Articles - Page 232

Not All Heroes Wear Capes. Here's Why CMS Is Your 'Unsung Hero' in 2025

janus-boye

The seventeenth maintenance release of the Drupal 6 series is available. Only bugfixes and minor improvements have been committed. New features are only being added to the forthcoming Drupal 7.0 release. This release does not fix any security issues.
Full changelog: <a href="http://drupal.org/node/816290">http://drupal.org/node/816290</a>
Download: <a href="http://ftp.drupal.org/files/projects/drupal-6.17.tar.gz">http://ftp.drupal.org/files/projects/drupal-6.17.tar.gz</a>

Drupal 6.17 released

mike-johnston

CC: First off, let me thank you for taking time out of your no doubt busy day to speak with me today, I appreciate the opportunity.
CM: It's my pleasure. Thanks for the offer.
CC: Can you tell us a bit about yourself and how you came to be with Nuxeo?
CM: Yes. I started with Nuxeo in Sept 2009 as their first Chief Marketing Officer. Nuxeo embarked on an aggressive North American expansion program for 2009, and building an experienced sales and marketing team was part of that plan. I've spent most of my 16+ yr career in one aspect of ECM or another. I started doing consulting and technical training, then moved into more product management and marketing roles.
I've been with leading ECM companies such as Open Text, Hummingbird and PC DOCS. The last role I had at Open Text before joining Nuxeo was Director for their Enterprise 2.0 team. But my academic background is not in technology or computer sciences, I came to the world of content management through graduate work in history, so I've always been fascinated by aspects of information capture and long term preservation of digital content.
CC: Interesting, you said you came from OpenText to Nuxeo. OpenText has, over the last couple of years been doing some fairly aggressive acquisitions. What made you choose to leave for Nuxeo?
CM: I really am an avid trend watcher in the ECM space… and always made the choice to be with a vendor that I thought was pushing the envelope in shaping the next generation of ECM. The signals around me were lining up to show that we were (and are) on the brink of some interesting changes in this market.
Having lived the world of Enterprise 2.0 for 2 years, realized that the concepts of openness, transparency, community were not just buzzwords. When I started investigating open source ECM companies it struck me that companies like Nuxeo were not just talking about these concepts – but had been running their business with these principles for years. It seemed like the utterly logical next step in my career.
We are also seeing disruption from other new models – Sharepoint continues to grow in adoption, and the new 2010 release will push this momentum even further. The rise of interoperability standards, open source, Cloud and SaaS are all putting pressure on the leading vendors of the 1990s that are struggling to move architectures and business models forward.
CC: I would agree, it seems like a bit of a shift in the industry to a more open environment then it used to be.
CM: Open is important – but it's open source as well as open standards. CMIS is a really key innovation.
CC: Compared to open source competitors such as Alfresco, how do you feel Nuxeo differentiates itself? I know this has been asked a thousand times I'm sure but it bears repeating.
CM: Sure… Alfresco is certainly the most well-known open source ECM brand out there, so we're glad that much of the tough work on educating business buyers about the benefits of open source has been done. We differ in a few ways: 1) technology stack 2) business model 3) target markets.
1) Technology stack – we've architected our underlying ECM platform – what we call Nuxeo Enterprise Platform (Nuxeo EP for short) in a way that we think is technically superior to most other vendors out there. It's intended to be highly extensible, configurable, plug in friendly, and is proven to scale at rates Alfresco often cannot.
2) Our business model is intended to be clear and understandable by the end user or partner. We do not have a separate ‘free community” edition of the code vs. a paid for ‘enterprise edition' that customers need to purchase in order to get support. We have 1 downloadable offering (under LGPL license agreement) that is platform – so what the customer prototypes and pilots is exactly what we'll engage with them on a support contract. No unpleasant surprises or unplanned budget items down the road.
