Blog
Mar 27, 2023
Why Raytha is the best CMS for a nonprofit associationIf you are looking for a CMS platform that can handle all the important aspects of a nonprofit association website, such as content restriction, event calendar, news and blog posts, conference agenda and speakers, job board...
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Mar 25, 2023
Resolving SAML error: Unexpected error occurred: ASN1 corrupted data.
Written by Zack Schwartz
Recently, I had an infuriating experience implementing SAML in .NET 6+ while trying to load an x509 Certificate via the string method. We store the x509 cert in the database instead of a file on the file system, so we wanted to load the string value.However, we kept getting an...
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Mar 25, 2023
Implementing `groupby` custom liquid filter for .NET Fluid
Written by Zack Schwartz
IntroLiquid is a popular template engine used in web development. Fluid, an implementation of Liquid in .NET, is used in Raytha, our open-source .NET CMS platform. However, there is no implementation of the groupby operation in the Liquid templating language. This blog post de...
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Mar 25, 2023
Release of v1.0.3
Written by Zack Schwartz
Hello everyone, v1.0.3 is now released with the key highlights being:New json liquid filter (See #89)New groupby liquid filter (See #92)Fixed crash when setting a favorite view (See #91)Hopefully you find these new liquid filters helpful!Thank you!
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Mar 19, 2023
How to Create a Successful Conference Website for Your Association
Written by Zack Schwartz
IntroAssociations play a critical role in organizing conferences, which often serve as a platform for continuing education credits or presenting papers and research. However, managing conferences can be a chaotic affair, particularly when there are multiple sessions, speakers,...
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Mar 13, 2023
Everything .NET Devs Need to Know About Authenticating With SAML2
Written by Zack Schwartz
IntroIn this post, we will dive into the world of SAML2. With over 12 years of experience building SSOs of various types, I have gained a wealth of knowledge on the subject. From popular standards like OAuth, JWT, and SAML to custom-built and sometimes quirky SSOs, I have like...
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Mar 12, 2023
Integrating Maps into Your Directory Website
Written by Zack Schwartz
IntroIn this post we are going to explore creating a restaurant directory website that includes the locations of restaurants on a map via latitude and longitude coordinates. Restaurants are just an excuse to create the website, but the techniques learned in this tutorial will ...
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Mar 05, 2023
Create a members only website with a CMS with low-code
Written by Zack Schwartz
IntroOne of the outstanding capabilities of the Raytha content management is the ability to effortlessly set up a website that includes user and account management. With Raytha, users can create their own accounts, or administrators can create accounts on their behalf, making ...
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Mar 05, 2023
Release of v1.0.2
Written by Zack Schwartz
Hi everyone,Excited to announce the release of 1.0.2.The key features in this release include:New field type available: wysiwyg field, which uses the MIT open sourced and awesome TinyMCE editor. This will allow you to have much more control over the content you write if you wa...
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Mar 01, 2023
The First 30 Days as a CTO or VP of Engineering for SaaS: What You Need to Know
Written by Zack Schwartz
Starting a new leadership position can be both exciting and daunting, especially if you're taking over a product or team that you know little about. The first 30 days are critical for setting the tone and direction of your leadership and establishing credibility with your team...
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Feb 25, 2023
Migrate a static HTML site to a CMS
Written by Zack Schwartz
IntroIf you're a web developer who has built a static HTML website, you've probably experienced the scenario where your client wants to make updates to their site but you don't have an easy way to facilitate that. You could have them email you the changes or give them access t...
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Feb 25, 2023
Release of v1.0.1
Written by Zack Schwartz
Hi everyone,Excited to announce the release of 1.0.1.The key features in this release include:Built in liquid filter to convert content item time to the organization's time zone in strtotime formatRun Raytha at a different PathBase, meaning if you run behind a reverse proxy, y...
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Feb 23, 2023
Best Open Source .NET CMS alternative to Sitefinity for Nonprofit Associations
Written by Zack Schwartz
In 2011, I joined a web design company called NonprofitCMS. Our primary focus was creating websites for non-profit organizations and membership associations using platforms such as Wordpress, Drupal, and Sitefinity. Over time, we honed our skills in building large-scale websit...
