Umbraco UI Builder is installed via the NuGet package manager by issuing the following command in your web project.

dotnet add package Umbraco.UIBuilder

If you wish to install Umbraco UI Builder into a class library without the UI elements, you can add a reference to the Umbraco.UIBuilder.Startup package instead.

dotnet add package Umbraco.UIBuilder.Startup

Alternatively, you can also find and install the NuGet package via the NuGet Package Manager graphical user interface (GUI) in Visual Studio.

Installing a License

See the Licensing page for details on how to install a license.

Umbraco UI Builder tries its best to mimic the content pipeline as closely as possible whilst sticking to public and supported APIs. This is so that the Data Type suite can be used fully for editing properties. There are some features in the Umbraco Core that are locked away in internal methods. This means that some features may not be fully supported. Below is a list of known issues to date.

Property Editors

Tags

Whilst we have support for persisting the tag's value, we don't currently have the ability to write these tags to the cmsTags DB table. This is all handled via a tagsRepository which is internal so we currently can't save to it as core does.

Umbraco UI Builder is a commercial product. You can run an Umbraco UI Builder unrestricted locally without the need a license. Running Umbraco UI Builder on a public domain will display a warning banner in the backoffice and will limit usage to a single editable collection. To remove these restrictions, you'll need to have a valid license.

How does it work?

Licenses are sold per backoffice domain and will also work on all subdomains. If you have alternative staging/qa environment domains, additional domains can be added to the license on request.

Let's say that you have a license configured for your domain, mysite.com, and you've requested two development domains, devdomain.com and devdomain2.com.

The license will cover the following domains:

• localhost

• *.local

• *.mysite.com

• www.mysite.com

• devdomain.com

• www.devdomain.com

• devdomain2.com

• www.devdomain2.com

What does a license cover?

There are a few differences as to what the licenses cover:

• A single license covers the installation of Umbraco UI Builder in 1 production backoffice domain, as well as in any requested development domains.

• The production domain includes all subdomains (e.g. *.mysite.com).

• The development domains work with or without the www subdomain.

• The license allows for an unlimited number of editable collections.

• The license also includes localhost and *.local as a valid domain.

Configuring your license

You can look at the pricing, features, and purchase a license on the Umbraco UI Builder page. On this page, you can fill out the form with your project details and requirements. A member of the Sales team will manage this process. In the process, you will need to provide all domains you wish to have covered by the license such as primary and staging/QA domains. You should then receive a license code to be installed in your solution.

Add additional domains

If you require to add additional domains to the license, reach out to the sales team. They will manage your request and take care of the process.

Installing your license

Once you have received your license code it needs to be installed on your site.

1. Open the root directory for your project files.

2. Locate and open the appSettings.json file.

3. Add your Umbraco UI builder license key to Umbraco:Licenses:Umbraco.UIBuilder:

"Umbraco": {
    "Licenses": {
        "Products": {
            "Umbraco.UIBuilder": "YOUR_LICENSE_KEY"
         }
  }    
}

Verify the license installation

You can verify that your license is successfully installed by logging into your project's backoffice and navigating to the settings section. Here you will see a license dashboard which should display the status of your license.

Validating a license without an outgoing Internet connection

Some Umbraco installations will have a highly locked down production environment, with firewall rules that prevent outgoing HTTP requests. This will interfere with the normal process of license validation.

On start-up, and periodically whilst Umbraco is running, the license component used by Umbraco UIBuilder will make an HTTP POST request to https://license-validation.umbraco.com/api/ValidateLicense.

If it's possible to do so, the firewall rules should be adjusted to allow this request.

If such a change is not feasible, there is another approach you can use.

You will need to have a server, or serverless function, that is running and can make a request to the online license validation service. That needs to run on a daily schedule, making a request and relaying it onto the restricted Umbraco environment.

To set this up, firstly ensure you have a reference to Umbraco.Licenses version 13.1 or higher. If the version of UIBuilder you are using depends on an earlier version, you can add a direct package reference for Umbraco.Licenses.

Then configure a random string as an authorization key in configuration. This is used as protection to ensure only valid requests are handled. You can also disable the normal regular license checks - as there is no point in these running if they will be blocked:

  "Umbraco": {
    "Licenses": {
      "Umbraco.UIBuilder": "<your license key>"
    },
    "LicensesOptions": {
      "EnableScheduledValidation": false,
      "ValidatedLicenseRelayAuthKey": "<your authorization key>"
    }

Your Internet enabled server should make a request of the following form to the online license validation service:

POST https://license-validation.umbraco.com/api/ValidateLicense
{
    "ProductId": "Umbraco.UIBuilder",
    "LicenseKey": "<your license key>",
    "Domain": "<your licensed domain>"
}

The response should be relayed exactly via an HTTP request to your restricted Umbraco environment:

POST http://<your umbraco environment>/umbraco/licenses/validatedLicense/relay?productId=<product id>&licenseKey=<license key>

A header with a key of X-AUTH-KEY and value of the authorization key you have configured should be provided.

This will trigger the same processes that occur when the normal scheduled validation completes ensuring your product is considered licensed.

In this section, we have summarized the changes to Umbraco UI Builder released in each version. Each version is presented with a link to the UI Builder issue tracker showing a list of issues resolved in the release. We also link to the individual issues themselves from the detail.

If there are any breaking changes or other issues to be aware of when upgrading they are also noted here.

Release History

This section contains the release notes for Umbraco UI Builder 14 including all changes for this version.

14.0.0-alpha1 (September 2nd 2024)

• Product migrated to support the new Web Component-based Umbraco

You can read more about the new Backoffice in the Umbraco CMS documentation.

Legacy release notes

You can find the release notes for Konstrukt in the Change log file on Github.

Umbraco UI Builder is the Umbraco v14+ backoffice UI builder for custom data structures configured via a fluent API.

If you have a custom data store that you want to content manage from within Umbraco, then you can use Umbraco UI Builder. With some lines of code, you can configure a custom administration UI, and reuse many core components with a consistent look and feel.

With Umbraco UI Builder, custom backoffice integrations can now take a matter of minutes, rather than days.

Using the Documentation

This documentation is aimed at developers who have at least a basic understanding of Umbraco, as well as C#/MVC principles.

Use the main menu to dive deeper into Umbraco UI Builder and get to know all of its features in detail. You can then jump to the specific topic you are interested in to find out more.

Getting Help

If you require assistance you can use our support channels to seek assistance.

Umbraco UI Builder can be configured directly via the AddUIBuilder extension method on IUmbracoBuilder.

AddUIBuilder

To configure Umbraco UI Builder via the AddUIBuilder extension method, You can look in the Program.cs file in the root of your web project. From within this file, before the call to AddComposers() we can add our AddUIBuilder configuration.

The AddUIBuilder extension method accepts a single parameter, a delegate function with one of the Umbraco UI Builder configuration builder arguments. With this, you can then call the relevant fluent APIs to define your solution.