3) Our target markets are generally large enterprises or governments who have unique content management challenges that need a platform that can be extended and tailored for their needs. We don't try to chase the Sharepoint alternative message – offering basic content management is something we can do, but not where the power of our platform shines. We'd be much happier working to fill the gaps where Sharepoint doesn't have a strong fit instead of trying to go head to head with a de facto office standard.
But we also have Cloud editions of our DM offering for small or medium businesses who don't have the IT infrastructure to support an ECM deployment – we can get them up and running very quickly priced at simple monthly or yearly subscription rates.
CC: Do you find Nuxeo products tend to be used more in one type of market then another? By market, I am referring more to sector such as retail, manufacturing, warehousing, etc.
CM: Our top industry sectors are : government, high-tech engineering, education and aeronautics/aerospace. Generally we do well in organizations that perceive themselves to be innovators or leaders in their own industry segment – they've realized the value of using technology for competitive edge in this information economy.
CC: Who are your most high profile customers (that you can share with us)?
CM: Larger companies often have development teams and architects that know their business and technical requirements. These kind of organizations are becoming impatient with software vendors who have fewer resources than they do, don't know their business needs, and take too long to deliver fixes or new features. Some of the high profile customers using Nuxeo for ECM include: EllisDon ($3B construction management company in Canada), Cengage Learning (large K-12 online learning/encyclopedias), the French Press Association, French Ministry of Education, and numerous public sector agencies in Europe. Also, BBC.
CC: How is Nuxeo aligning itself with mobile application functionality? Is there any such existing integration functionality already in place?
CM: Yes, mobility has been a really hot area for us lately. Some of the beauty of being open source is that we're seeing creative applications and clients built for our platform all of the time. The new CMIS initiative is also inspiring developers to build out CMIS clients that work with any cmis-compatible ECM repository (including Nuxeo).
Toolkits for Android were published just in the last couple of weeks, and we have Nuxeo specific clients for iphone, windows mobile. We're also seeing some really interesting new partners come on board specifically looking to build document centric applications on iphones – but needing a repository for secure content storage at the back end. So 2 streams of innovation – interesting clients accessing Nuxeo stored content, but also using our enterprise platform to build brand new content applications with a mobile user interface.
CC: You recently announced some new integration possibilities with Lotus Notes. Can you expand on that for us?
CM: Sure. We worked with our Nuxeo Galaxy Partner metaLogic on this integration and migration toolkit. metaLogic has been a partner since 2009, and bring 2 decades of Lotus Notes and Domino Doc expertise.
With many Domino Doc customers trying to decide what to do with their legacy investment now that IBM is end-of-lifing it, metaLogic found a great way to help refresh their content management infrastructure by introducing Nuxeo as their next generation platform.
So this toolkit bring migration and integration support to help in a few ways – from simple Lotus Notes email filing and capture in Nuxeo DM repository, to more complex migrations of content and metadata when the customer choose to move entirely. They have early adopter clients that are seeing success on this movement today, and we're thrilled we could co-launch the solution for a global audience.
CC: What other integration options are available for Nuxeo that people may not be aware of.
CM: We work with a range of proprietary and open source vendors to help our customers round out their content management needs. Examples include scanning/capture and OCR with products such as ReadSoft. CMIS has opened up some amazing doors to integration even as it was in late draft stage. We have integrations with WCM tools such as EZPublish and Drupal, portal apps such as LifeRay, BPM tools such as Bonitasoft and Intalio.
