Articles - Page 187

What I Mean to Say: A Practitioner Perspective on AI, Semantics, and Content Evolution

msalvatierra

SpringCM today announced the latest release of its cloud content sharing and collaboration service for business, now with a new Open Cloud Connector, an easy to implement and powerful way to put content to work in virtually any web application or portal a business wants.  Business people can now view and act on content related to specific groups, such as customers, suppliers, products, or employees, while letting the cloud service keep everything in sync.
In research conducted by SpringCM in 2011, organizations reported from 52% to 90% of the documents, images, drawings, audio and video associated with records in core business applications was not viewed or acted on from the application.  Often this content is on individual laptops, hard to manage shared drives, or content management systems disconnected from their applications.
<blockquote>
“Connecting content to structured data and to end users in a more engaging manner has many implications for commercial applications, with mashups, portlets and widgets becoming popular alternatives to hard-wired integration approaches,” commented Mark Gilbert, Research Vice President, Gartner, Inc. “But the biggest potential impact of content integration comes from linking it to transactional business data and delivering a rich information experience that allows end users to get the job done easier and faster.”
“The new Open Cloud Connector is really slick.   It is easy to implement because the Open Cloud Connector basically does the heavy lifting to expose any kind of content in your application,” said Tom Hedgecoth, Global Director of Consulting, sakonent. “Teaching someone how to use it is a snap because the user interface is clean, intuitive and easy to understand.”
“The new way work gets done today is being able to work with content anywhere, anytime, from any device and in your application of choice,” said Christopher Junker, CEO, SpringCM.  “Our new Open Cloud Connector puts IT in a position to quickly deliver and manage the experience business users now demand.”
</blockquote>
Highlights of the new capability:
<ul>
<li>Implement in minutes</li>
<li>Edit and collaborate around documents, images, CAD files, audio and video files associated with the records in an application</li>
<li>Put content to work without leaving applications with features such as sending for approval, check-in/check-out, emailing links or documents and viewing complete history</li>
<li>Easily add multiple documents to the right record in an application</li>
<li>Organize documents to match multiple levels of records in your application with unlimited levels in folder hierarchies, e.g. Division, Department, Employee</li>
<li>Easily manage user provisioning and security through integrated user management and single sign-on</li>
<li>Maintain a single, easy to manage content repository across multiple web applications and portals</li>
</ul>
More on <a href="http://www.springcm.com/products/build-your-own/content-workflow-integration" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">content management integration using the SpringCM Open Cloud Connector</a>

SpringCM Release Breaks the Barrier Between Applications and Content

mike-johnston

<a href="http://www.gossinteractive.com/solutions/web-content-management">GOSS iCM Web Content Management</a> solution has been given approved supplier status following selection for the G-Cloud list of software suppliers in partnership with Bramble.cc.
Suppliers on the G-Cloud list, known as the ‘CloudStore’, are approved by the government to offer a range of ‘cloud-based’ software, infrastructure, platform and consultancy services. The store allows Government departments to buy leading technology more quickly and cost efficiently.
As a leading supplier of web content management and mobile web solutions to over 50 local and central government departments, GOSS Interactive has been listed on the CloudStore under 5 categories to supply GOSS iCM (intelligent Content Management), Search, Geographical Search, LiveChat and Service Analytics. GOSS iCM is a fully featured and trusted Web solution used to manage complex content for large organisations whilst keeping their web and mobile content agile and engaging. In buying GOSS iCM via the cloud, Government departments will benefit from the flexible, agile and extensive experience GOSS have in the market delivering secure hosted services and support.
According to the HM Government CloudStore website – The CloudStore is part of the G-Cloud programme which aims to transform the way that Government uses information and communications technology. What is even better news is that every product and service in the CloudStore is offered using the G-Cloud framework – and that means buyers:
<ul>
<li>don’t need to go through time and expense by issuing OJEUs (http://www.ojec.com/)</li>
<li>have the assurance that every product and service in the catalogue has been accredited to Government standards.</li>
<li>will always use suppliers that are approved by Government as being agile, efficient and offering value for money.</li>
<li>can find low cost and high quality solutions simply.</li>
</ul>
<blockquote>
Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude said: “The launch of CloudStore is an important milestone in the government’s ICT strategy to deliver savings and an IT system fit for the 21st century. Simply stated, purchasing services from CloudStore will be quicker, easier, cheaper and more transparent for the public sector and suppliers alike.”
Maude went on to say “Using cloud solutions that have already been secured and accredited will almost always be less expensive, and we will only pay for what we use.”
</blockquote>
Kathryn David, Applications Team Leader, Bury Metropolitan Borough Council comments “We selected GOSS as they had significant experience in delivering excellent Local Authority websites and were the preferred supplier at the end of an extensive procurement process. The software is functionally rich and the technical and system knowledge of the GOSS demonstrators was second to none and very impressive. They achieved the highest marks and had by far the lowest costs.”
Rob McCarthy, CEO, GOSS Interactive stated “Having delivered comprehensive web solutions to an extensive list of Government departments for over 10 years, we are ideally placed to understand their requirements and deliver tailored solutions that offer real value for money. The new G-Cloud framework will offer departments a simple way to take advantage of the GOSS iCM web content management and mobile web solutions, with the reassurance that they are Government secured and approved. Additionally, being listed on the HM Government CloudStore means that we do not need to go through expensive processes and so reduces our cost of business and allows us to pass on these savings to our government customers.”
Included in the CloudStore offerings supplied by GOSS are:
<ol>
<li>GOSS iCM (intelligent Content Management) – software to manage website content and customer experience management.</li>
<li>Search – software to provide advanced enterprise wide search.</li>
<li>Geographical Search – location based search services as used in “find my nearest” type implementations.</li>
<li>LiveChat – efficiency saving contact technology to allow web users to “chat” online with contact centre agents.</li>
<li>Service Analytics – Advanced insight into service use and where efficiency savings can be made with channel shift to digital platforms.</li>
</ol>
GOSS clients include Central Government departments such as the Met Office, as well as Police Forces, NHS Trusts and over 50 Local Authorities.

