuGet Package Manager > Package Manager Console.
    b. At PM, enter update-epidatabase.
  2. Build the solution (CTRL + SHIFT + B).
  3. Start the front-end site (Ctrl + F5).
  4. When prompted, log in using the default credentials admin/store (remember to change these later).
  5. If you see a screen of migration steps, click Execute all pending steps.
  6. Verify that you can access the edit and admin views using http://localhost:nnnnn/episerver (where nnnnn is the port number that is already displayed in the URL).

If you have difficulty accessing Commerce Manager from edit view:

  1. Right-click your back-end site with the Commerce Manager project in Visual Studio.
  2. Select Set as StartUp Project.
  3. Start the Commerce Manager site and log in.
  4. Make the front-end project the start-up project again.

To further set up your Commerce project, continue with the project structure section on Creating your project.

Install Optimizely Search & Navigation

Optimizely Search & Navigation consists of a service that you sign up to, and client packages that you install on your site. See Creating your project how to add Search & Navigation to your solution.

Integrate Optimizely Search & Navigation with Commerce

This integration adds Commerce-specific functionality when using Optimizely Search & Navigation with Optimizely Commerce. To install this on your website, run the Search & Navigation content indexing job on the site after the EPiServer.Find.Commerce package is installed.

Install Tracking & Personalization

The Optimizely Personalization product suite adds personalized content and product recommendations, and personalized search results to the site. You can also add components to store and analyze visitor activity through Optimizely Visitor Intelligence. Tracking and personalization components are based on services that you sign up to, and client packages that you install on the site.

See the following how to install and get started:

Install Marketing Automation components

The Marketing Automation product suite includes Optimizely Campaign for cross-channel automated campaign management, and a number of marketing automation connectors for popular marketing tools like Delivra, Salesforce, and Microsoft Dynamics. Marketing automation components are based on services that you sign up to, and client packages that you install on the site.

See the following how to install and get started:

Install other apps

You can extend Optimizely through applications (apps, also known as add-ons) available for a wide selection of areas, for example analytics, search optimization, and marketing automation. Most apps are installed as NuGet packages, see Optimizely add-ons and Installing add-ons.

If your solution will be using the Optimizely Digital Experience Platform cloud services, see DXP Requirements for supported apps.

Cloud deployment

There are different options for managing and deploying Optimizely solutions in the cloud. Before deploying, ensure that you have followed the requirements and recommendations to optimize your solution for cloud-based environments. 

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