Content Management System

The main page of this article begins with the premise that, to properly implement a content management system, the first step is to understand what content actually is. The second step is to understand the process by which it will be managed.

Lots of organisations have gone down the me-too route:

We have loads of content
If we manage it with a management product we will increase its value
We will implement a commercial CMS

The implementation should have definable benefits

Cost reduction
Value addition
Improved accessibility
Better security

How does it work?

There are a number of ways to design a CMS and still get the same technical results.

But each design strategy supports a different functionality profile. And each functionality profile suits some management processes better than others.

The diagram to the right shows some of the key elements of a CMS:

The content owners are corralled with the content repository - Here they can (subject to their security and file permissions) create, update and delete content. To do this they will use applications like Word, PhotoShop and Dreamweaver; tools like digital cameras and sound recorders.

The content repository might - ideally - be a physically central storage facility. It is likely, however, that it will be a diversity of databases, file servers and suchlike; probably spread across different hardware and quite likely using different operating systems.

In the content repository there will be some kind of version control that will manage different generations of each document family. This may well be virtual metadata, simply a record of what has been and is now available in the database.

There may be workflow elements active in the content repository, too.

Content management: Illustrating a simple strategy

Publishing management is the gateway through which all content must pass before it is available to the web sites and, through those sites, to the user population. The user population can use the published content but, for a user, there is no mechanism by which content in the repository can be changed. It may be that some users are members of both the user community and content owners: Their applications will provide the tools required for both roles.

In a simple case content owners will save documents and the documents will appear on the web site. In the real world, chances are the documents will be saved then reviewed by an editor or other arbiter before they are published onto the web site.

Also, you need to bear in mind that every user will need to comply with the requirements of the CMS

When using XML as part of a publishing or document management strategy users must appreciate the importance of using distinct styles: Writing a hundred-page Word document in normal then tarting the document up with large type, changing fonts and emboldening here and there is right out! (Anyone who's used Adobe Acrobat Distiller to create PDF documents with navigation structure will know what I mean, too.)

And when you come to save a new document, the temptation to click on OK without wading through all those document properties must be avoided.

The process of managing a document - for every user - must include certain basic disciplines. And each user must understand the requirements of those disciplines and apply them every time.

Some management applications provide a checking step, maintaining document properties as required. But the vast majority don't currently have the level of integration with desktop applications that is required to do this.

If you elect to develop at least part of your CMS, rather than buy in a complete package, then document automation can be used to check these properties before a document is saved. Otherwise, templates are a useful step towards useful document structure, especially where the template document has an OnSave macro to check for obvious cataloguing problems.

This has really only just started to scratch at the surface of content management: I hope the general principles described will provide some food for thought, at least. There is a mass of information available on the internet but a lot of it is sales material.


If you have experience of developing CMS or having implemented one (or more!) I would like to hear your story. Drop me an email and tell me! Thanks.


Other pages in the Content Management article
Managing web site content Main article	What now? Where next?	The market: Content Management Systems