GOSS iCM now available on UK Government CloudStore

<a href="http://www.jadu.net/cloud">Jadu</a>, a UK based Web Experience Management supplier, today announced a new cloud-based offering for its line of web content management (WCM), online forms and mobile web tools which have been listed on the Government’s G-Cloud ‘CloudStore’.
G-Cloud is the Government's formal channel for procuring cloud services. Jadu was among over 600 companies bidding for a place on the G-Cloud catalogue and is now one of the 255 successful suppliers selected for the framework. The G-Cloud is expected to revolutionise the way the Government buys IT, potentially saving millions in licensing, infrastructure and service costs, as well as making Government services digitally enabled much faster.
Jadu's new cloud offering, called ‘Universe Cloud’, has been listed under two lots in the UK Government ‘G-Cloud App store’ of enterprise IaaS, PaaS and SaaS solutions available to service the public sector. Jadu has put its digital forms and data capture solution ‘Jadu Universe Forms’ and its mobile web application network ‘Weejot’ in the G-Cloud list of products and services.
<blockquote>
“Millions of pounds have been spent on outsourcing deals with large IT services companies for web solutions that can otherwise be implemented quickly and easily by SMEs in the cloud,” says Suraj Kika, CEO of Jadu. “SMEs like Jadu can deliver faster, cheaper and more secure solutions, enabling Government to innovate and deliver services much faster.”
</blockquote>
The Government’s G-Cloud strategy states that it could save £3.2bn of the Governments annual £16bn spend on IT, actually it’s likely to be much more, but only if departments in Government adopt the service.
“CloudStore represents a revolution in how the public sector buys software and services,” says Kika. “This bold move has potential to showcase the UK as a global leader in online service delivery, providing the procurement culture in Government evolves to take advantage.”
Jadu’s Universe Forms product is currently used for online forms on the Directgov website as well as scores of local authorities across the UK. The solution for Directgov was delivered in 2011 to help build online transactions for the existing Directgov service.
Jadu’s ‘Weejot’ mobile app network provides organisations with the unique ability to rapidly develop mobile web applications though a powerful SDK (Software Development Kit) and SaaS infrastructure. Using the mobile web, organisations can save significant time and costs over building native apps for the growing number of device platforms.
“We will be opening the Jadu Universe Cloud to any organisation in any sector, not just Government. Soon, any enterprise will be able to instantly provision Jadu applications, try them, adopt them and begin rapid business transformation using the Jadu Universe Platform. All the apps we make from now on will be Universe Cloud first,” adds Kika.
Jadu has had success in Local Government and Higher Education with adoption of the Weejot Mobile Cloud service (launched last November) – with early adoption from South Lanarkshire Council, City of Edinburgh Council, Enfield Council, Coventry City Council and several US Higher Education institutions.