This article shows how to manually upgrade Umbraco UI Builder to run the latest version. When upgrading Umbraco UI Builder, be sure to also consult the notes to learn about potential breaking changes and common pitfalls.

Get the latest version of Umbraco UI Builder

To upgrade to the latest version of Umbraco UI Builder you can use:

• NuGet

• Visual Studio

NuGet

• NuGet installs the latest version of the package when you use the dotnet add package Umbraco.UIBuilder command unless you specify a package version: dotnet add package Umbraco.UIBuilder --version <VERSION>

• After you have added a package reference to your project by executing the dotnet add package Umbraco.UIBuilder command in the directory that contains your project file, run dotnet restore to install the package.

Visual Studio

1. Go to Tools -> NuGet Package Manager -> Manage NuGet Packages for Solution... in Visual Studio, to upgrade Umbraco UI Builder:

2. Select Umbraco.UIBuilder.

3. Select the latest version from the Version drop-down and click Install.

4. When the command completes, open the .csproj file to make sure the package reference is updated:

If you are using one or more of the below sub-packages, they also need to be upgraded as well:

This page covers specific upgrade documentation for when migrating to major 14 of Umbraco UI Builder.

Version Specific Upgrade Notes History

Version 14 contains a number of breaking changes from the previous, Konstrukt product.

See the for full details.

Legacy version specific upgrade notes

You can find the version specific upgrade notes for versions out of support in the .

This section will guide you through the key steps necessary to get you started with Umbraco UI Builder.

It is assumed that you have an Umbraco 10+ website configured, and ready to install Umbraco UI Builder.

System Requirements

At this time, the minimum requirements for using Umbraco UI Builder are as follows:

• Umbraco CMS version 10.0/12.0+

• SQL Server Database (SQLite is fine for testing, but not recommended for live deployments)

Versioning

This is an add-on product to Umbraco CMS. Umbraco UI Builder follows the .

This guide provides a step-by-step approach to migrating a default Konstrukt solution to Umbraco UI Builder.

Key changes

Before outlining the exact steps, there are a few key changes to be aware of.

These changes will dictate the steps to take in the process of migrating to Umbraco UI Builder.

Project, Package, and Namespace changes

Step 1: Replace dependencies

In this first step, we will be replacing all existing Konstrukt dependencies with Umbraco UI Builder dependencies.

1. Remove any installed Konstrukt packages:

1. Delete the Konstrukt App_Plugins folder:

1. Install Umbraco.UIBuilder:

1. Compile your project against .NET 7.0.

Step 2: Update namespaces and entity names

Step 3: Update your configuration

Step 4: Finalizing the migration

1. Delete any obj/bin folders in your projects to ensure a clean build.

2. Recompile all projects and ensure all dependencies are restored correctly

3. Delete the existing Konstrukt license files in the umbraco\Licenses folder.

4. Add your new Umbraco.UIBuilder license key to the appSettings.json file:

1. Run the project.

There are different areas of the Umbraco UI that Umbraco UI Builder can be injected into. Before you get to managing your actual content you need to choose which area makes the most sense to present that data in. Then you can review how to go about configuring that particular type of area.

Choose an area type from the list below to find out more.

In this guide, you can find the necessary steps needed for a basic implementation using Umbraco UI Builder to manage a single custom database table.

Set up the database

Out of the box, Umbraco UI Builder works using PetaPoco as the persistence layer as this is what ships with Umbraco. If you prefer, it is possible to use a custom . However, for getting started, it is expected that you are using this default strategy.

Start by setting up a database table for your model (you might want to populate it with some dummy data as well while learning). We’ll use the following as an example:

Set up your model

With the database table setup, we then need to create the associated Poco model in our project.

Configure Umbraco UI Builder

With the database and model setup, we can now start to configure Umbraco UI Builder itself. The entry point for the Umbraco UI Builder configuration is via the AddUIBuilder extension method. On this method, we call on the IUmbracoBuilder instance within the Program.cs class.

For our example, we will use the following configuration:

Access your UI

With your configuration defined and your project compiled, there is one last step to perform before you can access your UI. And that is to give your backoffice user account permission to access the newly defined section. To do this you'll need to login to the backoffice, head to the user's section, and update the user group. There you will need to make sure that your user belongs to the allowed access.

With the permissions set, you can refresh your browser and you should now see your new section available in the site navigation.

Summary

As you can see, with little code you can start to create powerful interfaces for your custom data structures.

A tree is a hierarchical structure that helps organize a section into logical sub-sections. A tree is accessed in the main side panel of the Umbraco interface. In Umbraco UI Builder, a section may only have a single tree definition. However, you can use folder nodes to help organize the tree structure as you need it.

Configuring a Umbraco UI Builder section tree

Tree(Lambda treeConfig = null) : TreeConfigBuilder

Accesses the tree config of the given section.

Adding a tree to an existing section

AddTree(string name, string icon, Lambda treeConfig = null) : TreeConfigBuilder

Adds a tree to the current section.

AddTree(string groupName, string name, string icon, Lambda treeConfig = null) : TreeConfigBuilder

Adds a tree to the current section in a group with the given name.

AddTreeBefore(string treeAlias, string name, string icon, Lambda treeConfig = null) : TreeConfigBuilder

Adds a tree to the current section before the tree with the given alias.

AddTreeAfter(string treeAlias, string name, string icon, Lambda treeConfig = null) : TreeConfigBuilder

Adds a tree to the current section after the tree with the given alias.

Changing the tree icon color

SetIconColor(string color) : TreeConfigBuilder

Sets the trees icon color to the given color. The options that are possible are black, green, yellow, orange, blue or red.

Adding a group to a tree

AddGroup(string name, Lambda groupConfig = null) : GroupConfigBuilder

Adds a group to the current tree with the given name.

Adding a folder to a tree/group

AddFolder(string name, Lambda folderConfig = null) : FolderConfigBuilder

AddFolder(string name, string icon, Lambda folderConfig = null) : FolderConfigBuilder

Adding a collection to a tree/group

AddCollection<TEntityType>(Lambda idFieldExpression, string nameSingular, string namePlural, string description, Lambda collectionConfig = null) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

AddCollection<TEntityType>(Lambda idFieldExpression, string nameSingular, string namePlural, string description, string iconSingular, string iconPlural, Lambda collectionConfig = null) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Extending an existing tree

WithTree(string alias, Lambda treeConfig = null) : WithTreeConfigBuilder

Starts a sub-configuration for the existing Umbraco tree with the given alias.

Adding a context app to an existing tree

AddContextApp(string name, Lambda contextAppConfig = null) : ContextAppConfigBuilder

AddContextApp(string name, string icon, Lambda contextAppConfig = null) : ContextAppConfigBuilder

AddContextAppBefore(string beforeAlias, string name, Lambda contextAppConfig = null) : ContextAppConfigBuilder

AddContextAppBefore(string beforeAlias, string name, string icon, Lambda contextAppConfig = null) : ContextAppConfigBuilder

AddContextAppAfter(string afterAlias, string name, Lambda contextAppConfig = null) : ContextAppConfigBuilder

AddContextAppAfter(string afterAlias, string name, string icon, Lambda contextAppConfig = null) : ContextAppConfigBuilder

There is a lot that can be configured from the collection config, but what follows are the core basics. You can find more configuration options about specific topics from the other configuration sections in the main menu.