CC: What can you tell us about Nuxeo Studio?
CM: Nuxeo Studio is one of our gems. We launched it in early 2010 and it has already started driving new opportunities and revenue for us.
Nuxeo Studio is a hosted design environment that helps our subscription customers and partners significantly fast track their application customization and configuration activities. Rather than needing developers to code changes specific to a site deployment, Nuxeo Studio lets business users with a technical background build new content types, lifecycles, content automation streams, even re-brand the look and feel of the application with simple drag and drop/wizard tools.
A business analyst or information architect who understands business logic, metadata, etc can build out new applications in hours instead of days or weeks. At the end of the design session, the customizations can be simply exported into a .jar file, and when dropped into their Nuxeo repository, they immediately can see the plug-in take effect and can get their users to work.
CC: With this suite of applications, Studio, EP, DM.. what is the next innovation we can expect to see from Nuxeo?
CM: We have a few cool things on the 2010 roadmap. In late June we'll be launching our Case Management Framework, which is another distribution of our Nuxeo Enterprise Platform foundation offering that has been extended and tailored to help companies and ISVs and integrators build case-centric business applications for vertical or horizontal purposes.
We have numerous success stories in government globally with applications such as correspondence management, so we've taken many of the common elements, templates, workflows, metadata and added the framework element to fast-track new application deployments. It's bundling much of the work and learning we've accumulated by doing successful deployments to help more organizations get their projects moving quickly.
We are also enhancing our Records Management offering so that we can get our US Federal DoD 5015.2 certification done in October 2010. We've got strong content lifecycle management capabilities in our core offering today, but have a couple of new features to add before we go for certification. So we will also drive new opportunities in the government and regulated industries who need the stringent records management features that the DoD spec outlines.
CC: How is Nuxeo working to help educate vendors, system integrators and customers on best practices? What tools are in place to make the transition from standard records management to electronic less “frightening” for companies seeing this as a requirement?
CM: I started my career in ECM as a trainer, so I'm pretty committed to education on all levels. We're on a constant improvement project to help improve our documentation, publish more whitepapers, get more customer stories out there.
We're also big supporters of the industry associations like AIIM and ARMA who are committed to these vendor-agnostic best practices. I'm constantly trying to keep my blog fresh (as does the whole Nuxeo management team) so that we're sharing what we learn, what we read, what our customers/partners do that works.
There's a really vibrant ECM community out there on the various social networks, so we do what we can to connect people and publish content that is useful and can help projects get moving.
CC: Well, Cheryl. That's about all of the questions I had for you today and you've done a great job of answering them in good depth, I appreciate that. Do you have any parting comments you would like to make? (Consider this your open mic moment)
CM: This has been fun, glad to have the opportunity. Final comments? Just that this is one of the most fascinating times I've seen in the world of ECM. Some of the changes we're seeing today – move to interoperability, split between the ECM platform vendors vs. ECM Suite vendors, rise of open source and SaaS – “means the innovation in space are going to come from some new vendors and fresh perspectives. Watch this space ? “
You can learn more about Nuxeo by visiting their website at <a href="http://www.nuxeo.com">http://www.nuxeo.com</a> or <a href="http://twitter.com/cherylmckinnon">follow Cheryl on twitter</a>.