Jadu signs up for UK Government Cloud Computing framework with new CMS tools

<a href="http://www.jahia.com">Jahia</a> announced today the new version of its flagship CMS product in version 6.6 with two major areas of improvements: the platform management and Jahia Studio, its visual integration tool to build highly customized and personalized User Experiences.
Jahia Studio, a new standard of User Experience Building
Jahia Studio is a unique visual User Experience Builder that allows for the convergence of socialized content applications, websites, portals and mobile sites thanks to the easy dragging and dropping of pre-packaged components and modules. Zero code required!
Introduced with Jahia 6.5, this unique integrated User Experience Builder is available for free and for all Jahia integrators.
<blockquote>
“The Jahia Studio is a great addition to the Jahia platform.  Not only does it accelerate development, but it also gives non-technical users the ability to create solutions that would otherwise require developer assistance.  This is a big win for organizations that want to empower their business users to the greatest extent possible.” Glenn Korban -Director of Technology- Oshyn, Cerritos, California
</blockquote>
Some of Jahia 6.6 improvements further enhancing the Jahia Studio experience:
<ul>
<li>More options for administrators and integrators to control Jahia’s rich authoring interfaces and components permissions</li>
<li>New deployment options for modules allowing bulk and/or selective deployments of the modules over the sites hosted on the Jahia instance.</li>
<li>Better management of module dependencies for easier application packaging.</li>
<li>Redesigned item deletion and addition of a Trash: authors may restore content items before complete deletion approval</li>
</ul>
Further enhancements of the Jahia Composite Content Platform
Jahia 6.6 provides many improvements to facilitate integration within existing IT infrastructures and administrative work, including:
<ul>
<li>New Framework : The Visibility Framework</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>Advanced content delivery and personalization capabilities: the new Visibility Framework features business rules, additional server side personalization capabilities and an advanced control over content delivery.</li>
</ul>
<li>Advanced Administration:</li>
<ul>
<li>New configuration options for stack traces, threads and memory dumps.</li>
<li>Extended import and export mechanisms to support both live and/or default workspaces, including User Generated Content.</li>
</ul>
<li>Data storage flexibility:</li>
<ul>
<li>Improved performances and reliability for relational databases and files systems storage using datastore mechanism for files and documents managed by the Jahia platform</li>
</ul>
<li>Agile Maintenance:</li>
<ul>
<li>Easier upgrades from version to version thanks to a new FixApplier application.</li>
</ul>
For Enterprise Jahia Subscribers:
<ul>
<li>Update of all Enterprise Jahia software packages and documentation in version 6.6</li>
<li>For our Enterprise Subscribers, the Jahia Studio is fully aligned with your enterprise development cycles on the environments deployed with Enterprise Jahia installation tools. Thanks to Enterprise Jahia tools and support, safe management of the canonical architecture -development, staging, production-  is guaranteed for applications and user experiences from their creation in the Jahia Studio to their deployment in the production environment -whether it is clustered or not</li>
<li>Extended interoperability: Kerberos configuration tools and support providing enhanced SSO, stronger authentication &amp; security in Enterprise environments.</li>
</ul>

Jahia Launches Jahia 6.6, the new version of its flagship CMS solution

<a target="_blank" href="https://www.phpfox.com/">phpFox</a> is one of many social networking packages that are commercially available for those looking to deploy a Facebook or MySpace style social network. Given the response I've had to our <a href="/socialengine-review/">Social Engine Review</a> and the apparent lack of support offered by that company, I thought we'd explore some other, potentially better supported social networking options such as this one in order to provide alternatives. As a result, I bring you my phpFox Review. This social networking software is very popular with a large community and today, we'll find out if it's a suitable option for those in the market.For those unfamiliar with phpFox, it has been on the market for quite some time and offers a well priced system packed with quite a few features such as:<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/features-__-phpfox-social-networking-script-google-chrome_2012-02-13_14-36-44-450x403.png" alt="phpfox review" /><h2>First Impressions</h2>The interface is simple but functional and as you can see from the screenshot below, once populated with content and users, the system has a nice clean flow to it. It resembles what we've all come to expect from most systems of this caliber.<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/feature_banner-450x218.png" alt="phpFox Review" />I chose to use the phpFox demo as the basis of this phpFox review since it's already populated with some content and member profiles.Signing up for a new account on the demo site was fast and painless and I received a confirmation email immediately. Moving around the interface and adding profile data was both snappy and easy to do. In a matter of a few moments, I had customized my profile, added a profile pic and cropped it.<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/evoqcontent_dxdunw.png" alt="phpFox Review" />Adding blog posts, videos and comments works without issue and I did not detect any issues doing so. The system seemed to respond quickly to every task I've tried so far without issue.Every installation of phpFox comes with a mobile friendly version as well which is great for those looking to be accessible on multiple platforms. Here's a screenshot of the mobile version of the site:<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/social-networking-community-powered-by-phpfox-google-chrome_2012-02-13_14-39-40-450x246.png" alt="phpFox Review" />Everything on the mobile system from my tests was without incident and worked as expected as well.I'm not going to focus too much on the front end of this system as it's fairly easy for you to test it out for yourself using their demo system. What I will say is that it works and appears to not have any glaring bugs that I can see!<h2>Administering the System</h2>Once a user has been set up as an administrator of the system, an AdminCP link becomes available on the top right of the main site once you've logged in. Clicking on this brings you to the admin dashboard where you can modify the settings for the system.<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2021/07/admin-cp-__-dashboard-__-social-networking-community-google-chrome_2012-02-13_14-46-33-620x396_ars2vf.png" alt="phpfox review" />As you can see, the user of drop-down menus is applied to the admin panel giving you quick and easy access to the settings within each setting of the CMS.Should you wish to modify any of the many menus on the website itself, you can do so quickly and easily using the Manage Menus option under CMS. From there, you can change the order, edit a menu item or delete it completely. If you wish to simply deactivate it, you can do so with a simple check box.Adding menus or individual items is extremely simple and is done through the following interface:<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/phpfox-adding-menu-items-450x356.png" alt="phpFox Review" />The system layout is handled using blocks, which can be managed in two different ways depending on your tastes. The traditional interface or a slick visual drag and drop mode.Traditional:<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/baremetrics1_d0urry.png" alt="phpFox Review" />Drag and Drop:<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/greenshot_2012-02-13_15-21-17-450x356.png" alt="phpFox Review" />Regardless of which way you choose, adding content to the various areas of the site is quick and easy.Taking a look at user management, I was surprised to see how granular one can be with security permissions.<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2021/07/admin-cp-__-social-networking-community-google-chrome_2012-02-13_15-28-09-620x376_y15ash.png" alt="phpfox review" />I've used a number of scripts similar to phpFox and a large number of them are lacking in the area of user security so it's nice to see this one is the exception to the rule.On the expandability front, there are tons of themes and plugins for phpFox, all of which can be managed from within the Extensions menu. You can even create language packs, manage phrases and much more. On the phpFox website, they also list a number of user created modules and themes which are available both for purchase and free. At a glance, it appears there are over 400 apps/modules and over 100 themes available through their website.On the social front, phpFox provides the ability for your users to use their Facebook, Twitter, Google, OpenID and more to login to your site and if speed is a concern, it can also be configured to work with Amazon's CDN network.<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2021/07/admin-cp-__-manage-settings-__-social-networking-community-google-chrome_2012-02-14_10-32-14-620x409_c6ogzs.png" alt="phpfox review" />Looking to integrate a payment system into your social networking software platform? phpFox has you covered there as well with integrations from PayPal and 2checkout.The list of configurable options goes on and on and there is no way I can hope to cover them all in this review other than to say, there's a lot you can configure if you choose to do so. One key thing I do want to highlight is the maintenance and backup options within the admin panel. This is a great addition and gives administrators the ability to optimize and repair tables within their database as well as the option to perform backups quickly and easily.<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2021/07/admin-cp-__-sql-maintenance-__-social-networking-community-google-chrome_2012-02-14_10-42-53-620x353_m4j0kl.png" alt="phpfox review" /><h2>Conclusion</h2>The purpose of this phpFox review was to determine if the software was suitable for the average consumer and I can confidently say that yes, it is. If you are looking for social networking software that offers a myriad of options with a great community and ease of use, look no further. Using the system was a pleasure and throughout my testing I did not encounter any bugs or hiccups within the software. Therefore, I have no problem recommending this as a solid solution to those in the market for social networking software. What do you think of phpFox? Did this phpFox Review help you? Let us know in the comments below or <a target="_blank" href="https://www.phpfox.com/">Check out phpFox today</a>.

