eCMS

Web site development includes selecting and structuring site content, but managing this crucial element of the site effectively requires a methodical approach to the topic. At the simplest level, “Content” includes everything on the site delivered to the visitor's browser, but “Content Management” normally implies that there is a higher level of value to the information – documents, articles and reports, but potentially multimedia, software, news and statistical or financial data. Transactional content – that relating to sales and orders or to database output – is another type of information that requires sophisticated management tools.

Content management is the process of collecting, storing, delivering and monitoring information vital to the organization. In web site terms, this includes uploading, storing and serving the information to those who need it, but only to those authorized to see it. As a concept, content management is often seen as a technical activity based around intranet, knowledge management or archive systems and processes, but it can also encompass the whole life-cycle of information from creation to deletion.
Our general purpose “Content Management System” has been designed around a web site manager's needs. This involves the allocation of staff time to the creation or selection of appropriate information, the conversion of that information to a format that can be delivered over a network when requested by the user, and a series of limitations to ensure that documents are secure, up-to-date, searchable, attributable and accessible.
Manual Solutions – involving individuals converting naming and linking documents through the website – are inevitably time-consuming, so automated solutions have been developed to alleviate the effort required to deliver the information on demand.

Following customizations are available in our content management system;

Web Facilitation – templates, wizards or conversion tools to enable non-experts to deposit documents into a retrieval system. This could be as simple as a directory into which word documents are filed, with the filenames listed as the directory home page; or it could be a sophisticated document-delivery system with browser plug-ins that convert the documents as they are called up by users, so that they can be viewed in the browser.

Format Management – Documents from legacy collections (those not created specifically for the current system) need to be organized by format for easy management, and converted into suitable delivery and viewing formats (perhaps HTML or PDF, or TIFF images for scanned documents). These formats then allow the documents to be shared with third parties if that is required. Data may also be in audio or video formats, spreadsheets or databases. Our advanced Content Management system is able to deliver all of these files through the browser window – with the appropriate plug-ins where necessary (Acrobat, Flash, QuickTime, RealPlayer, etc)

Revision Tracking – File naming and dating protocols (standards imposed upon or agreed by the organization) should ensure that document versions can be identified. This is essential if a series or rewritten documents is involved, such as financial regulations or contracts where access to superseded versions may be required. The identity of the author, and of those who update and revise the document, should be available for security, audit and referencing purposes.

Indexing, searching and retrieval – In order to be useful and usable, the data has to be easily accessible. This implies some form of cataloguing and classification, and will usually depend on the author rigorously following the naming protocols (and perhaps the addition of other information such as keywords, subject classification, date of publishing, etc).

Access Management – While the entire system might be protected from external access by firewall software or simple password security, internally to the organization there will be further levels of Access Control, Management, Financial and Marketing information will carry different levels of restriction, depending on the nature of the information itself and on the structure of the organization.
An advanced knowledge-based organization may have all staff involved in the development and management of the content management system – in other organizations there may be a core team to whom documents are delivered for conversion, classification and cataloguing.