Interview with Nuxeo CMO, Cheryl McKinnon

The Injader CMS project has decided to close it's doors for good and no longer continue producing this open source CMS. For those interested, here is the post from the Injader website announcing this decision. We wish all the best to Ben and his team:
<blockquote>
After many, many months of consideration, I have made the tough decision to bring the Injader project to a close. The purpose of this post is to explain my reasons for ending the project, and what the future holds. Injader started as a closed source project called Majestic, way back in May 2005. The goal of the system was to make my life easier, as I was sick of updating my sites by hand. In this respect, the project succeeded. Injader has allowed me to set up numerous blogs and websites, and it's also been used for several sites run by family and friends.
In October 2006, Lauren and I emigrated to Australia. We joined a small software company that needed a new website along with some other web-based tools. Majestic was used for this purpose and I developed it rapidly, adding various features that the company required for its operations. The system was a success here, too, and the company still uses it to this day.
By September 2007, Majestic had become a commercial product owned by Injader Pty Ltd, which Lauren and I set up. Unfortunately, this didn't work out. Gradually, the price was slashed, then we offered a free version, before finally closing the business. Majestic was rebranded as Injader, and released under an open source licence in mid 2008. Development continued, and interest picked up as the price tag was no longer a barrier to new adopters. Once we moved back to the UK, it quickly became apparent just how much free time we had when in Australia, and how little time we had after we moved back. I've added new features and streamlined the product in a few ways (mainly due to the extremely valuable feedback from Ovi at Distinctive Quality), but some major work is required before the project can fully mature. There are many, many things that need improving, especially the code. Injader started out as a learning project to allow me to pick up PHP, and a lot of it is at least 2 years old. Injader 2.5 was going to be a huge rewrite, and I did make some good progress. But if I'm totally honest, after spending a few of my weekends working solidly on it, I'd be surprised if it's more than 2% complete. I feel like I've done so much work on it… and yet that doesn't seem like an unrealistic estimate of how much is left to do.
So, what happens now?
Sites that are currently using Injader will not cease to exist, unless the sites are closing anyway. All of my blogs will stay as they are for the moment, at least until I can plan what to do next. I might start a new project (probably for my use only) and move those sites across to it. Or I might write an export script and put the sites on another platform. I don't know yet. If you're using Injader at the moment and you don't want to move away, that's your call, I don't mind what you choose to do. If I do write a script to move my blogs elsewhere, I'd be happy to share it on Injader.com.
As the project is open source, there is always the option for someone else to continue it. If you're a budding coder and you feel like taking on Injader, go ahead. But please understand my reasons for closing the project and that a lot of work is required to get it moving. It hasn't died – but it never really took off. If you're interested, I should point out that outside of a few queries, I really can't provide a lot of support. I can tell you how the framework was set up, the good things and bad things in the system, and what was planned for the future. I can't write any of the code though. You need to be prepared to learn the system on your own, with minimal pointers. (Honestly, I get asked to do this all the time – it's tough at first, but very rewarding if you persevere.)
I'm sure there will be a few people who are disappointed by this decision. I'm sorry if this is the case. I have been thinking about this for a while now, and I believe it is the right choice.
If you'd like to stay in touch, you can find me in the following places:
My blog: http://www.benbarden.com/
Thank you for your support over the years – it is very much appreciated. It has been an enjoyable experience and I have learned a lot.
Ben
</blockquote>

Injader CMS project closes its doors

Sourcefabric, formerly known as Campware, has made its first software release since the restructuring and renaming of the organisation, which started over a decade ago as the digital media department of the Media Development Loan Fund. The new Campsite 3.3.6 release sees over twenty-five improvements, new features and bug fixes that focus on increased stability and security for users.
<a href="http://sourceforge.net/projects/campsite/">Download Campsite 3.3.6</a>.
Security and stability enhancements include:
<ul>
<li>Total compatibility with newest version of PHP – 5.3.</li>
<li>A SQL Injection vulnerability in the TinyMCE text editor's article attachment functions is fixed (previously remedied with this <a href="http://www.sourcefabric.org/en/home/web_news/65/?tpl=32">patch</a>)</li>
<li>Security for PHP scripts in the javascript directory significantly improved.</li>
<li>The upgrade process has been made safer by not allowing multiple upgrade processes in parallel.</li>
</ul>
Bug fixes include:
<ul>
<li>Minor article lists, ordering and unlocking bugs fixed</li>
<li>Small issues with polls and forums fixed</li>
<li>Default login page language and character front end script bugs fixed</li>
</ul>
For a full list of improvements, please visit <a href="http://links.sourcefabric.org/3.3.6">http://links.sourcefabric.org/3.3.6</a>. The Campsite manual can be found <a href="http://en.flossmanuals.net/Campsite/Introduction">here</a> and the mailing list and forum is at <a href="http://forum.sourcefabric.org/">http://forum.sourcefabric.org</a>.
Campsite is the only open source content management system (CMS) written specifically for news organisations. The next release is Campsite 3.4, due at the end of June.

