Consensus
Piero Tintori - TERMINALFOUR piero.tintori@terminalfour.com
Stephen Pope - Eduserv stephen.pope@eduserv.org.uk

Agenda
• Defining Web Content Management
– What is a WCMS?
– What isn’t a WCMS?
• The key advantages of a WCMS
• Life without a WCMS

Defining Web Content Management
• Our definition:
– Software automation of the tasks involved in publishing and managing content on a website
– A system that allows users update content on a website

Defining Web Content Management
– What is also WCMS?
• Blogs – simple content management
• Wiki
• Discussion boards
– What isn’t a WCMS?
• A database on its own (no business logic)
• Unstructured files

The key advantages of a CMS
Stephen Pope
[stephen.pope@eduserv.org.uk]

The Manual Edit ..
• Someone in the company wants an important press release put on the web site.
• Release is emailed (probably in word format) to the web team (or external company)
• Web team have to download the original page from the website / create a new page from a template then manually convert the text/formatting into HTML.
• Press release has to go live at 12 midnight so someone has to wake up and upload it at 11:59pm :¬/

Workflow
• Enforce standards
• Editorial Control
– Editor final approval / Preview content in place.
– Version control – instant rollback
– nothing overwritten.

Workflow
• Publishing Control
– Hide / Schedule / Expire / Archive
• Quality Control
– Compel alt tags / tidy html / check spelling
• Accountability / Paper trail

Security
• Granular role based security
– No more ‘Pandora's Box’ – people only see what they are allowed to see.
• Delegate Responsibility
– Different people can be in charge of their own parts of the web site
(press/events)
– No need for everything to pass through the web team!

Content Delivery
• Scheduled Publish / Archive
• Multiple Platforms
(Web/Mobile/RSS)
• Multiple Languages
• Multiple Audiences (Metadata)
• Edit in place
• Publish to Staging / DR / Static
• SES URLs / Aliases
• Snapshots for FOI requirements

Rapid Development
• Separation of content from presentation
– People of all skill levels involved
– Design
– Content Migration
– Quick re-skinning
• Reusable elements such as templates and renderings (breadcrumb / nav. menus)
• Centralised Content / Documents
(extranet / intranet) / Links – Update Once
!
• Security / Workflow controls
• Modules - Probably been written before !

Maintenance
• Rapid Updates
– Common Interface
– Quick to train
– Content users in charge of their own content not web devs.
• Import / Paste from office apps
• Manage many users
• Workflow
– Distributed contributions
– Rollbacks
• Centralised document management

System Integration
• Doesn’t all have to be out of the box
– Security - Integrate with
LDAP/Athens/Shib
– Documents – Sharepoint /
Central Store
– Search Engines –
Google/Dtsearch/Ultraseek
– Data-Providers (XML/SQL)
– Stats
• Will always needs customisation

Open Standards
• Information freely available
• Data in XML
– Route out
– Minimise Migration
• Presentation in XSLT
– Small changes can be made by people with HTML knowledge
– Not locked into custom API for presentation
• XAML / SAML / XACML

Life without a CMS
Stephen Pope
[stephen.pope@eduserv.org.uk]

Problem Areas
• Tedious Web Management
• The Webmaster Bottleneck
– “Enterprise Cut and Paste”
• Corporate Governance
• Reuse of Content

Tedious Web Management
• Your spend most of your time making minor changes to areas that won’t even be appreciated by people
– Fixing broken links
– Restructuring Site Map
– No time to work on more interesting features and developments

The Webmaster Bottleneck
• You become the typing pool of the organisation
– “Enterprise Cut and Paste”
– Build up of frustration
• Publishers want to publish faster and have control
• Webmasters find that “Cut and paste” is boring work
– Would be publishers don’t understand the work involved

Corporate Governance
• “Extra bureaucracy to cover ourselves from complaints”
– Version control – snap shots =
Lots and lots of backup tapes!
– Who signed off what… in the absence of an audit trail who is responsible?

Reuse of Content
• If you have good content… get more value from it… reuse it
– Five websites = five times the work
– 5 Languages = five times the work excluding translation
– Different versions of the same content in different places

Conclusion
• WCMS will make you life easier…
• Your internal publishers will be happier…
• Your visitors will have up-to-date and consistent / accessible content…

Conclusion
• CMS may change your life….