phpFox Review

Release 0.4.0 introduces another milestone, focusing on latest web technologies such as HTML5 and CSS3, getting rid of outdated browser and their limitations. Enjoy the mobile friendly environment – break free from your desktop and manage your website using any mobile or tablet device – keep in touch with your visitors anytime.

Driven with the intention to tread new paths by breaking traditional concepts, the existing admin dashboard has been removed and replaced by an admin panel and overlays docking into your website.
WYSIWYE – what you see is where you edit – enables a novel approach to manage content.

Since Redaxscript 0.4.0 includes a built-in frontend framework – dreams of every web developer are met. An innovative on-demand loader handles to join, minify and output multiple CSS and Javascript files as needed.

Online demo
You are going to experience limited permissions and XSS filters: <a href="http://demo.redaxscript.com/login/demo" rel="nofollow">http://demo.redaxscript.com/login/demo</a>
Feature list
<ul>
<li>Simple installation wizard</li>
<li>Builds contents lightning fast</li>
<li>Search engine friendly environment</li>
<li>Fluide and elastic grid layout</li>
<li>HTML5, CSS3, RSS2 and ATOM1 compliant</li>
<li>Media queries powered mobile support</li>
<li>On-Demand JS and CSS loader</li>
<li>Built-in frontend framework</li>
<li>Module system with hook points</li>
<li>Advanced user and group permissions</li>
<li>Bundled with the latest jQuery</li>
<li>Ultra lightweight WYSIWYG editor</li>
<li>Multiple language and template support</li>
<li>Available in over 20 languages</li>
<li>Extensive setting options</li>
</ul>
More info: <a href="https://redaxscript.com/">https://redaxscript.com/</a>

New version or Redaxscript has been made available

Kontent.ai - Agentic CMS

Meet the world's first Agentic CMS

#ffffff

EPiServer CMS updates its partner list twice a year, and the data we can compile from it shows the CMS' popularity around the world. One thing is the number of partners in each country, but another more interesting metric is the number of certified developers on the EPiServer platform as this is more closely linked to the size of the market share.
The updated list published in January 2012 clearly shows that EPiServer dominates its homeland, Sweden, with 294 ECDs (EPiServer Certified Developers) and its neighbor Norway with 117 ECDs. The biggest partner, Making Waves, is also based in Norway.
EPiServer AB has had a clear goal of expanding into the UK and US market, and we can see the result of this in the growth in ECDs in both countries which now ranks third (45, a growth of 6) and fourth (30, a growth of 10) respectively. And interesting point is the the biggest US partner, First Line Software, is based in Russia.
We can also find partners in Australia, Poland, Serbia, Finland, Netherlands, France etc., but an a glaring omission in that list is Denmark with 0 ECDs. A good guess would be that the Danish .Net CMS, Sitecore, has cornered the market, but I might be mistaken.
To see the summed up stats for the 2012 EPiServer partner list check out this blog post on EPiServer World: <a href="http://world.episerver.com/Blogs/Alexander-Haneng/Dates/2012/2/The-Biggest-EPiServer-Partners-Worldwide-2012/">http://world.episerver.com/Blogs/Alexander-Haneng/Dates/2012/2/The-Biggest-EPiServer-Partners-Worldwide-2012/</a>

