Information Technology

The use of content management systems in government is a personal and work interest of mine. There is actually a lot of diversity in what governments need their CMS to do and I'm curious to see how well the panel handles that diversity. Tony White, Ars Logica, is the moderator for this panel. 

Leaders from Featured CMSes will be on-hand during this panel discussion to participate in a live analysis of the CMSes, asking probing questions of each, to determine how their represented Content Management System (and supporting community and infrastructure) best meets the demands of today's governmental needs, whether at a municipal, state or federal level.

Represented on this panel are: Lee Middleton (SilverStripe), Shaun Walker (DotNetNuke), Brian Colhounyan (TERMINALFOUR), Benjamin Mack (TYPO3), Ken Wasetis (Plone), Jeff Kline (Accrisoft), and Casey Neehouse (Umbraco). The following questions were asked either by the moderator, Tony White, or audience members. The panels' answers to these questions are paraphrased.  

What features in your CMS make it a good choice for government?

• Plone - Government is already actively using Plone. Plone can address complex and flexible workflow. Import/export capability for security purposes.
• TYPO3 - Addresses accessibility (Section 508 in US government).
• Umbraco - Lots of state agencies are switching to .Net CMS. Umbraco and Dotnetnuke are .Net CMS. Section 508 compliance. 
• Accrisoft - Local government is the specific client for this company...delivering a turnkey solution.
• TERMINALFOUR - The UN is a client. Multi-language is why the UN chose TERMINALFOUR for their CMS. 
• SilverStripe - SilverStripe sees government as partners and have built a very robust product that can be used by government.
• DotNetNuke - Microsoft has helped partner with DotNetNuke which has been a positive in introducing DNN and open source to all level of governments.
  

"The more I learn about Enterprise 2.0, the more inclined I am to encourage companies to throw caution to the wind: buy (or build) some well-designed lightweight tools that take advantage of emergence and game mechanics, find a few leaders willing to lead by example, and go live."

- Andrew McAfee, Enterprise 2.0 the Indian Way,  AndrewMcAfee.org, April 7, 2011.

"Information technology should enable government to better serve the American people. But despite spending more than $600 billion on information technology over the past decade, the Federal Government has achieved little of the productivity improvements that private industry has realized from IT. Too often, Federal IT projects run over budget, behind schedule, or fail to deliver promised functionality. Many projects use “grand design” approaches that aim to deliver functionality every few years, rather than breaking projects into more manageable chunks and demanding new functionality every few quarters.

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Spearhead your campaign with a Green Community area of the intranet, and then add in collaborative apps like the ones below.

Tip #2: Suggestion box

"In a space currently dominated by proprietary technologies, managing the long-term preservation, provenance, and accessibility of digital content is often downplayed or ignored."

- Cheryl McKinnon, CMO of Nuxeo, From information overload to Dark Ages 2.0?, OpenSource.com, October 29, 2010.

"Until we learn that, in an increasingly content-centric world, we cannot continue to base automation efforts exclusively on a technology-centric model, agencies will continue to invest millions of dollars in programs and have little to show for it."

-Barry Schaeffer, Federal IT program failures: It's the content, stupid, Federal Computer Week, September 23, 2010.

If you have ever worked for a large organization, you should easily relate to this Dilbert cartoon. As the IT guy trying to make everyone happy at work, I've spent the last year making sure everyone that needs two monitors gets two monitors. It's not an easy task in an era of tight budgets and cycle replacements but we're getting there...

A few days ago, I read Mary Jo Foley's article titled Microsoft: Our strategy with Silverlight has shifted. According to an interview with the President of the Server and Tools Division at Microsoft, the company will be shifting support for Silverlight away from the PC and Mac desktop and toward the phone market.

So what’s a developer to make of Microsoft’s messaging (or lack thereof) about Silverlight at its premiere developer conference?

I asked Bob Muglia, the Microsoft President in charge of the company’s server and tools business, that very question and got what I consider to be the clearest answer yet about how Microsoft is evolving its Silverlight strategy.

“Silverlight is our development platform for Windows Phone,” he said. Silverlight also has some “sweet spots” in media and line-of-business applications, he said.

But when it comes to touting Silverlight as Microsoft’s vehicle for delivering a cross-platform runtime, “our strategy has shifted,” Muglia told me.

Microsoft plans to be using HTML 5 to replace the functions currently being provided by Silverlight 5.

It is not the point of this post to debate the merits of HTML 5, Silverlight and even Flash. What is my point though, is that Microsoft appears to me to be desperate. Desperate to come up with a strategic plan that will carry them beyond the day of Windows PCs. Microsoft is desperate to become innovative for the sake of innovation that they're really confusing a lot of their developers. If only after a few years of support, Microsoft is shifting focus of it's Silverlight platform...what potential developer in his or her right mind would support another future Microsoft endeavor? Just take a look at the comments to Bob Muglia's blog post discussing this topic and I think you'll see my point.

Why Web Content Management Systems are the way of the future, making traditional web development a thing of the past

The Web is an exciting place. With excitement come innate complexity and an overwhelming abundance of choices when defining how to take your website into the future.  Ask web evangelists of today versus evangelists of say 5 years ago, and they will highlight the importance of device support, marketing tools, analytics and focusing on creating great content that will stand the test of time.

Recently, companies like Google and Apple have prompted questions to the public, such as, “Why are we still building things like we did 30 years ago?” These types of provocative questions are spawning answers in the form of new tools, such as the iPhone 4 and the upcoming wave of Google WebOS notebooks. Ask yourself these questions:

• Would you still create artwork using MS Paint?
• Would you still write articles using Notepad?
• Would you still use Netscape as an Internet Browser?

Then why are you still developing websites in the traditional approach?

Let me start by defining what I mean by “traditional”. Traditional Web Development refers to the act of taking a Web Framework such as HTML, ASP.net, PHP and building a website from the ground, up. This includes everything from setting up Database connections, setting up Database Tables, creating separate files for your Contact Us and Products page, the list goes on. Most web agencies that I consult with have control libraries that make this process less tedious and time consuming but this is not addressing the fundamental issue, being, this is a traditional methodology for building web sites. Weddings should be traditional; your grandmother’s brownie recipe should be traditional. Your web presence should be innovative.

I will be taking my annual break from technology. From now through August, I'll be posting and managing the site a little less. I won't be abandoning CMS Report, but you will be seeing me a little less.