FAO Web guide: 2.7c Content Management Systems (CMS)

Web Guide home 1. Introduction 2. Web publishing basics 3. Planning 4. Content collection 5. Design 6. Construction 7. Testing 8. Launch 9. Maintenance 10. Writing for the Web Resources 1.1 FAO and the Internet: What is an FAO Web site? 1.2 Quality criteria of Web sites 1.3 An introduction to Web accessibility at FAO 1.4 Electronic publishing at FAO 2.1 Content quality 2.2 Roles in Web publishing 2.3 Web site quality clearance and continuity 2.4 Policy and legal matters 2.5 Language coverage policy 2.6 Web site traffic monitoring 2.7 Static and dynamic content 2.8 Really Simple Syndication (RSS) 2.9 Social Media Guidelines 2.10 Current server structure at FAO 3.1 What and (who) is the site for and what is it about?3.2 Define the Web site subject scope 3.3 Define your audience 3.4 Identify resources 3.5 How to track and share planning decisions 4.1 Developing a content inventory 4.2 FAO content repositories 4.3 Metadata 5.1 Review user needs 5.2 Defining information architecture 5.3 Prepare interface design 5.4 Define technical implementation 5.5 Tracking design implementation 6.1 Management of files/naming 6.2 HTML and coding 6.3 Use of style sheets 6.4 Graphics 6.5 Conversion of electronic documents 6.6 Language encoding 6.7 Link management 6.8 Printable pages 6.9 Providing access to search 6.10 Domains, URLs and aliases 6.11 Tools 7.1 Testing approaches 7.2 How to use the test environment 8.1 Launch checklist 8.2 Promotion 9.1 Quality assurance and routine checking 9.2 Update procedures for Web sites 9.3 Web usage analysis 9.4 Evaluation of Web sites 10.1 Writing a page of text 10.2 Organizing your text on the page 10.3 How to optimize content for search engines 10.4 How to write feedback, error messages 10.5 Quotations 10.6 Non-discriminatory language Checklists Acronyms Newsletter Guidelines Policies Procedures Web resources Tag cloud Contacts 2.3a Data ownership 2.3b Regulation of access to servers 2.3c Clearance of Web sites by OCP 2.4a Country names, flags and maps 2.4b The fao.org domain, subdomains and root directories 2.4c Use of FAO emblem and logos 2.4d Politically sensitive material 2.6a FAO Web sites: the user perspective 2.6b How to gather user information: user research 2.6c Designing for the user 2.6d Page size and downloading 2.7a Static content 2.7b Dynamic content 2.7c Content Management Systems (CMS) 2.9a FAO and Facebook 2.9b FAO and Flickr 2.9c FAO and Google+2.9d FAO and LinkedIn 2.9e FAO and SlideShare 2.9f FAO and Twitter 2.9g FAO and Wikipedia 2.9h FAO and YouTube 4.3a What is metadata?4.3b Why embed metadata in Web pages?4.3c How to embed basic metadata in the HTML head section 4.3d How to create or improve current metadata 4.3e FAO standards for encoded metadata 4.3f Metadata, search engines and their robots 5.2a Identify Web pages and subject categories 5.2b Define navigation 5.2c Define metadata and search requirements 5.3a Corporate visual identity 5.3b Web site design usability principles 6.1a How to use the FTP server 6.2a HTML and XHTML 6.2b Browser compatibility 6.2c New windows and pop-ups 6.2d JavaScript 6.2e HTML title and metadata tags 6.3a CSS and Web accessibility 6.3b Cascading Style sheets (CSS) and browser compatibility 6.4a Graphic formats 6.4b Use of images on the Web 6.4c Photos 6.5a Converting Word documents into PDF 6.6a Guidelines for language encoding 6.6b Multilingual interfaces 6.7a Linking files across languages 6.7b Links to the FAO home page, FAO copyright and AskFAO 6.7c Absolute and relative links 6.7d Avoid spamming on e-mail addresses 6.8a How to prepare print-safe Web pages using CSS 6.8b Other ways of preparing print-safe Web pages 6.11a Recommended editing tools for Web site construction 6.11b Graphics, document and conversion tools 9.1a Maintaining quality 9.1b Content freshness
	Web Guide > webguide > 2. Web publishing basics > 2.7 Static and dynamic content > 2.7c Content Management Systems (CMS)
