Page collections
Summarize
Summary of Page collections
Page Collections in ServiceNow are groups of reusable pages designed to be employed across multiple experiences. These collections enable you to efficiently replicate and share custom pages without duplicating effort. They operate in a sandboxed environment, isolating them from direct access to URL parameters or data resources on the parent page. Instead, they rely on a specified Controller record passed at runtime. Although they cannot directly alter the parent page, page collections can communicate by dispatching events that the calling page listens for to trigger actions.
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Key Features
- Reusability: Create sets of pages that can be reused in various experiences, saving time and ensuring consistency.
- Sandboxed Environment: Pages within a collection are isolated, enhancing stability and security while enabling controlled interaction via event dispatching.
- Flexible Components: Page collections can be used within Viewports, Viewport Modals, and Tabs components to enrich user experiences.
- Controller Integration: Use a Controller record or pass JSON dependencies to provide necessary data and manage interactions.
- Modal Viewports: Allow users to interact with pages without leaving the parent page, useful for additional information or edits.
- Tabbed Content: Organize content into tabs within a page collection, facilitating structured and reusable navigation across experiences.
Practical Usage and Considerations
- Page collections are created and managed from the UI Builder home screen or from components that support them.
- When creating page collections, you must select the component type (Tab or Viewport) and associate a Controller.
- Data resources must be bound from the parent page to pass information into the page collection effectively.
- Routing within page collections requires specifying which page to display in a viewport.
- Because page collections cannot directly modify the parent page, rely on event dispatching to communicate changes.
Benefits for ServiceNow Customers
By leveraging page collections, customers can streamline the development and maintenance of UI experiences by reusing pages across multiple contexts. This approach reduces duplication, enhances consistency, and enables dynamic interaction via modals and tabs without navigating away from the main page. It is particularly valuable for delivering targeted information or workflows to different user groups efficiently.
Page Collections are groups of pages that can be used across multiple experiences.
What is a page collection
Page Collections (sys_ux_extension_point) are groups of pages that are meant to be re-used across multiple experiences. These sets of pages can be used in a modal viewport or in a tabs component. These pages are sandboxed and do not have access to things like URL params or data resources from the page that is calling them. All they have access to is the Controller record that is specified on the Page Collection record and that is passed down by the calling page in runtime.
Page collections are sandboxed inside of the pages they are within, this means that they do not have direct access to change the parent page. However, because of the way seismic works, your page collection page can dispatch an event that the calling page can listen for to take action. This is the only way to achieve a change in the calling page.
Why should you use page collections
Page collections allow you to reuse custom pages across experiences. This will save you time if you need to replicate a page for multiple experiences and help pass information to different groups of users.
You can also use page collections to provide additional information within an existing topic by using a viewport modal. A viewport modal will allow your audience to view pages outside of their experience to make changes without leaving the parent page.
Create collection of tabs that can be shared across experiences. Each tab is an individual page in a page collection.
Where can you use page collections
You can access a page collection from the UI Builder home screen. The list of page collections details which component and type each page collection is.
You can create a page collection from the UI Builder home screen, or from a component that uses page collections.
- Viewports
- Viewport Modals
- Tabs
Things to consider
The page collection creation screen requires a component and controller selection.
Data resources need to be selected to pass information to a page collection. Need to bind data from the parent page.
Need to route to the page in a page collection you want to display in a viewport.
Add a link to creating a page collection.
Page collection on the platform
You create a page collection within the ServiceNow platform. At this time, only the Tab and Viewport component can be used when creating a page collection. You can select a controller or pass controller dependencies using JSON.