Defining a collection

You can define a collection by calling one of the AddCollection methods on a given Tree or parent Folder config builder instance.

AddCollection<TEntityType>(Lambda idFieldExpression, string nameSingular, string namePlural, string description, Lambda collectionConfig = null) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Adds a collection to the given container with the given names and description and default icons. An ID property accessor expression is required so that Umbraco UI Builder knows which property is the ID property.

// Example
folderConfig.AddCollection<Person>(p => p.Id, "Person", "People", "A collection of people", collectionConfig => {
    ...
});

AddCollection<TEntityType>(Lambda idFieldExpression, string nameSingular, string namePlural, string description, string iconSingular, string iconPlural, Lambda collectionConfig = null) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Adds a collection to the given container with the given names, description and icons. An ID property accessor expression is required so that Umbraco UI Builder knows which property is the ID property.

// Example
folderConfig.AddCollection<Person>(p => p.Id, "Person", "People", "A collection of people", "icon-umb-users", "icon-umb-users", collectionConfig => {
    ...
});

Changing a collection alias

SetAlias(string alias) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Sets the alias of the collection.

Optional: When creating a new collection, an alias is automatically generated from the supplied name for you. However, if you need a specific alias you can use the SetAlias method to override this.

// Example
collectionConfig.SetAlias("person");

Changing a collection icon color

SetIconColor(string color) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Sets the collection icon color to the given color. Possible options are black, green, yellow, orange, blue or red.

// Example
collectionConfig.SetIconColor("blue");

Defining an entity name

Within Umbraco, it is expected that an entity has a name property. So we need to let Umbraco UI Builder know which property to use for the name. If the entity doesn't have a name property, then it needs to know how to construct a name from an entity's other properties. We do this by using either the SetNameProperty or SetNameFormat methods on a Collection config builder instance.

SetNameProperty(Lambda namePropertyExpression) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Sets which property of your entity to use as the name property. Property must be of type string. By defining a property as the name property, its value will be used as the label for the entity in trees and list views. It will also be editable in the header region of the editor interface. The property will also automatically be added to the searchable properties collection and be used for the default sort property.

// Example
collectionConfig.SetNameProperty(p => p.Name);

SetNameProperty(Lambda namePropertyExpression, string heading) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Sets which property of your entity to use as the name property and what custom heading should the list view column heading be. Property must be of type string. By defining a property as the name property, its value will be used as the label for the entity in trees and list views. It will also be editable in the header region of the editor interface. The property will also automatically be added to the searchable properties collection and be used for the default sort property.

// Example
collectionConfig.SetNameProperty(p => p.Name, "Person Name");

SetNameFormat(Lambda nameFormatExpression) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Sets a format expression to use to dynamically create a label for the entity in things like trees and list views. By providing a name format it is assumed there is no single name property available on the entity. And as such none of the default behaviors described for the SetNameProperty method will apply.

// Example
collectionConfig.SetNameFormat(p => $"{p.FirstName} {p.LastName}");

Defining a default sort order

SetSortProperty(Lambda sortPropertyExpression) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Sets which property of our entity to sort against, defaulting to ascending sort direction.

// Example
collectionConfig.SetSortProperty(p => p.FirstName);

SetSortProperty(Lambda sortPropertyExpression, SortDirection sortDirection) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Sets which property of our entity to sort against in the provided sort direction.

// Example
collectionConfig.SetSortProperty(p => p.FirstName, SortDirection.Descending);

Defining time stamp properties

SetDateCreatedProperty(Lambda dateCreatedProperty) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Sets which property of our entity to use as the date created property. Property must be of type DateTime. When set and a new entity is saved via the repository, then the given field will be populated with the current date and time.

// Example
collectionConfig.SetDateCreatedProperty(p => p.DateCreated);

SetDateModifiedProperty(Lambda dateCreatedProperty) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Sets which property of our entity to use as the date modified property. Property must be of type DateTime. When set and an entity is saved via the repository, then the given field will be populated with the current date and time.

// Example
collectionConfig.SetDateModifiedProperty(p => p.DateModified);

Configuring soft deletes

By default, in Umbraco UI Builder any entity that is deleted via the Umbraco UI Builder repository is definitively removed from the system. The SetDeletedProperty method can be used if needed to keep the records in the data repository despite having them marked as deleted. This is so they do not show the the UI.

SetDeletedProperty(Lambda deletedPropertyExpression) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Sets which property of our entity to use as the deleted property flag. Property must be of type boolean or int. When a deleted property is set, any delete actions will set the deleted flag instead of deleting the entity. For boolean based properties, deleted entities will have a value of True when deleted. For int based properties, deleted entities will have a UTC Unix timestamp value of the date the entity was deleted. In addition, any fetch actions will also pre-filter out any deleted entities.

// Example
collectionConfig.SetDeletedProperty(p => p.Deleted);

Disabling create, update or delete features

DisableCreate() : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Disables the option to create entities on the current collection. An entity could be created via code and only then editing is allowed in the UI for example.

// Example
collectionConfig.DisableCreate();

DisableCreate(Predicate<CollectionPermissionContext> disableExpression) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Disables the option to create entities on the current collection if the given runtime predicate is true. An entity could be created via code and only then editing is allowed in the UI.

// Example
collectionConfig.DisableCreate(ctx => ctx.UserGroups.Any(x => x.Alias == "editor"));

DisableUpdate() : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Disables the option to update entities on the current collection. An entity can be created, but further editing is not allowed.

// Example
collectionConfig.DisableUpdate();

DisableUpdate(Predicate<CollectionPermissionContext> disableExpression) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Disables the option to update entities on the current collection if the given runtime predicate is true. An entity can be created, but further editing is not allowed.

// Example
collectionConfig.DisableUpdate(ctx => ctx.UserGroups.Any(x => x.Alias == "editor"));

DisableDelete() : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Disables the option to delete entities on the current collection. Useful if the data needs to be retained and visible. See also configuring soft deletes.

// Example
collectionConfig.DisableDelete();

DisableDelete(Predicate<CollectionPermissionContext> disableExpression) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Disables the option to delete entities on the current collection if the given runtime predicate is true. Useful if the data needs to be retained and visible. See also configuring soft deletes.

// Example
collectionConfig.DisableDelete(ctx => ctx.UserGroups.Any(x => x.Alias == "editor"));

MakeReadOnly() : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Sets the collection as read-only and disables any Create, Read, Update, and Delete (CRUD) operations from being performed on the collection via the UI.

// Example
collectionConfig.MakeReadOnly();

MakeReadOnly(Predicate<CollectionPermissionContext> disableExpression) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Sets the collection as read-only if the given runtime predicate is true. It also disables any Create, Read, Update, and Delete (CRUD) operations from being performed on the collection via the UI.