EPiServer CMS' popularity around the world 2012

Web content management has changed. The explosive growth of content consumption from mobile and social interfaces, the pending expansion of the “internet of things” and consumer expectation of content availability is driving WCMS providers to shift their value proposition. Web Content Management is no longer simply solved by making it easier to publish content online.
Analyst firm Gartner has been releasing research and thought leadership about Context Aware Computing for a few years, and they estimate that “by 2012, the typical Global 2000 company will be managing between two and 10 business relationships with context providers.”Further Gartner predicts that “ by 2015, context will be as influential in mobile consumer services and relationships as search engines are to the Web.”
This idea of context is at the core of what is shifting Web Content Management and consumer expectations. Today WCM solutions must go beyond delivering solutions that help a manager DELIVER a web experience — but also deliver one that helps both managers and their audiences CREATE and CONSUME content in an experience of their own making. This is context aware content management.
<blockquote>
“For WCM solution providers, ‘context aware’ goes well beyond managing web experiences and personalization,” said Jeroen Verberg, CEO of Hippo. “It digs deep into how we will enable our clients to open their repositories so that things like location, environmental data, history, social attributes and even real-time online behavior can be utilized to deliver a more relevant, contextual experience. At Hippo we believe that this philosophy applies to both the managers of the content and the audiences the managers are empowering to consume their content through whatever method they choose.”
</blockquote>
<a href="http://www.onehippo.com/"> Hippo CMS</a> 7.7 is the first true step toward an Open Source content management solution delivering context aware content management. It enables users to easily manage content across multiple channels and delivery platforms – and delivers personalized, device-aware, location-aware and even interface-aware content.
<ul>
<li>Global Brand Content Management – Using Hippo’s Multi-Channel manager organizations now have an extraordinarily easy way to add, edit and manage new content channels and sub-channels for managing context. This includes channels for language, device, marketing campaigns, or any other strategy the organizations wants to create.</li>
<li>Content &amp; Marketing Insight – Hippo’s new extensible reporting dashboard provides marketers with the insight they need to deliver continued Web experience management success.</li>
<li>Contextual Content Delivery – Hippo continues to lead the way in delivering content appropriate for the channel. Hippo CMS 7.7 can automatically deliver optimized interfaces across multiple content channels – whether that be iPhone, iPad, Android, Web or even social channels.</li>
<li>Content As An Open Service – Hippo CMS 7.7 continues to be focused on Open Standards and Open Source models. Customers can utilize the standards based content storage within Hippo CMS and utilize both contextual delivery models and contextual content management models – meaning that the same content repository can be accessed by multiple ways to both deliver AND manage the content.</li>
</ul>
Examples of the power and benefits of Hippo CMS to organizations range from government organizations to global brands. For example The Dutch National government was able to reduce the complexity and expense of their CMS footprint from 13 websites and multiple CMS systems to one, enterprise implementation of Hippo CMS. Global publisher Incisive Media was able to easily migrate 260,000 existing articles from multiple online magazines, integrate with Autonomy Search and Quark DMS to provide a central online content management and delivery system. And the Dutch Libraries were able to deploy a completely open “content service” (perfect for a library) that allows video, social media interaction and even storage for User Generated content. This means that each library can not only deliver the full range of content to their audiences contextually across mobile, social and web platforms – but they can also manage the content from just about any type of input mechanism channel they choose.
Arje Cahn, CTO of Hippo, said “Hippo CMS 7.7 is designed to drive the best of both worlds. In the past, CMS editing interfaces and the target site were almost two disconnected worlds. In Hippo CMS 7.7 they live together in a single, unified interface. So, the architectural separation between presentation and content is still there – but its now visually integrated. This makes the system much easier to comprehend and use for end-users.”s.

New Hippo CMS 7.7 Empowers Both Managers And Audiences To Create Contextualized Online Experiences

