Delivered at Institutional Web Management Workshop 2006 at the University of Bath, 14 - 16 June 2006

1. Advantages of CMSCMS Debate: Challenging the
Consensus
Piero Tintori - TERMINALFOUR
piero.tintori@terminalfour.com
Stephen Pope - Eduserv
stephen.pope@eduserv.org.uk

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

3. 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

4. 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

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

6. 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 :¬/

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

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

9. 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!

10. 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

11. 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 !

12. 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

13. 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

14. 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

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

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

17. 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

18. 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

19. 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?

20. 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

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

22. Conclusion
• CMS may change your life….