Background

In DotNetNuke page's are programmatically known as tabs (this was the legacy term used in the original Ibuyspy code). When operating with pages via code, page instances are stored in the TabInfo class and manipulated via the TabController class, both of which are in the DotNetNuke.Entities.Tabs namespace

Note: The API documentation can be downloaded from the downloads page.

Creating the page via code

Note: When creating a new page via code, it is not sufficent to create the page itself. DotNetNuke implements a rich set of permissions including page permissions (via the TabPermissionCollection), so new pages require permissions to be programatically set otherwise they cannot be navigated to.

To create a page programmatically code similar to the following is used:

Dim controller As New TabController

Dim newTab As New Tabs.TabInfo

Dim newPermissions As TabPermissionCollection = newTab.TabPermissions

Dim permissionProvider As PermissionProvider = permissionProvider.Instance

Dim infPermission As TabPermissionInfo



' set new page properties

newTab.PortalID = PortalId ' the portal you want the page created on

newTab.TabName = PageName 'the new page name

newTab.Title = PageTitle 'the new page title

newTab.Description = Description 'the new page description

newTab.KeyWords = Keywords 'the new page keywords (used for meta keywords and search)

newTab.IsDeleted = False 'whether it is deleted - always false for new pages

newTab.IsSuperTab = False 'whether it should only be accessible by superusers

newTab.IsVisible = True 'whether it is visible

newTab.DisableLink = False 'whether it has a menu link

newTab.IconFile = "" 'the image file used in the menu

newTab.Url = "" 'if the page is a redirection to a URL such as another page or an external site

newTab.ParentId = <insert relevant pageid here - see notes below>



' create new page

controller.AddTab(newTab, LoadDefaultModules)



' copy permissions selected in Permissions collection

For index As Integer = 0 To (Permissions.Count - 1)

    infPermission = New TabPermissionInfo



    infPermission.AllowAccess = Permissions(index).AllowAccess

    infPermission.RoleID = Permissions(index).RoleID

    infPermission.RoleName = Permissions(index).RoleName

    infPermission.TabID = Permissions(index).TabID

    infPermission.PermissionID = Permissions(index).PermissionID



    'save permission info

    newPermissions.Add(infPermission, True)

    permissionProvider.SaveTabPermissions(newTab)

Next index

Notes:

• Pages require a "parent" page id. Whilst this might be fixed (e.g. create all new pages under a particular page), sometimes code will look to add it under the current page. A popular option for this would be to pull back the tabid for the current module e.g.
  

  objModuleInfo = objModuleContr.GetModuleByDefinition(PortalId, "UserReg")
  
  intModTabID = objModuleInfo.TabID
  
  newTab.ParentId = intModTabID

  
  

• it's of course possible to "clone" a tab, but retrieving it's definition from an existing tab and then saving it elsewhere e.g.

  dim newTab as TabInfo = controller.GetTab(oldTabId, portalID, true)

  . However, if doing this on versions 5.5.0 or higher, please ensure that you change the uniqueID value i.e newTab.UniqueId = System.Guid.NewGuid()
  

• if you purely want a clone of a tab then the TabController already has the handy, if not very flexible, TabController.CopyTab method.
  

Useful references

• programmatically creating dotnetnuke pages
• Programmatically add page and html module with content DotNetNuke DNN