	2.7c Content Management Systems (CMS) A content management system (CMS) assists users in the process of administering a Web site's content. It facilitates the organisation, control and publication of a large body of documents, images, multimedia resources, etc. without programming knowledge. It also enables programmers to rapidly customize a Web site’s structure, menus, layout and page functionalities. To manage their Web site users access the CMS through their Web browser. Why use a CMS? allows content to be easily updated, so that it appears fresh, consistent and of a high quality; facilitates the re-use of content; enables decentralised content creation; and facilitates centralised workflow, approval processes and procedures. A CMS may also manage the collaborative creation/editing of documents. Some CMSs offer collaborative components such as Wikis and blogs. Many CMSs also manage content workflows. Content Management Systems are sometimes called Web Content Management systems or (WCM systems). This is to differentiate them from CMSs that exclusively manage and store electronic files: text and/or images, audio, video, etc. These are sometimes called Document Management Systems (DMS). First generation CMS at FAO The following CMSs were built by FAO for specific needs. Distributed Web site Management System (DWS) DWS is a content management system developed by KCT years ago that has been used to construct FAO internet and intranet Web sites. CIO is currently replacing DWS with TYPO3. Community Directory Service (CDS) CDS is an application framework developed to facilitate the creation of multilingual, thematic portals and communities of practice. The framework is built on Lucene, a powerful open source search engine API, allowing it to efficiently search both metadata and free text. The CDS has a powerful information syndication mechanism allowing it to render information published in almost any Web system or database searchable and navigable in one place. The CDS allows for administration and data entry via Web forms. Editorship and peer review can be devolved and distributed around the world, eliminating the editorial bottleneck. The CDS supports control over visibility of information down to document level; versioning of documents and topics; e-mail notification of changes at the document or topic level; ontology integration and many other features. Sites built using the CDS are: International Phytosanitary Portal; Rural Finance Learning Centre; and International Portal on Food Safety, Animal & Plant Health. The Forestry Information System (FORIS) The Forestry Department's Web site is managed using a custom-designed CMS. FORIS links subject pages with FAO's forest-related databases to generate continuously updated information. Specific subject pages are created and maintained directly by FAO forestry officers. See the Forestry Web site. Fisheries Global Information System (FIGIS) The FIGIS system provides users with access to dynamically-generated information, statistics, data, fact sheets and documents on fisheries. It promotes effective and focussed cooperation to share and exchange information using harmonized and streamlined standards. News and Events Management System (NEMS) The NEMS system was developed many years ago by KCE to manage the news sections of FAO Web sites. NEMS is no longer in development or being integrated as this function is now being supported by the news extension features of CMS. TYPO3 Since 2005, FAO has been investigating various open source CMSs, particularly Drupal, Joomla, TYPO3 and OpenCMS. Open source software permits users to use, change, improve the software, and to redistribute it in a modified or an unmodified form. The ‘Collaborative Tools’ Wiki records the experience of FAO staff who have evaluated and compared open source CMSs. TYPO3 has been selected as the open source CMS supported by CIO as its robustness, scalability and architecture are able to support the users and features required at the corporate level. An example of an FAO Web site that is maintained through an open source CMS is the Web Guide Web site. The Web Guide team login through the CMS's administration page to manage the Web site online, from any computer. The CDR Guide for Users [internal] and the Web2forDev - Participatory Web for Development Web site are two further examples of CMS Web sites. If you would like more information on using TYPO3 please contact CIOK on service-desk@fao.org.