// Example
collectionConfig.MakeReadOnly(ctx => ctx.UserGroups.Any(x => x.Alias == "editor"));

Set the visibility of the collection

SetVisibility(Predicate<CollectionVisibilityContext> visibilityExpression) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Sets the runtime visibility of the collection.

// Example
collectionConfig.SetVisibility(ctx => ctx.UserRoles.Any(x => x.Alias == "editor"));

Changing a collection connection string

By default, Umbraco UI Builder will use the Umbraco connection string for its database connection. However, you can change this by calling the SetConnectionString method on a Collection config builder instance.

SetConnectionString(string connectionStringName) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Sets the connection string name for the given collection repository.

// Example
collectionConfig.SetConnectionString("myConnectionStringName");

Field Views allow you to customize the markup used by a field when displayed in a list view. Field Views are implemented as .NET Core View Components that are passed a single FieldViewsContext argument with information about the entity/field being rendered.

Defining a field view

You can define a field view in one of two ways.

1. A basic view file for the built in FieldView view component

The simplest way to define a field view for non-complex fields is to place a view file in the /Views/Shared/Components/FieldView folder with the following markup.

@model Umbraco.UIBuilder.Web.Models.FieldViewContext
<!-- Insert your markup here -->

When registering a basic file view you can pass the name of the view file (excluding the .cshtml file extension) to the relevant API method.

2. A complete custom view component

To define a more complex field view you can create your own view component class (which can use dependency injection for any required dependencies). This can be done by using the following signature:

// Example
public class MyComplexFieldViewViewComponent : ViewComponent
{
    public async Task<IViewComponentResult> InvokeAsync(FieldViewContext context)
    {
        // Do your custom logic here

        return View("Default", model);
    }
}

For the view element of your component, based on the example above, you would place a file Default.cshtml into the /Views/Shared/Components/MyComplexFieldView folder with the following markup:

@model Namespace.Of.Model.Returned.By.Custom.ViewComponent
<!-- Insert your markup here -->

The field view context

Field view components are passed a FieldViewContext object with the following information:

public class FieldViewContext
{
    public string ViewName { get; set; }
    public object Entity { get; set; }
    public string PropertyName { get; set; }
    public object PropertyValue { get; set; }
}

Setting the field view of a list view field

A field view is assigned to a list view field as part of the list view configuration. For more information you can check the List View Documentation.

Retrieving child collections in one-to-many relationships with UI Builder, can be achieved with the support of child repositories. One-to-many relations are where one parent entity of a collection is associated with multiple entities from another.

Models Representation

The models would look like this:

[TableName("Students")]
[PrimaryKey("Id")]
public class Student
{
    [PrimaryKeyColumn]
    public int Id { get; set; }

    public string FirstName { get; set; }

    public string LastName { get; set; }

    public string Email { get; set; }
}

[TableName("StudentProjects")]
[PrimaryKey("Id")]
public class StudentProject
{
    [PrimaryKeyColumn]
    public int Id { get; set; }

    public string Name { get; set; }

    public int StudentId { get; set; }
}

Child Repositories

You can create child repository instances via the IRepositoryFactory and use them to retrieve information from the child collection.

public class StudentProjectController : Controller
{
    private readonly IRepositoryFactory _repositoryFactory;

    public StudentProjectController(IRepositoryFactory repositoryFactory)
    {
        _repositoryFactory = repositoryFactory;
    }

    public IActionResult Index(int projectId)
    {
        var childRepository = _repositoryFactory.GetChildRepository<int, StudentProject, int>(projectId);

        var list = childRepository.GetAll();

        var count = childRepository.GetCount();

        var listPaged = childRepository.GetPaged();

        return View(list);
    }
}

If you want to work with a subset of data within a given collection then this is where the global filters come in handy. These allow you to define a filter to apply to all queries for a given collection.

Applying a global filter

Applying a global filter is controlled via the collections configuration.

SetFilter(Lambda whereClauseExpression) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Sets the filter where clause expression. Expression must be a boolean expression.

// Example
collectionConfig.SetFilter(p => p.Current);

Actions are a powerful way of adding custom functionality to Umbraco UI Builder without needing to create custom UI elements. By providing an action to run, Umbraco UI Builder can automatically trigger actions from a number of UI locations.

Defining an action

To define an action create a class that inherits from the base class Action<> and configure it like below:

// Example
public class MyAction : Action<ActionResult>
{
    public override string Icon => "icon-settings";
    public override string Alias => "myaction";
    public override string Name => "My Action";
    public override bool ConfirmAction => true;

    public override ActionResult Execute(string collectionAlias, object[] entityIds)
    {
        // Perform operation here...
    }
}

The required configuration options are:

• Name: The name of the action.

• Alias: A unique alias for the action.

• Icon: An icon to display next to the name in the action button.

• Execute: The method to run against a given list of entities.

Additional optional configuration options are:

• ConfirmAction: Set whether a confirm dialog should display before performing this action.

The generic argument is a return type for the action. See Controlling the action result below.

Controlling the action result

Actions by default will return a ActionResult but you can return other types of result by swapping the Action<> generic argument.

• ActionResult - Standard result with a boolean Success value.

• FileActionResult - Returns a file stream / bytes and triggers a download dialog.

Capturing settings for an action

Sometimes you may need to collect further user input before you can perform an action. To achieve this you can use the Action<> base class that accepts an additional TSetting generic argument.

// Example
public class MyAction : Action<MyBulkdActionSettings, ActionResult>
{
    public override string Icon => "icon-settings";
    public override string Alias => "myaction";
    public override string Name => "My Action";
    public override bool ConfirmAction => true;

    public override void Configure(SettingsConfigBuilder<MyActionSettings> settingsConfig)
    {
        settingsConfig.AddFielset("General", fieldsetConfig => fieldsetConfig
            .AddField(s => s.RecipientName).SetLabel("Recipient Name")
            .AddField(s => s.RecipientEmail).SetLabel("Recipient Email"))
    }

    public override ActionResult Execute(string collectionAlias, object[] entityIds, MyActionSettings settings)
    {
        // Perform operation here...
    }
}

public class MyActionSettings
{
    public string RecipientName { get; set; }
    public string RecipientEmail { get; set; }
}

By implementing this base class you are required to implement an additional Configure method which accepts a SettingsConfigBuilder<> parameter. You should use this parameter calling the builders fluent API to define the settings dialog UI and how it maps to the settings type. With the settings config builder you are able to create fieldsets and fields with the same fluent API as defined in the Collection Editors section.

In addition to this Configure method, the Execute method will now accept an additional settings parameter of the settings type. This will be pre-populated by Umbraco UI Builder with the value entered by the user, allowing you to alter your actions behavior accordingly.

Adding an action to a collection

Actions are added via the Collections configuration.

AddAction<TMenuActionType>() : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Adds an action of the given type to the collection.

// Example
collectionConfig.AddAction<ExportMenuAction>();

AddAction(Type actionType) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Adds an action of the given type to the collection.