Campsite 3.3.6 Becomes Sourcefabric's First Release

Ephox Corporation, a leading provider of enterprise online authoring software, and Moxiecode Systems, the developer of the leading open source JavaScript editor, announced today that the companies have entered into a partnership agreement. The agreement enables Ephox to provide commercial licenses of TinyMCE, in addition to providing support and integration services to the TinyMCE community.
TinyMCE is an open source, WYSIWYG (what-you-see-is-what-you-get) and JavaScript-based HTML editor used by millions to author content for web pages, blogs, emails, wikis and more. Popular for its full set of rich text editing features, TinyMCE is also known for being lightweight, fast, and browser compatible. Downloaded more than three million times on Sourceforge and used by over 22 million WordPress publishers, TinyMCE is trusted by a large community of users. In addition, TinyMCE has been gaining momentum with enterprise software companies such as EPiServer, Interwoven and Oracle, as well as popular open source content management systems such as Alfresco and Joomla.
The partnership between Ephox and Moxiecode came as a result of widespread need for enterprise grade support and licensing for TinyMCE. When integrating the editor into their software or web site, some companies prefer a standard commercial license with clearer entitlements than an open source license provides. Others need help from a team of expert support staff. Ephox Enterprise TinyMCE fills these gaps with a degree of reliability that is unprecedented with open source online authoring software.
“Our customers have been asking us for enterprise level support,” said Joakim Lindkvist of Moxiecode. “Ephox has a proven track record providing quality support in the authoring market. We believe that this partnership enables our customers to get the best of both worlds – the leading JavaScript editor supported by the leading authoring company.”
Ephox will initially introduce three Enterprise TinyMCE offerings: Gold, Silver, and Bronze. The Gold subscription offering consists of a commercial license packaged with enterprise support, which includes email and phone support, installation guidance, and version upgrade assistance. Customers also are entitled to all fixes and release updates during the subscription period. The Silver and Bronze offerings include commercial licenses for those clients that do not require enterprise support. In addition to the commercial offerings, Ephox will make available a Community Edition package under the LGPL open source license at no charge.
“We are excited about our partnership and the introduction of Ephox Enterprise TinyMCE,” said Andrew Roberts, CEO of Ephox. “With this partnership, customers can now access the leading Java and JavaScript editors on the market from a single source. Further, the JavaScript editor user community – which includes Fortune 500 companies and leading software vendors – has been clamoring for a JavaScript editor backed by enterprise-grade support. With offices around the world and over a decade in the business, Ephox is uniquely qualified to deliver on this market need.”
Ephox has a long history of providing best-in-class functionality for online authoring. In the future, Ephox plans to leverage its expertise in this area by contributing back to the TinyMCE project and bringing additional add-on functionality to the JavaScript based authoring space. For more information on the Ephox Enterprise TinyMCE offerings, please visit: http://tinymce.ephox.com
About Ephox
Founded in 1999, Ephox (<a href="http://www.ephox.com">www.ephox.com</a>) develops enterprise-class solutions for authoring content and providing web content intelligence for business websites, wikis and blogs. The company’s technology is licensed by leading web content management vendors including EMC|Documentum, IBM, Oracle, and Percussion. Ephox products are used by hundreds of thousands of content authors in over 1,500 organizations across 35 countries. For more information, please visit www.ephox.com.
About Moxiecode
Founded in 2003, Moxiecode Systems (<a href="http://www.moxiecode.com">www.moxiecode.com</a>) is a software and systems developer located in Skellefteå, Sweden, and the main developers behind the TinyMCE open source project.

