Column Two » website

One CMS or two?

James Robertson — Mon, 16 May 2011 04:23:45 +0000

Selecting a new web content management system (CMS) is no small matter. As discussed in one of our earliest articles, How to evaluate a CMS, this decision must be driven by an evaluation against business requirements.

One question that often arises early in the process is whether the same CMS should be used for the website and intranet, or whether two solutions should be deployed.

Historically, this question was often driven by a desire to reuse the public-facing CMS for the intranet. These days, the question is equally likely to relate to reusing the intranet solution (such as SharePoint) for the website.

While there are advantages to having a single solution, this is not a ‘slam dunk’ option as this article will explore.

[May article, read the full article]

Do you have an elevator pitch for your online activities?

James Robertson — Wed, 07 Apr 2010 00:59:28 +0000

Dorthe Raakjær Jespersen asks: do you have an elevator pitch for your online activities? To quote:

It can be very tiring to have to explain the same things over and over again. But have you stopped to look at how you reply and respond to people? Are you speaking their language? Could it be done in a simpler way?

Houston: we have a go!

James Robertson — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 00:38:23 +0000

The new website is officially live, as of midday yesterday. It’s been a long time coming, but hopefully worth the wait. The key changes/improvements:

Commenting: you can now comment not just on this blog, but also on the articles themselves. This has been the biggest point of pain for a long time now, ever since the old copy of Movable Type was overwhelmed by spam.
New design: the site is hopefully looking fresh and new, in keeping with modern design principles. There’s more work to be done on this, but at least the rounded corners have gone!
Clean code: all the nasty 1996-era spacer images have been killed, and the site is now presented using clean code and CSS.
Better functionality: there have been a range of incremental improvements to the site, including better navigation to (and between articles), and a number of blog enhancements. More to come, watch this space.
RSS feed for articles: yes, there is now an RSS feed just for articles, which is something that a few have asked for.

Consider this a work-in-progress release for the site. Now that we finally have the site on a supported and manageable platform, there are a raft of enhancements planned for the coming months. Watch this space!

Oh, and please do provide feedback on the site (you can add comments to this post, or to any of the articles). In particular, I’m sure there are some bugs and teething problems to fix, and we’ll need your help with that.

Onwards and upwards.