// Example
collectionConfig.AddAction(actionType);

AddAction(IAction action) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Adds the given action to the collection.

// Example
collectionConfig.AddAction(action);

Umbraco UI Builder comes with some inbuilt actions that are available for you to use straight away.

ExportEntityAction

Namespace Umbraco.UIBuilder.Infrastructure.Configuration.Actions

Provides a Comma-Separated Values (CSV) export functionality converting all properties to column headings and rendering each entity property values on each row.

ImportEntityAction

Namespace Umbraco.UIBuilder.Infrastructure.Configuration.Actions

Provides a Comma-Separated Values (CSV) import functionality matching column headings with entity properties and mapping row values to an entity.

Count cards allow you to define cards directly against the collection configuration, providing a basic where clause to use in a count SQL statement. These work perfectly for basic data visualizations based on counts of entities in a collection.

If you need to do more than a basic count, you'll want to take a look at the custom cards documentation.

Adding a count card to a collection

Cards allow you to display basic summaries of key information that may be useful to the editor.

AddCard(string name, Lambda whereClauseExpression, Lambda cardConfig = null) : CardConfigBuilder

Adds a card with the given name and where clause filter expression. Expression must be a boolean expression.

// Example
collectionConfig.AddCard("Older than 30", p => p.Age > 30, cardConfig => {
    ...
});

AddCard(string name, string icon, Lambda whereClauseExpression, Lambda cardConfig = null) : CardConfigBuilder

Adds a card with the given name + icon and where clause filter expression. Expression must be a boolean expression.

// Example
collectionConfig.AddCard("Older than 30", "icon-umb-users", p => p.Age > 30, cardConfig => {
    ...
});

Change the color of a count card

SetColor(string color) : CardConfigBuilder

Sets the color of the card.

// Example
cardConfig.SetColor("blue");

Add a suffix to a count value

SetSuffix(string suffix) : CardConfigBuilder

Sets the suffix of the card value.

// Example
cardConfig.SetSuffix("years");

Formatting the value of a count

SetFormat(Lambda formatExpression) : CardConfigBuilder

Sets the format expression for the card.

// Example
cardConfig.SetFormat((v) => $"{v}%");

Custom cards allow you to perform more complex metric calculations and are defined via a class implementing the Card base class.

When Umbraco UI Builder resolves a card it will attempt to do so from the global DI container. This means you can inject any dependencies that you require for your card to calculate its value. If there is no type defined in the DI container, Umbraco UI Builder will fall-back to manually instantiating a new instance of value mapper.

Defining a custom card

To define a card you create a class that inherits from the base class Card and configure it within the constructor like so.

// Example
public class AvgPersonAgeCard : Card
{
    public override string Alias => "avgPersonAge";
    public override string Name => "Average Age";
    public override string Icon => "icon-calendar";
    public override string Color => "green";
    public override string Suffix => "yrs";
        
    public override object GetValue(object parentId = null)
    {
        // Perform value calculation logic
    }
}

The required configuration options are:

• Name: The name of the card.

• Alias: A unique alias for the card.

• GetValue(object parentId = null): A method to get the cards value.

Additional optional configuration options are:

• Icon: An icon to display in the card.

• Color: The color of the card.

• Suffix: A suffix to display after the card value.

Adding a custom card to a collection

AddCard() : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Adds a card of the given type to the collection.

// Example
collectionConfig.AddCard<AvgPersonAgeCard>();

AddCard(Type cardType) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Adds a card of the given type to the collection.

// Example
collectionConfig.AddCard(typeof(AvgPersonAgeCard));

Repositories are used by Umbraco UI Builder to access the entity data stores. By default, collections will use a generic built-in NPoco repository. However, you can define your own repository implementation should you wish to store your entities via an alternative strategy.

Defining a repository

To define a repository create a class that inherits from the base class Repository<TEntity, TId> and implements all of its abstract methods.

// Example
public class PersonRepository : Repository<Person, int> {

    public PersonRepository(RepositoryContext context)
        : base(context)
    { }

    protected override int GetIdImpl(Person entity) {
        return entity.Id;
    }

    protected override Person GetImpl(int id) {
        ...
    }

    protected override Person SaveImpl(Person entity) {
        ...
    }

    protected override void DeleteImpl(int id) {
        ...
    }

    protected override IEnumerable<Person> GetAllImpl(Expression<Func<Person, bool>> whereClause, Expression<Func<Person, object>> orderBy, SortDirection orderByDirection) {
        ...
    }

    protected override PagedResult<Person> GetPagedImpl(int pageNumber, int pageSize, Expression<Func<Person, bool>> whereClause, Expression<Func<Person, object>> orderBy, SortDirection orderByDirection) {
        ...
    }

    protected override long GetCountImpl(Expression<Func<Person, bool>> whereClause) {
        ...
    }

    protected override IEnumerable<TJunctionEntity> GetRelationsByParentIdImpl<TJunctionEntity>(int parentId, string relationAlias)
    {
        ...
    }

    protected override TJunctionEntity SaveRelationImpl<TJunctionEntity>(TJunctionEntity entity)
    {
        ...
    }
}

Note: For all Impl methods there are public alternatives without the Impl suffix. However, there are separate implementation methods in order to ensure all repositories fire the relevant Umbraco UI Builder events. This is whether triggered via the Umbraco UI Builder's UI or not.

Changing the repository implementation of a collection

SetRepositoryType<TRepositoryType>() : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Sets the repository type to the given type for the current collection.

// Example
collectionConfig.SetRepositoryType<PersonRepositoryType>();

SetRepositoryType(Type repositoryType) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Sets the repository type to the given type for the current collection.

// Example
collectionConfig.SetRepositoryType(typeof(PersonRepositoryType));

Accessing a repository in code

To help with accessing a repository (default or custom) Umbraco UI Builder has an IRepositoryFactory you can inject into your code base. This includes a couple of factory methods to create the repository instances for you. Repositories should only be created via the repository factory as there are some injected dependencies that can only be resolved by Umbraco UI Builder.

IRepositoryFactory.GetRepository<TEntity, TId>() : Repository<TEntity, TId>

Creates a repository for the given entity type. Umbraco UI Builder will search the configuration for the first section/collection with a configuration for the given entity type. Then it will use that as a repository configuration.

// Example
public class MyController : Controller
{
    private readonly Repository<Person, int> _repo;

    public MyController(IRepositoryFactory repoFactory) 
    {
        _repo = repoFactory.GetRepository<Person, int>();
    }
}

IRepositoryFactory.GetRepository<TEntity, TId>(string collectionAlias) : Repository<TEntity, TId>

Creates a repository for the given entity type from the collection with the given alias.

// Example
public class MyController : Controller
{
    private readonly Repository<Person, int> _repo;

    public MyController(IRepositoryFactory repoFactory) 
    {
        _repo = repoFactory.GetRepository<Person, int>("person");
    }
}

Umbraco UI Builder fires a number of notification events during regular operation to allow for extending of the default behaviour.