Ephox and Moxiecode Announce Partnership

Platformic, an end-to-end online web development environment (OWDE) and content management system (CMS) provider that allows businesses to quickly and easily build and maintain websites without coding or third party authoring tools, today announced it has been selected as the platform of choice to develop and manage the websites for three stations recently acquired by Local Media of America (LMA), a subsidiary of The Broadcast Company of the Americas-Magic 92.5 (XHRM-FM), Z-90 (XHTZ-FM), and 91X (XETRA-FM).
The new websites, powered by Platfomic and launched in only one week, are a testament to the quick time to market, flexibility and ease-of-use of the company's technology. In January 2010, LMA acquired the assets of San Diego-based Finest City Broadcasting, operator of the three radio stations serving the San Diego market, and that can be found online at:
<ul>
<li>Magic 92.5 (XHRM-FM) San Diego's Old School: <a href="http://www.magic925.com/pages/main" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">http://www.magic925.com/pages/main</a></li>
<li>Z-90 (XHTZ-FM):  <a href="http://www.z90.com/pages/main" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">http://www.z90.com/pages/main</a></li>
<li>91X (XETRA-FM) Local. Independent. Radio.: <a href="http://www.91x.com/pages/main" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">http://www.91x.com/pages/main</a></li>
</ul>
“At Platformic, our goal is to make it easier for broadcasters and other businesses to harness the power of the web-with one platform for media publishing; targeted ad serving; managing content, videos, mobile content, etc. We aim to make the web more manageable and put full control in the stations' hands,” said CEO of Platformic, Claudio Canive. “We are excited about the cool things Magic, Z-90 and 91X are doing with Platformic to further build those brands and interact with listeners online, and of course, pleased by the further expansion of our platform.”
Platformic's patented technology, used by leading companies around the globe such as Comcast, Fox, Tribune, Bicoastal Media, Broadcast Company of the Americas and Peak Broadcasting, enables users to easily build and manage media-rich websites that incorporate social media tools and user generated content (UGC). Users can “visually” create layouts and manage content from a browser in a fraction of the time while adhering to professional standards. The result is a completely customized website and CMS with the ability to change the layout and content quickly and easily. Users can update sites or change their entire look in minutes with no downtime. Staff members with little or no web experience can then simply update the sites more often to keep content fresh and make the site “stickier” for visitors.
About Platformic
Platformic is a complete end-to-end online web development environment (OWDE) and content management platform that allows businesses to quickly and easily build/update websites in real-time without sacrificing professional or creative standards or writing a single line of code.  Used by leading companies such as Peak Broadcasting, Comcast SportsNet, Fox, Tribune and others, Platformic enables even users that are not technical in nature to visually create feature-rich websites from their browser that incorporate podcasts, video blogs, user-generated content, and other interactive tools and further the organization's online goals. Platformic makes updating content and its various formatting easy to manage, throughout the website, from a central place. Its versatility allows departments throughout an organization to expand online offerings and do more with less.  For more information, visit <a href="http://www.platformic.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">www.platformic.com</a>.

Platformic Selected by Leading San Diego Radio Stations

Semrush - Be an SEO hero

Be an SEO hero with Semrush

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Notre-DAM is an open-source Digital Asset Management platform targeted to the mid-market segment (digital libraries, micro-stock agencies, editorial teams, etc.).
The key features of Notre-DAM are:
<ul>
<li>multi-user, web-based application accessible from the most popular browsers</li>
<li>can manage images, video, audio and text</li>
<li>provides a customizable catalogue based on taxonomies and collections</li>
<li>full metadata support (EXIF, IPTC, XMP, Creative Commons, PLUS)</li>
<li>geo referencing and search, directly on a map</li>
<li>fully scalable, relies on a cluster of PCs for resource storage, processing, and delivery</li>
<li>provides a REST API for integration with other applications (e.g. CMSs)</li>
<li>distributed under the GPL v.3 licenseScreenshot: 
<img style="max-width:580px" title="notre-dam" src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2021/07/notre-dam-580x306_zhohfp.png" /></li>
</ul>
More information (and an on-line demo) is available on the project's web site <a href="http://www.notre-dam.org">Notre-DAM.org</a>. A short <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cMehvlhOPFY">video presentation is available too</a>.

