Transcript What`s a CMS? - Information Today, Inc.

From Static to Dynamic:
Choosing and Implementing a CMS
Ruth Kneale, [email protected]
National Solar Observatory, Advanced Technology Solar Telescope
What’s a CMS anyway?
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CMS = Content Management System
Used to collaboratively and interactively
create, manage, control, and publish
information
 Known by many other terms
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 PDM
or EDMS, like DocuShare
 Web CMS, like Drupal
 Wiki
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We need a web CMS
Why do we want one?
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To avoid any more of the “single point
syndrome”
To enable:
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Ease of administration
Increased team collaboration
Increased functionality
Improved presentation for the web site
Our Basic Starting Point
Open Source = $0 cost
 LAMP Setup
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Must Haves
Audit trail
 Content approval
 WYSIWYG editor
 Granular privileges
 Friendly URLs
 Versioning
 Content reuse
 CGI support
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Should Haves
Sandbox/staging area
 Online administration
 Inline administration
 Mass uploading
 Site map/index
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Nice to Have
Contact management
 Drag-n-drop
 Photo gallery
 Events calendar
 Web statistics
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To CMS or to Wiki?
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That is the question
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Both are strong possibilities
How to determine?
Experience of others (listservs, etc)
 Cmsmatrix.org and wikimatrix.org
 Opensourcecms.com
 Experts-Exchange.com
 Local evaluation
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Initial Search Results
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WebCMS’s:
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Lenya
Drupal
e107
eTouch
ExpressionEngine
Joomla!
Plone
WebGUI
Xoops
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Wiki’s:
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Giki
KeheiWiki
MediaWiki
MoniWiki
PHPwiki
PmWiki
PukiWiki
SnipSnap
TWiki
The Weeding Begins
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Exclusions based on:
Too many missing functionalities
 Hidden fees
 Currency of support
 Required database underpinnings
 Reports of others on ease of installation
 Reports of others on ease of use
 Short evaluation on opensourcecms
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The Final Four
Drupal
TWiki
WebGUI
MediaWiki
These were installed and tested locally.
Drupal: Adding Content
WebGUI: Adding Content
TWiki: Adding Content
MediaWiki: Adding Content
Local Testing
Small group of local users made up of
staff who would also be final users of the
product
 Created, edited content
 Provided feedback
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General Thoughts
Wanted familiar look-and-feel
 Wanted terminology changed
 Liked the CMSs
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“More like Word”
Disliked the wikis
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“Too much work”
The Winner Is…
Next Steps
Expanding functionality
 Ingesting existing site
 Training staff on use
 Going live on new server by 2008
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Thanks for Listening!
http://atst.nso.edu
(after January 1st)