Registering event handlers

Umbraco UI Builder uses the same Notification Mechanism built into Umbraco v9+ and so uses the same registration process. First you will need to define a notification event handler for the event you wish to handle like below:

public class MyEntitySavingEventHandler :  INotificationHandler<EntitySavingNotification> {

    public void Handle(EntitySavingNotification notification)
    {
        // Handle the event here
    }

}

Then register your event handler in the Program.cs file like below:

builder.CreateUmbracoBuilder()
    .AddBackOffice()
    .AddWebsite()
    .AddDeliveryApi()
    .AddComposers()
    .AddNotificationHandler<EntitySavingNotification, MyEntitySavingEventHandler>()
    .Build();

Repository events

EntitySavingNotification

Raised when the repository Save method is called and before the entity has been persisted. The notification contains an Entity property with Before and After inner properties. These properties provide access to a copy of the currently persisted entity (or null if a new entity) and the updated entity that´s saved. Changes can be made to the After entity and they will be persisted as part of the save operation. If the Cancel property of the notification is set to true then the save operation will be canceled and no changes will be saved.

// Example
public class MyEntitySavingEventHandler :  INotificationHandler<EntitySavingNotification> {

    public void Handle(EntitySavingNotification notification)
    {
        var person = notification.Entity.After as Person;
        if (person != null){
            ...
        }
    }

}

EntitySavedNotification

Raised when the repository Save method is called and after the entity has been persisted. The notification contains an Entity property with Before and After inner properties. These properties provide access to a copy of the previously persisted entity (or null if a new entity) and the updated entity that´s saved.

// Example
public class MyEntitySavedEventHandler :  INotificationHandler<EntitySavedNotification> {

    public void Handle(EntitySavedNotification notification)
    {
        var person = notification.Entity.After as Person;
        if (person != null){
            ...
        }
    }

}

EntityDeletingNotification

Raised when the repository Delete method is called and before the entity is deleted. The notification contains an Entity property providing access to a copy of the entity about to be deleted. If the Cancel property of notification is set to true then the delete operation will be cancelled and entity won't be deleted.

// Example
public class MyEntityDeletingEventHandler :  INotificationHandler<EntityDeletingNotification> {

    public void Handle(EntityDeletingNotification notification)
    {
        var person = notification.Entity.After as Person;
        if (person != null){
            ...
        }
    }

}

EntityDeletedNotification

Raised when the repository Delete method is called and after the entity has been deleted. The notification contains an Entity property providing access to a copy of the entity that´s deleted.

// Example
public class MyEntityDeletedEventHandler :  INotificationHandler<EntityDeletedNotification> {

    public void Handle(EntityDeletedNotification notification)
    {
        var person = notification.Entity.After as Person;
        if (person != null){
            ...
        }
    }

}

SqlQueryBuildingNotification

Raised when the repository is preparing a SQL query. The notification contains the collection alias + type, the NPoco Sql<ISqlContext> object, and the where clause/order by clauses. These will be used to generate the SQL query.

// Example
public class MySqlQueryBuildingEventHandler :  INotificationHandler<SqlQueryBuildingNotification> {

    public void Handle(SqlQueryBuildingNotification notification)
    {
        notification.Sql = notification.Sql.Append("WHERE MyId = @0", 1);
    }

}

SqlQueryBuiltNotification

Raised when the repository has repaired a SQL query. The notification contains the collection alias + type, the NPoco Sql<ISqlContext> object and the where clause/order by clauses that was used to generate the SQL query.

// Example
public class MySqlQueryBuiltEventHandler :  INotificationHandler<SqlQueryBuiltNotification> {

    public void Handle(SqlQueryBuiltNotification notification)
    {
        notification.Sql = notification.Sql.Append("WHERE MyId = @0", 1);
    }

}

Data views builders allow you to create a collection data views list dynamically at run time. By default, Umbraco UI Builder will use the hard-coded data views defined in your Umbraco UI Builder config. However, if you need to build your data views list dynamically, then this is when you'd use a data views builder.

When Umbraco UI Builder resolves a data views builder it will attempt to do so from the global DI container. This means you can inject any dependencies that you require for your builder. If there is no type defined in the DI container, Umbraco UI Builder will fall-back to manually instantiating a new instance of value mapper.

Defining a data views builder

To define a data views builder you can create a class that inherits from the base class DataViewsBuilder<TEntityType> and implements the abstract methods.

// Example
public class PersonDataViewsBuilder : DataViewsBuilder<Person>
{
    public override IEnumerable<DataViewSummary> GetDataViews()
    {
        // Generate and return a list of data views
    }

    public override Expression<Func<Person, bool>> GetDataViewWhereClause(string dataViewAlias)
    {
        // Return a where clause expression for the supplied data view alias
    }
}

The required methods are:

• GetDataViews: Returns the list of data views to choose from.

• GetDataViewWhereClause: Returns the boolean where clause expression for the given data views alias.

Setting the data views builder of a collection

Setting a data views builder is controlled via the collections configuration.

SetDataViewsBuilder<TDataViewsBuilder>() : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Sets the collections data views builder which allows you to define the data views dynamically at run time.

// Example
collectionConfig.SetDataViewsBuilder<PersonDataViewsBuilder>();

SetDataViewsBuilder(Type dataViewsBuilderType) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Sets the collections data views builder which allows you to define the data views dynamically at run time.

// Example
collectionConfig.SetDataViewsBuilder(typeof(PersonDataViewsBuilder));

SetDataViewsBuilder(DataViewsBuilder<TEntityType> dataViewsBuilder) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Sets the collections data views builder which allows you to define the data views dynamically at run time.

// Example
collectionConfig.SetDataViewsBuilder(new PersonDataViewsBuilder());

Fluent Conventions

Most configuration methods in Umbraco UI Builder aim to be fluent. This means that they return a relevant config instance allowing to chain multiple methods calls together in one. For those who prefer to be a bit more verbose, many methods also accept an optional lambda expression. This allows you to pass in a delegate to perform the inner configuration of the element being defined.

// Chaining example
config.AddSection("Repositories").Tree().AddCollection<People>(p => p.Id, "Person", "People");

// Delegate example
config.AddSection("Repositories", sectionConfig => {
    sectionConfig.Tree(treeConfig => {
        treeConfig.AddCollection<People>(p => p.Id, "Person", "People");
    });
});

Naming Conventions

Throughout the API, where a method name starts with Add then multiple configurations can be declared. Whereas if a method name starts with Set then only one instance of the configuration can be declared within the current configuration context.

If needed to collect sensitive information in a collection but don't want to persist in a plain text format to the data storage mechanism. Umbraco UI Builder can help with this by allowing you to define properties as encrypted. After which any time the value is persisted or retrieved from persistence, Umbraco UI Builder will automatically encrypt and decrypt the value.

Defining encrypted properties

AddEncryptedProperty(Lambda encryptedPropertyExpression) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Adds the given property to the encrypted properties collection. Property must be of type String. When set, the property will be encrypted/decrypted on write/read respectively.

