CMSConnectSource Metadata Type in SFDX

Architectural Overview#

Many enterprises maintain marketing assets, global navigation headers, and localized blog content in an external Content Management System (such as Adobe Experience Manager, Drupal, Sitecore, SDL, or WordPress) while hosting authenticated customer and partner portals on Salesforce Experience Cloud (Network and ExperienceBundle). The CMSConnectSource metadata type declaratively configures CMS Connect connections so Experience Builder components can dynamically fetch and render HTML fragments, CSS/JS assets, and JSON feeds from the external CMS.

Directory Location and File Suffix#

In Salesforce DX projects, CMSConnectSource files reside in the cmsConnectSources directory.

Key Metadata Fields#

The following table details the XML configuration elements of CMSConnectSource in API version 68.0 (Winter ’27):

Declarative Metadata Example#

The following CMSConnectSource connects an Adobe Experience Manager (AEM) server to the Customer_Support_Portal network using a NamedCredential (AEM_Prod_Content_Endpoint), CSS scoping, and language mappings for English and French.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<CMSConnectSource xmlns="http://soap.sforce.com/2006/04/metadata">
    <cmsConnectAsset>
        <assetPath>etc/designs/corporate/clientlib-site.min.css</assetPath>
        <assetType>CSS</assetType>
        <sortOrder>1</sortOrder>
    </cmsConnectAsset>
    <connectionType>Authenticated</connectionType>
    <cssScope>.cms-corporate-wrapper</cssScope>
    <developerName>Corporate_AEM_Feed</developerName>
    <languageMappings>
        <cmsLanguage>en</cmsLanguage>
        <language>en_US</language>
    </languageMappings>
    <languageMappings>
        <cmsLanguage>fr</cmsLanguage>
        <language>fr</language>
    </languageMappings>
    <name>Corporate AEM Feed</name>
    <namedCredential>AEM_Prod_Content_Endpoint</namedCredential>
    <network>Customer_Support_Portal</network>
    <personalizationEnabled>false</personalizationEnabled>
    <rootPath>content/corporate/global</rootPath>
    <status>Active</status>
    <type>AEM</type>
</CMSConnectSource>

Package Manifest (package.xml)#

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<Package xmlns="http://soap.sforce.com/2006/04/metadata">
    <types>
        <members>Corporate_AEM_Feed</members>
        <name>CMSConnectSource</name>
    </types>
    <version>68.0</version>
</Package>

SFDX CLI Retrieval and Deployment#

Use the Salesforce CLI (sf) to retrieve and deploy CMSConnectSource configurations:

# Retrieve all CMSConnectSource metadata files
sf project retrieve start --metadata CMSConnectSource

# Deploy a specific CMSConnectSource to the target org
sf project deploy start --metadata CMSConnectSource:Corporate_AEM_Feed

Architect Best Practices and Gotchas#

• CSP and CORS Alignment: When using CMS Connect to render JSON or HTML/CSS in an ExperienceBundle site, you must also deploy a CspTrustedSite metadata component for the external CMS domain and configure CORS headers (Access-Control-Allow-Origin) on the external CMS CDN.
• Always Set cssScope: External CMS stylesheets often define global rules for body, h1, or a tags that break standard Lightning Web Components on the page. Specify a cssScope class (such as .cms-corporate-wrapper) to isolate external styles.

Frequently asked questions

What is the purpose of CMSConnectSource in Salesforce Experience Cloud?

It configures CMS Connect integrations that pull headers, footers, banners, and JSON content feeds from external CMS platforms like Adobe Experience Manager, WordPress, or Drupal into an Experience Cloud site.

How does CMSConnectSource authenticate to an external CMS endpoint?

A Public CMS connection uses a direct root URL, while an Authenticated connection references a Salesforce NamedCredential to securely sign outbound requests to the CMS server.

Where are CMSConnectSource files located in SFDX source format?

CMSConnectSource files are stored in the force-app/main/default/cmsConnectSources/ directory with the .cmsConnectSource-meta.xml extension.

Why do CMSConnectSource deployments fail if the target Network does not exist?

Each CMSConnectSource is scoped to a specific Experience Cloud site via the network field, so the target Network metadata must exist before deploying CMSConnectSource.