<a href="http://www.elcomcms.com">Elcom</a>, a leading provider of enterprise web content management solutions is pleased to announce that version 7.6 of their flagship product, elcomCMS will be available towards the end of February.
elcomCMS is a modular .NET enterprise web content management system. It has been designed from the ground up to provide mid-market organizations with the ability to meet their objectives around their corporate website, intranet, extranet, learning management, mobile web, social, eCommerce and online marketing. The modular, interoperable, scalable, flexible and powerfully simple design makes elcomCMS a true end-to-end, 360 degree business tool for web.
Building on elcomCMS’s existing success, v7.6 is focused around key feature enhancements in particular: Code Blocks, Real-Time Personalization and developments in its Social layer which was introduced in version 7.5.
Code Blocks Code Blocks, is an excellent new feature for the front-end developer and implementation community. It provides the ability to write and use custom front-end scripting code i.e. c# or VB and embed these Code Blocks into articles. This gives developers the flexibility and power to create dynamically generated structured content, such as custom menus and lists.
Real Time Personalization Real Time Personalization has been expanded in version 7.6 to include the ability to target individual articles based on what keyword(s) your audience types into a search engine such as Google, Yahoo! or Bing. This is a powerful and exciting tool for the marketing community as it will help increase conversion rates and reduce bounce rates.
Social elcomCMS’s Social capability continues to grow in 7.6 with ‘Social Stream’ a major feature update. Social Stream provides pre-defined user groups with the ability to connect exclusively to discuss a topic, project or idea. This is a great way to facilitate collaboration and communications between team members.
Commenting on the new release, Anthony Milner, Elcom’s Product Director said “In every release we endeavour to make it even easier for developers to write their own apps for the elcomCMS and Code Blocks provide another mechanism to achieve this. It’s an exciting development and we look forward to working with the dev community to build awesome apps.”
The latest version is available now as a beta release, and we expect the final release to be available to the market towards the end of February 2012. If you have any questions regarding elcomCMS please contact info@elcomCMS.com

elcomCMS kicks off 2012 with version 7.6

Head-turning ecommerce web design is pivotal for the success of your online store as attention-grabbing pages publicise your brand. Just like any other creative sphere, web design is a fickle industry that constantly undergoes changes. With the development of new tools like HTML5 and CSS3, new design trends start to take off. Below there are six popular trends in creative web design that can be incorporated into your own web page.
Go big
As ecommerce is growing big, it is high time to use big images and fonts for big impressions. Tiny thumbnails are out as oversized headers, logos, fonts and images are the latest trend in ecommerce web design today. Don’t make your visitors think that you are hiding some details in small fonts and go for a 60 pt title at the top of your page. Power web designers use bold and imposing calls for action as they demand users to note and remember your brand.
Print design and typography
Creative layouts resembling print newspapers and posters with multi-column text, supporting imagery and footnotes are in style. Sites with carefully crafted ecommerce web design are often called ‘art-directed’ and are fuelled by the determination of creators. Such designs are usually found at freelance sites and are rarely used by corporations as they require quite a lot of time and effort to create and maintain. If you decide to take advantage of art-directed design, don’t overload it with details as good design is about effective communication, not decorations. Remember that your layout should support the content of your site without dominating it.
Clean and minimal
Annoying oversaturated websites with dark colours have seen better days as minimalistic ecommerce web design has come into play today. Web sites featuring lots of refreshing pallets and plain textures spice up your page without distracting the attention from the content. If you are working with nature textures like wood or water, opt for the right chromatic palette in order to make sure that your design looks great.
Pixel-perfect design
Contemporary designers give a lot of attention to pixel-perfect elements like toolbars, menus and buttons that look great on both high resolution laptop monitors and iPods. Make sure that your page doesn’t feature any blurry areas by zooming all the page elements while designing. With the help of powerful software like Illustrator and Adobe Photoshop crisp ecommerce web design has never been easier to create.
Retro
Vintage has made a great come back in the ecommerce web design industry, still retro-looking sites are quite hard to create. Creased paper structure, retro-inspired imagery and beautiful retro aesthetic often attract a lot of viewers. Still, this style is sometimes hard to embrace without proper artistic taste and advanced skills, so if you are a big fan of the retro style, hire qualified designers who are glad to help you out.
Horizontalism
With the development of multi-touch devices, horizontal scrolling has come into play winning a lot of fans and followers. Elaborate web design allows users to avoid slowly-loading galleries and provides a pleasing reading experience. In order to make your website easy-to-navigate, opt for horizontal navigation with a speed control at the top of your site.
With the development of advanced web tools, new ecommerce web design trends appear every year. When designing a website you can take advantage of one of the trends listed above or incorporate a few ideas, creating your own trend.

Ecommerce Web Design: Six Hot Trends

<a href="http://drupal.org/drupal-7.12">Drupal</a> today released a total of four versions of the popular open source CMS. Yes, I said four. Drupal 6.23, 6.24, 7.11 and 7.12 releases were put on the servers today.
On the release announcement, they are stating that they want to release version that include only security updates and versions that include security + bug fixes. While I can appreciate that they are trying to follow the “try to make everyone happy” model, they are, in my opinion, just adding to the general consensus that Drupal is a complicated and highly technical CMS.
While this may very well be the target market that Drupal is aiming towards, one would think it would be more sensible to attempt to follow suit with the whole customer experience movement that is occurring right now and try to make things as transparent and easy as possible for the end users.  Unfortunately, it seems that the Drupal team is not heading down this path.
In my opinion, Drupal should offer separate release announcements. One for the 6.x series with a countdown as to when this series will stop being supported so that those on the platform, know when it will be grandfathered and will be better able to plan a transition to 7.x.
For those on the 7.x version, I would personally just offer a single version. However, if it's absolutely necessary to have two types of installs, why not simply offer one version and within the upgrade process have a prompt for the user asking them if they'd like to do a complete upgrade (with security + bug fixes) or a partial just to address security issues and have the system do what's needed. Single file, single download, no confusion.
For release announcements, I think that Drupal needs to spruce things up a bit and write-up announcements that give more detail and less technical terminology akin to the way that the Joomla! and WordPress teams do their write ups. It's a fairly easy change to make and is more likely to get picked up by people and get them excited about the new release. If  the customer wants more technical information, link to a more technical document. Otherwise, follow the keep it simple methodology.
I am aware that the Drupal teams have a ton of work and do the best they can with all of the tasks at hand and I don' t want to come across as someone who doesn't appreciate their efforts. I do, however, believe that there is always room for improvement and it is my hope that they take this writeup as feedback and not as an attack.