// Example
collectionConfig.AddEncryptedProperty(p => p.Secret);

A value mapper is an Umbraco UI Builder helper class that sits between the editor UI and the database. It also lets you tweak the stored value of a field. By default Umbraco UI Builder will save a datatype value as it would be stored in Umbraco. Value mappers let you change this.

When Umbraco UI Builder resolves a value mapper it will attempt to do so from the global DI container. This means you can inject any dependencies that you require for your mapper. If there is no type defined in the DI container, Umbraco UI Builder will fall-back to manually instantiating a new instance of value mapper.

Defining a value mapper

To define a mapper create a class that inherits from the base class ValueMapper and implements the methods EditorToModel and ModelToEditor.

// Example
public class MyValueMapper : ValueMapper
{
    public override object EditorToModel(object input)
    {
        // Tweak the input and return mapped object
        ...
    }

    public override object ModelToEditor(object input)
    {
        // Tweak the input and return mapped object
        ...
    }    
}

Setting a field value mapper

Value mappers are defined as part of a collection editor field configuration.

SetValueMapper<TMapperType>() : EditorFieldConfigBuilder<TEntityType, TValueType>

Set the value mapper for the current field.

// Example
fieldConfig.SetValueMapper<MyValueMapper>();

SetValueMapper(Type mapperType) : EditorFieldConfigBuilder<TEntityType, TValueType>

Set the value mapper for the current field.

// Example
fieldConfig.SetValueMapper(typeof(MyValueMapper));

SetValueMapper(Mapper mapper) : EditorFieldConfigBuilder<TEntityType, TValueType>

Set the value mapper for the current field.

// Example
fieldConfig.SetValueMapper(new MyValueMapper());

By default actions are not visible in the UI and you must expressly define when and where an action should display. This can be achieved in two ways, either on the action definition itself or at the point of registration on the collections config.

Controlling the default action visibility

To define the default visibility of an action at the action level you can do this by overriding the IsVisible method of the Action<> base class.

// Example
public class MyAction : Action<ActionResult>
{
    ...
    public override bool IsVisible(ActionVisibilityContext ctx)
    {
        return ctx.ActionType == ActionType.Bulk 
            || ctx.ActionType == ActionType.Row;
    }
    ...
}

The IsVisible method is passed a ActionVisibilityContext which you should use to decide whether the action should display, returning true if it should, or false if it should not. For more information check the Action visibility context.

Overriding an actions visibility

Overriding an actions visibility is controlled via the collections configuration.

AddAction<TMenuActionType>(Lambda actionConfig = null) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Adds an action of the given type to the collection with the given visibility.

// Example
collectionConfig.AddAction<ExportMenuAction>(actionConfig => actionConfig
    .SetVisibility(x => x.ActionType == ActionType.Bulk 
        || x.ActionType == ActionType.Row)
);

AddAction(Type actionType, Lambda actionConfig = null) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Adds an action of the given type to the collection with the given visibility.

// Example
collectionConfig.AddAction(typeof(ExportMenuAction), actionConfig => actionConfig
    .SetVisibility(x => x.ActionType == ActionType.Bulk 
        || x.ActionType == ActionType.Row)
);

AddAction(IAction action, Lambda actionConfig = null) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Adds the given action to the collection with the given visibility.

// Example
collectionConfig.AddAction(action, actionConfig => actionConfig
    .SetVisibility(x => x.ActionType == ActionType.Bulk 
        || x.ActionType == ActionType.Row)
);

Action visibility context

When controlling the visibility of an action you will be given a ActionVisibilityContext object from which you can decide whether to show the action or not. The visibility context contains two key pieces of information on which you can base this decision.

ActionType

The action type property is an enum property that define which area of the UI it is that wishes to access this action. Enabling an action to display for a given action type will determine where an action is displayed.

ContainerMenu

The ContainerMenu action type determines that the action will be displayed in both the tree of the collection and its list view actions menu.

EntityMenu

The EntityMenu action type determines that the action will be displayed in the actions menu of a collection editor UI.

Bulk

The Bulk action type determines that the action will be displayed in the collection list view bulk actions menu.

Row

The Row action type determines that the action will be displayed in the collection list view action row menu.

Save

The Save action type determines that the action will be displayed as a sub button in an entity editors save button. All Save action types trigger a save before the action is executed and so to convey this, all Save action type button labels are prefixed Save & [Action Name]

UserGroups

The user groups collection contains a list of Umbraco IReadOnlyUserGroup objects for the current logged-in backoffice user. This allows you to control the visibility of actions for given user group members.

A folder can appear in either a tree or as a sub folder to other folders. Folders can contain either other (sub)folders or collections.

Defining a folder

You can define a folder by calling one of the AddFolder methods on a given Tree or parent Folder config builder instance.

AddFolder(string name, Lambda folderConfig = null) : FolderConfigBuilder

Adds a folder to the current tree with the given name and a default folder icon.

// Example
treeConfig.AddFolder("Settings", folderConfig => {
    ...
});

AddFolder(string name, string icon, Lambda folderConfig = null) : FolderConfigBuilder

Adds a folder to the current tree with the given name + icon.

// Example
treeConfig.AddFolder("Settings", "icon-settings", folderConfig => {
    ...
});

Changing a folder alias

SetAlias(string alias) : FolderConfigBuilder

Sets the alias of the folder.

Optional: When creating a new folder, an alias is automatically generated from the supplied name for you. However, if you need a specific alias you can use the SetAlias method to override this.

// Example
folderConfig.SetAlias("settings");

Changing a folder icon color

SetIconColor(string color) : FolderConfigBuilder

Sets the folder icon color to the given color. The options that are possible are black, green, yellow, orange, blue or red.

// Example
folderConfig.SetIconColor("blue");

Adding a sub folder to a folder

AddFolder (string name, Lambda folderConfig = null) : FolderConfigBuilder

Adds a sub folder to the current folder with the given name and a default folder icon.

// Example
folderConfig.AddFolder("Categories", subFolderConfig => {
    ...
});

AddFolder (string name, string icon, Lambda folderConfig = null) : FolderConfigBuilder

Adds a sub folder to the current folder with the given name + icon.

// Example
folderConfig.AddFolder("Categories", "icon-tags", subFolderConfig => {
    ...
});

Adding a collection to a folder

AddCollection<TEntityType>(Lambda idFieldExpression, string nameSingular, string namePlural, string description, Lambda collectionConfig = null) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Adds a collection to the current folder with the given names, descriptions, and default icons. An ID property accessor expression is required so that Umbraco UI Builder knows which property is the ID property. For more information check the Collections documentation.

// Example
folderConfig.AddCollection<Person>(p => p.Id, "Person", "People", "A collection of people", collectionConfig => {
    ...
});

AddCollection<TEntityType>(Lambda idFieldExpression, string nameSingular, string namePlural, string description, string iconSingular, string iconPlural, Lambda collectionConfig = null) : CollectionConfigBuilder<TEntityType>

Adds a collection to the current folder with the given names, description and icons. An ID property accessor expression is required so that Umbraco UI Builder knows which property is the ID property. For more information check the Collections documentation.