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Feb 19, 2023
Lightweight alternative to aspnetboilerplate
Written by Zack Schwartz
What is aspnetboilerplate?ASP.NET Boilerplate (aspnetboilerplate.com) is a web application framework that is built on top of the popular ASP.NET Core framework. It provides a set of pre-built tools and components to help developers quickly build scalable and maintainable appli...
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Feb 18, 2023
Recreating 'Reddit Live' with .NET and SignalR
Written by Zack Schwartz
IntroReddit Live is a unique feature of reddit.com that comes into play during serious ongoing news events with rapidly evolving information. Essentially, volunteers create a Live Thread where they constantly provide updates to visitors who are eagerly following the event. One...
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Feb 13, 2023
Setup a headless CMS in five minutes
Written by Zack Schwartz
Welcome to the exciting world of Raytha, the open-source .NET CMS. With its latest version 1.0.0, Raytha now offers a powerful and versatile Headless CMS mode. In this article, we'll take a closer look at this exciting new feature and guide you through the process of getting s...
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Feb 12, 2023
Release of v1.0.0
Written by Zack Schwartz
Hi everyone,This is the major 1.0.0 release.The headline features in this release include:Headless REST API with Swagger / OpenAPI specAdditional List View pagination controlsAble to set a List View as the home pageSupport for running in Scaled Out instanced, for example on Az...
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Feb 07, 2023
Setup custom domain on Azure Blob Storage behind reverse proxy
Written by Zack Schwartz
Hey there! If you're reading this, you're probably wondering about the nitty-gritty details of how we run our website here at https://raytha.com. Well, let us tell you - we've got the Raytha platform all set up and running smoothly on an Azure Web App, with all our files safel...
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Feb 07, 2023
Ensure users remain logged in on Azure Kubernetes Service with AddDataProtection()
Written by Zack Schwartz
Logged in sessions are lostHave you ever deployed a .NET application that allows users to log in, only to run into issues when scaling it out? It can be frustrating when everything seems to be working fine, but then users randomly get logged out or have inconsistent login stat...
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Feb 06, 2023
Using Cloudflare Workers and D1 to build a Twitter Clone
Written by Zack Schwartz
I dedicate my weekends to discovering new technologies and expanding my skill set. This curiosity led me to explore Cloudflare Workers and their recently launched D1 service - a serverless SQLite database. D1 is still in its alpha phase and documentation is sparse and frequent...
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Jan 31, 2023
The ultimate guide to hiring a software developer
Written by Zack Schwartz
A few years ago, I received a call from an acquaintance of an acquaintance, who had heard of my background as a software developer. They shared with me their idea for a complex app that would combine features of a social network, location-based services, real-time live video s...
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Jan 30, 2023
Simple form to email in .NET
Written by Zack Schwartz
This post will cover creating an HTML form with simple fields: name, email, and a message to represent filling out a Contact Us form. The .NET application will receive the form submission, send an email to the administrator, and also save a copy of the form submission to the R...
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Jan 26, 2023
Release of v0.9.4
Written by Zack Schwartz
Hi everyone,v0.9.4 has been released with some bug fixes and enhancements.Highlights:Support for DomainEvents before AND after db.SaveChanges()DomainEvents added for ContentItemsSupport for custom domains on Azure Blob StorageRedirectPermanent issue resolved on media item redi...
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Jan 25, 2023
Open Source .NET CMS Alternative to Wordpress
Written by Zack Schwartz
As a .NET developer, I have often found myself in a difficult position when it comes to building websites or bespoke systems with a content management component. In the past, I have had to resort to using Wordpress or Strapi, despite neither of them being built in .NET. This w...
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Jan 25, 2023
Solving issues with https and SSL: .NET 6, Azure App Services, Cloudflare reverse proxy
Written by Zack Schwartz
IntroductionAs fans of Azure App Services, we can attest to its convenience as a Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) solution for deploying .NET applications. The Raytha platform, for instance, runs exceptionally well on Azure App Services for both .NET runtime and Azure Web App for ...
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