The Drupal Release Model and Why it Needs to be Revamped

For this month's newsletter, we spoke with Vern Imrich, CTO of <a href="http://www.percussion.com">Percussion</a> to get his thoughts on the growth of the CMS market and more. Read on for some valuable insights.
CC:  Please tell us a bit about yourself and your background leading up to working with Percussion.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/lemonstand_ucvyum.png" alt="Vern Imrich" />
VI:  My formal training and degrees are all in engineering, numerical methods and computer simulations.  But all along I was heavily involved in publications, running engineering magazines and other periodicals.  I became a pro at SGML, desktop publishing systems, and even typesetting languages.  Then, while in graduate school at MIT, SGML suddenly became HTML and the Web exploded onto the scene.  I ditched the numerical simulation code and grad school altogether and went full time to the Web, building sites, doing web applications. When I arrived at Percussion in the mid 90's, it was a “data to  documents” company looking for a new market to expand in.  I spurred the company's move to the Web, and by 1999 we had adopted XML  as our new core technology.  We quickly saw the core value proposition for this technology as helping companies publish web sites and web content quickly and cost effectively, and released our first Web Content Management System in the spring of 2000.  There have been many ups and downs as the Web bubble burst, morphed several times over, was reborn with Web 2.0 and into the social media explosion of today.  My experience combining the technical rigor of engineering with the free form creative processes of content publishers and editors has allowed me to guide Percussion to keep pace with the Web market all throughout.
CC: What makes Percussion a strong option for companies to consider in the market?
VI:  What we hear from our customers and prospects is that they choose our software because its highly usable, and because we deliver functionality as a product (rather than a set of complex customizations) which make our product supportable, flexible and upgradeable. This is a fundamentally different way to deliver the CMS than what you are hearing from other vendors in the market that require far more customization services. And we offer everyone a cloud-based evaluation to prove that the demo they just saw is really out of the box functionality. If I may say, it’s really a sad commentary on the state of the CMS market that prospects are often jaded by knowing that the sexy demo’s they see so often are really just “demo-ware.” They know that the vendors show up to their kick-off with nothing more than a bag of parts and a large consulting contract.
We think there is fundamentally a better way to manage your content, drive customer engagement, and manage your content marketing. We believe that simplifying all of that complexity into a highly usable out-of-the-box product that marketers and content owners can actually use to get their job done, CM1 solves a fundamental need and drives a real business outcome. If companies can’t use their web efforts to scale their business, then they are missing out on revenue. Our products breakthrough that wall.
CC: What do you feel was your greatest technical achievement over the last two years?
VI: Without a doubt the CM1 user experience is the key breakthrough that we are most proud about and the one that our customers love us for. “Finally,” they tell us, “something that we can actually use!” Believe it or not, we just had a prospect tell us during a demo that they felt like a caveman staring at fire for the first time! Now not sure we should go THAT far, but it’s definitely been a major breakthrough.
And we really believe that user experience is not about how pretty the interface looks (though we know that ours is pretty sexy looking!). We know that design can be fleeting, you can refresh how your product looks at any time, and many vendors have, but we took the time to completely rearchitect how you use the product based on how users actually want to do work. And by users, we mean the people actually managing the content, not the technical team in charge of the app.
This is a real breakthrough in user experience. It puts the power over the content back in the hands of the content owner. It creates flexibility, allows marketers to be more agile in their activity, and gives them the flexibility to take on whatever comes next.
Further the dashboard creates a comprehensive connection between analytics and action. Now teams can go from simply reading and reporting on the analytic data to a much more powerful “Read and Act” in the moment based on what’s working, or what’s trending in the market.
CC: From a technical standpoint, how does Percussion fare for customers with multiple infrastructure types within their corporate landscape?
VI: Our core DNA since we first launched WCM back in 2000 has always been as a decoupled system. Even as we add delivery-tier services like dynamic tagging and categorization, comments, ratings, personalization etc we treat the architecture the same and keep them decoupled. This creates limitless flexibility for our customers with their infrastructure and existing applications. Move to the cloud? No problem. Integrate with a custom built delivery side database? No problem. Integrate CRM or ERP or Marketing Automation connections? Also no problem.
And as important, because we don’t require you to change your current web infrastructure, you don’t have to redesign or re-architect your site to use our product. This is a key driver for many organizations that have heavy investments in their web technologies.
CC: A fair portion of the code utilized for Percussion was derived from Open Source projects; What was the reason for choosing to build off of these projects?
VI: As with any software initiative, we know what we are good at. And where things exist already that can be leveraged to deliver a high quality experience, we would rather start there than build it ourselves. We are constantly looking for ways to expand our use of Open Source because it frees our technical team to focus on what we do best.
CC: How has Percussion given back to the open source community?
VI: We do publish our common code back to the community, but a lot of where we innovate involves pulling together all this great technology in such a way that folks can use it easily and cheaply. In other words, we're often the “last mile” to the user, so the code we publish tends to be widgets, gadgets and other plug-ins for our WCM offering.  Still, we're always looking for areas where we can share more.
CC: For customers looking to integrate with multiple third party applications such as Salesforce and ERP solutions, how does Percussion fit in?
VI: As I mentioned earlier, our hallmark has always been our ability to integrate with other applications that our customers use. Some of our most successful customers like Autotrader.com, Weather.com and BabyCenter.com have really complicated applications running their business. They appreciate our ability to easily connect to those systems.
We take a classic widget/gadget approach to integrating applications like SalesForce which allows us to frequently add new integrations either on client demand, or because we know they will be popular. Soon, we will also extend the capability to create new Widgets or Apps to our key development partners and will deploy them in an App-Store type model. This is a really exciting development because you gain true network momentum as more and more people come on line with CM1 and CM1 widgets, gadgets and Apps.
CC: Can you give us a preview of what we can expect from upcoming releases of the software?
VI: We hear from our prospects all the time that they have a very hard time managing their content and driving a true content marketing strategy with their current technologies. However, they can’t always get their senior team to understand why that matters. Some of the near term things being rolled out as part of our advanced content marketing dashboard will draw a much cleaner picture for executives on what kind of value they are getting from their content operations. By exposing data about how content is turning into revenue, or even reducing costs, we change the dynamic from “my job is hard, this will help me do it better” (which sadly is never a winning business case) to a “here is where we are driving value to the business.”
I already mentioned the concept of an App Store. This will be a really exciting development in the coming months as well.
CC: Do you have any parting comments or final thoughts?
VI: You know, I would just say that historically people thought of one-size-fits-all WCM. It was really complex, and it was really hard, and it was really expensive. Smaller companies aspired to afford it, but it was always the domain of the monied class. But we are seeing a widescale revolt against complexity. Users just want something that works, and preferably works now. And smaller companies are realizing they can get full-functioning content systems in an affordable package, they don’t need to suffer in silence any longer.
CC: Thank you for your time Mr. Imrich.