// Example
folderConfig.AddCollection<Person>(p => p.Id, "Person", "People", "A collection of people", "icon-umb-users", "icon-umb-users", collectionConfig => {
    ...
});

A collection is the cornerstone Umbraco UI Builder config and it represents a collection of entities for a given data model. From this config object, you can configure everything about how this collection integrates into the UI. You can also configure how it should display in a list view as well as how it should be edited.

Get started by reviewing the basics of collection configuration.

Context Apps in Umbraco UI Builder are analogous to Content Apps in Umbraco. They allow you to provide contextual apps that appear in the editor UI of content. From Umbraco UI Builder's perspective, defining context apps allows you to expose collections as content apps. This is where a collection has a relation to the content in question. An example could be something like blog post comments which are linked to individual blog posts. Exposing these as a content app allows them to be managed in context next to the blog post they are linked to.

Defining a context app

You can define a context app by calling one of the AddContextApp methods on a WithTreeConfigBuilder instance.

AddContextApp(string name, Lambda contextAppConfig = null) : ContextAppConfigBuilder

Adds a context app with the given name and default icon.

// Example
withTreeConfig.AddContextApp("Comments", contextAppConfig => {
    ...
});

AddContextApp(string name, string icon, Lambda contextAppConfig = null) : ContextAppConfigBuilder

Adds a context app to the Umbraco menu with the given name and icon.

// Example
withTreeConfig.AddContextApp("Comments", "icon-chat", contextAppConfig => {
    ...
});

AddContextAppBefore(string beforeAlias, string name, Lambda contextAppConfig = null) : ContextAppConfigBuilder

Adds a context app with the given name and default icon before the context app with the given alias.

// Example
withTreeConfig.AddContextAppBefore("umbContent", "Comments", contextAppConfig => {
    ...
});

AddContextAppBefore(string beforeAlias, string name, string icon, Lambda contextAppConfig = null) : ContextAppConfigBuilder

Adds a context app to the Umbraco menu with the given name and icon before the context app with the given alias.

// Example
withTreeConfig.AddContextAppBefore("umbContent", "Comments", "icon-chat", contextAppConfig => {
    ...
});

AddContextAppAfter(string afterAlias, string name, Lambda contextAppConfig = null) : ContextAppConfigBuilder

Adds a context app with the given name and default icon after the context app with the given alias.

// Example
withTreeConfig.AddContextAppAfter("umbContent", "Comments", contextAppConfig => {
    ...
});

AddContextAppAfter(string afterAlias, string name, string icon, Lambda contextAppConfig = null) : ContextAppConfigBuilder

Adds a context app to the Umbraco menu with the given name and icon after the context app with the given alias.

// Example
withTreeConfig.AddContextAppAfter("umbContent", "Comments", "icon-chat", contextAppConfig => {
    ...
});

Changing a context app alias

SetAlias(string alias) : ContextAppConfigBuilder

Sets the alias of the context app.

Optional: When adding a new context app, an alias is automatically generated from the supplied name for you. However, you can use the SetAlias method to override this if you need a specific alias.

// Example
contextAppConfig.SetAlias("comments");

Changing a context app icon color

SetIconColor(string color) : ContextAppConfigBuilder

Sets the context app icon color to the given color. Possible options are black, green, yellow, orange, blue or red.

// Example
contextAppConfig.SetIconColor("blue");

Changing when a context app should display

Changing when a context app is displayed, is controlled by a delegate method which is passed a ContextAppVisibilityContext instance. This method contains a Source property which holds a reference to the source object that the content app is being displayed on (i.e., an IContent instance). It also holds a reference to a UserGroups collection of the currently logged-in user's user groups. You can use any value from those to return a boolean result which sets whether to display the context app or not.

By default, Umbraco UI Builder will pre-filter context apps to only display on the tree it is defined in. This will be combined with the SetVisibility config to decide when to display the context app.

SetVisibility(Func<ContextAppVisibilityContext, bool> visibilityExpression) : ContextAppConfigBuilder

Sets the context app visibility delegate.

// Example
contextAppConfig.SetVisibility(appCtx => appCtx.Source is IContent content && content.ContentType.Alias == "blogPost");

Adding a collection to a context app

Context apps can consist of one or more collections. If a context app contains multiple collections, the collection list views will be displayed in tabs within the context app.

AddCollection<TEntityType>(Lambda idFieldExpression, Lambda fkFieldExpression, string nameSingular, string namePlural, string description, Lambda collectionConfig = null) : ContextAppConfigBuilder

Adds a collection to the current content app with the given names, descriptions and default icons. An ID property accessor expression is required so that Umbraco UI Builder knows which property is the ID property. A foreign key property accessor is also required so that the Umbraco UI Builder knows which property holds the Umbraco nodes UDI value. You can read more about this in the Collections documentation.

// Example
contextAppConfig.AddCollection<Comment>(p => p.Id, p=> "Comment", "Comments", "A collection of comments", collectionConfig => {
    ...
});

AddCollection<TEntityType>(Lambda idFieldExpression, Lambda fkFieldExpression, string nameSingular, string namePlural, string description, string iconSingular, string iconPlural, Lambda collectionConfig = null) : ContextAppConfigBuilder

Adds a collection to the current context app with the given names, description and icons. An ID property accessor expression is required so that Umbraco UI Builder knows which property is the ID property. A foreign key property accessor is also required so that Umbraco UI Builder knows which property holds the Umbraco nodes UDI value. You can read more about this in the Collections documentation.

// Example
contextAppConfig.AddCollection<Comment>(p => p.Id, "Comment", "Comments", "A collection of comments", "icon-chat", "icon-chat", collectionConfig => {
    ...
});

A dashboard is a view that is displayed at the root of a section and contains welcome information. It also includes useful tools relevant to the given section. When there are multiple dashboards to display in a section these are presented in a tabbed layout to allow you to switch between the dashboards.

Defining a dashboard

You can define a dashboard by calling one of the AddDashboard methods on either a SectionConfigBuilder or a WithSectionConfigBuilder instance.

AddDashboard(string name, Lambda dashboardConfig = null) : DashboardConfigBuilder

Adds a dashboard with the given name.

// Example
sectionConfig.AddDashboard("Team", dashboardConfig => {
    ...
});

AddDashboardBefore(string beforeAlias, string name, Lambda dashboardConfig = null) : DashboardConfigBuilder

Adds a dashboard with the given name before the dashboard with the given alias.

// Example
sectionConfig.AddDashboardBefore("contentIntro", "Team", dashboardConfig => {
    ...
});

AddDashboardAfter(string afterAlias, string name, Lambda dashboardConfig = null) : DashboardConfigBuilder

Adds a dashboard with the given name after the dashboard with the given alias.

// Example
sectionConfig.AddDashboardAfter("contentIntro", "Team", dashboardConfig => {
    ...
});

Changing a dashboard alias