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Part 4: Querying the CMS data

Introduction​

After syncing your Section and Content Type definitions with the VTEX Headless CMS, each Content Type will have a corresponding type on the Gatsby GraphQL layer.

In this section, we'll see how to query for this data using the GraphiQL IDE and how to adapt our pages components to consume this data.

Step by step​

Step 1 - Installing the gatsby-source-cms plugin​

To fetch data from the VTEX Headless CMS data layer into your FastStore project, you'll need to install the @vtex/gatsby-source-cms plugin.

  1. Open the terminal and change to the source directory of your FastStore project.

  2. Install the VTEX Headless CMS plugin.

    yarn add @vtex/gatsby-source-cms

  3. Open the gatsby-config.js file and add the following configurations for the @vtex/gatsby-source-cms plugin.

gatsby-config.js
module.exports = {
  ...,
  plugins: [
    ...,
+    {
+      resolve: '@vtex/gatsby-source-cms',
+      options: {
+        workspace: '{workspace}', //replace with the VTEX IO workspace in use - generally, use master.
+        tenant: '{account}',      //replace with the name of your VTEX account
+      },
+    },
  ],
}
caution

Remember to replace the values between curly brackets according to your scenario.

Step 2 - Querying the CMS data in GraphiQL​

Before we query the CMS data in our pages components, let's verify how our data is structured using the GraphiQL IDE.

  1. Open the terminal and change to the working directory of your project.

  2. Start a development server.

    yarn develop

  3. Open the GraphiQL IDE at http://localhost:8000/__graphql. Notice that a corresponding type on the GraphQL data layer is available for each content type that you have defined (e.g., cmsHome, cmsInstitutionalPage).

  4. Test some queries and check what they return. For example, for the home content type, try the following query:

    query MyQuery {
     cmsHome {
       sections {
         name
         data
       }
     }
    }

    This will return a JSON object as in the following example:

    {
      "data": {
        "cmsHome": {
          "sections": [
            {
              "name": "DynamicShelf",
              "props": {
                "searchParams": {
                  "hideUnavailableItems": true,
                  "from": 0,
                  "to": 11,
                  "collection": "143"
                },
                "title": "Special Offers"
              }
            }
          ]
        }
      },
      "extensions": {
        "enableRefresh": "true"
      }
    }

Next, we'll query this data inside our React components and use it to update their contents.

Step 3 - Querying the CMS data in the pages components​

Let's now query the CMS data in our pages so we can update our React components with the CMS content.

  1. Open your project in the code editor of your preference.

  2. Open the corresponding pages component of a Content Type you're integrating with the VTEX Headless CMS. For example, for the Home Page, open /src/pages/index.tsx.

  3. Update the GraphQL query of your content type to fetch the desired data from the CMS. Take the following example.

    src/pages/index.tsx
    export const query = graphql`
      query HomePageQuery(
        site {
          siteMetadata {
            title
            description
            titleTemplate
          }
        }
        cmsHome {
          sections {
            name
            data
          }
        }
        ...
    `

Step 4 - Rendering the CMS content​

Finally, let's update our components to present the content submitted via the VTEX Headless CMS app. To do that, take the following steps:

  1. Open your FastStore project in any code editor of your preference.

  2. Go to the src/components folder and create a new file named RenderCMS.tsx.

  3. Copy and paste the following code into the RenderCMS.tsx file.

    src/components/RenderCMS.tsx
    import React from 'react'
    import Shelf from 'src/components/sections/Shelf'
    import type { ComponentType } from 'react'

    /**
     * Sections: Components imported from '../components/sections' only.
     * Do not import or render components from any other folder in here.
     */
    const COMPONENTS: Record<string, ComponentType<any>> = {
      Shelf
    }

    interface Props {
      sections?: Array<{ name: string; data: unknown }>
    }

    function RenderCMS({ sections }: Props) {
      return (
        <>
          {sections?.map(({ name, data }, index) => {
            const Component = COMPONENTS[name]

            if (!Component) {
              throw new Error(
                `Could not find component for block ${name}. Add a new component for this block or remove it from the CMS`
              )
            }

            return <Component key={`cms-section-${index}`} {...data} />
          })}
        </>
      )
    }

    export default RenderCMS

  4. Import the React components corresponding to the Sections you previously created in the CMS (e.g., RichText, Shelf) and add it to COMPONENTS. For example:

    src/components/RenderCMS.tsx
    import React from 'react'
    import Shelf from 'src/components/sections/Shelf'
    import RichText from 'src/components/sections/RichText'
    import type { ComponentType } from 'react'

    const COMPONENTS: Record<string, ComponentType<any>> = {
    Shelf,
    RichText,
    }

  5. Save your changes.

  6. Now, go to the pages component corresponding to the Content Type you are integrating with the CMS. For example, for the Home Page, go to the src/pages/index.tsx file.

  7. Import the RenderCMS component.

    import RenderCMS from 'src/components/RenderCMS'

  8. Add the RenderCMS component to your page as in the following example.

    src/pages/index.tsx
    <RenderCMS sections={cmsHome?.sections} />

  9. Save your changes.