Interview with Vern Imrich, CTO of Percussion

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<a href="http://www.liferay.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Liferay, Inc.</a>, provider of the world’s leading enterprise-class open source portal, announced today the availability of Liferay Sync, a powerful document-sharing add-on to the Community Edition (CE) of Liferay Portal 6.1. Liferay Sync transforms the Liferay platform into a central, easy-to-use document sharing service.
With Liferay Sync, users now have the ability to access documents stored within a Liferay instance from their mobile devices and desktops. Documents can be dragged and dropped into a synchronized folder and then be edited, moved, or deleted. Sync automatically takes care of revision management.
A key benefit for Liferay users is access to documents offline; the documents synchronize when users are back online. A single user can make a change to a document on their desktop, which is then synchronized with the central server and updated for all other users who share that folder.  In these ways, Liferay Portal becomes a central repository for documents, opening up new avenues of collaboration for a distributed group of users.&gt;
<blockquote>
“Liferay Sync was designed to combine the benefits of a web application with the user interaction benefits of a desktop or mobile application,” said <a href="http://www.liferay.com/about-us/leadership/business-units" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Edwin Chung</a>, Liferay's VP of Product Management. “The web allows centralized data and group access, and the desktop provides a rich way to search, access and manipulate documents.  But while Office Web Apps and Google Docs require you to store a copy on the server and edit documents in a browser, Liferay Sync allows users to leverage any desktop or mobile office package, such as MS Office, OpenOffice, iWork, or Photoshop, to edit and save documents locally while either online or offline.”
</blockquote>
<blockquote>
“The launch of Liferay Sync is an exciting and significant product release for our company,” said Brian Chan, Liferay’s founder and Chief Software Architect. “The ability to combine desktop and mobile interfaces with a web service takes the Liferay experience to new heights of simplicity and enrichment for our end users.”
</blockquote>
Starting today with the beta form of Liferay Sync, Liferay Portal CE users can synchronize their documents within one Liferay Site. A coming edition of Liferay Sync for Liferay Portal Enterprise Edition (EE) will allow users to share documents across an unlimited number of Liferay Sites on one installation. Liferay Sync is compatible withWindows, Mac OS, and iOS.
For more about Liferay Sync, visit <a href="http://liferay.com/products/liferay-sync" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">www.liferay.com/products/liferay-sync</a>.

Liferay Introduces Liferay Sync with Powerful Document-Sharing Abilities

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