Notre-DAM Beta released - an open source Digital Asset Management Platform

The fifth alpha release of what will become Drupal 7 has been made available. You can read about the full list of incorporated changes between version 6 and 7 here: <a href="http://drupal.org/drupal-7.0-alpha1">http://drupal.org/drupal-7.0-alpha1</a>
From the announcement:
<blockquote>
This release includes many critical bug fixes, especially around the upgrade path, security issues, JavaScript, performance, and other areas.
Please see the <a href="http://drupal.org/node/806978">release notes</a> for more details.
</blockquote>
As always, you can download the release from <a href="http://www.drupal.org">http://www.drupal.org</a>

Fifth alpha release of Drupal 7 available

An urgent security release of e107 has been made available. This is a mandatory update for those running the popular content management system. A full changelog identifying the fixes can be found here: <a href="http://e107.org/svn_changelog.php?version=0.7.21">http://e107.org/svn_changelog.php?version=0.7.21</a>
Please ensure you upgrade immediately. You can do so by downloading the latest version from: <a href="http://www.e107.org/news.php?item.865.1">http://www.e107.org/news.php?item.865.1</a>

Urgent security release of e107 CMS

Let's face it, there are plenty of blog platforms out there to choose from when you get that sudden urge to share your thoughts and feelings (or just opinions like us) with the rest of the world. There's WordPress, Typepad, Movable Type, LifeType, OpenBlog, Blogger and many more.. but what makes WordPress such a Goliath to these other Davids?
Let's start with the basics..
<h3>It's got ease of use.</h3>
I know, I know, this is the part where everyone jumps in to tell me that all of the other platforms I've mentioned above are easy too.. and that may be the case.. but they aren't famous for it.<a href="http://www.wordpress.org"> WordPress</a> has ALWAYS been easy.. it's a fast install, it's got a small file size and most of the time it just works.
Let me put it this way, WordPress is the car you can typically rely on to start no matter the weather.. and should you stray and try another car because it seems like it may have better features and you decide to come back, it'll start right up again without a seconds delay. Trust me, I know.. I've tried a lot of them.
Ok, so it's easy you say.. what else does it have going for it? How about this one.
<h3>It's got community.</h3>
WordPress has easily one of the most diverse and largest communities in the CMS world let alone the blogging world. Still not sure? Check out <a href="http://central.wordcamp.org/">WordCamp Central</a>. We aren't just talking major cities of the world either, there are WordCamp's in places I've never even heard of until I heard there was a WordCamp happening there. Take WordCamp Fukuoka for example (I know, I'm not well travelled).
WordCamp's aren't the only example of community, however. There are tons of forums and bloggers all over the net that make helping others with WordPress or spreading the word their goals. Can you say, Free Advertising?
Nothing beats word of mouth right?
<h3>It's got Matt.</h3>
I've been bit by this one before but I still stand by my belief that projects, just like companies, need a leader. They need someone that can act as the focal point to give them substance. People want to be able to put a face to the products they use and <a href="http://ma.tt">Matt</a> does just that. He makes himself known, he shows up at WordCamp's.. he lives and breathes his product. And he's damn good at it too.
I really would love examples of where this has been done better because I really don't think it has. WordPress and Matt are synonymous with one another and it makes for good reading.. and the press eat it up.
<h3>It's got stuff.</h3>
Stuff. It's a broad word isn't it?
Let's face it.. WordPress is currently riding high with the most plugins and themes of (dare i say it?) any other CMS project out there.
Take a look at their plugin registry for an example: 9,674 plugins.
And themes? Don't even ask.. there are way too many to count.
So how do other projects get a chance to enjoy similar successes that WordPress has achieved?  That's a question that remains to be answered?
Do you agree or disagree? Comment below..

Editorial: What makes WordPress the blogging platform to beat?

CC: Can you tell us a bit about yourself, your background and how you came to work for Sitecore?
MS: I was President of a successful multimillion dollar custom software development company and while there, I envisioned the need for a Microsoft-centric system for creating and managing websites that could take the online experience far beyond the then present technology. In 2002, with four fellow Internet zealots, I started Sitecore. We developed a product with functionality and appeal that was completely disruptive in the market at that time. All five of us continue to be key contributors to the company today.
CC: How would you define the term “Content Management System”?
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2021/07/024-michael1-150x150_pmrfv9.jpg" />
MS: I feel compelled to say that I sincerely dislike the term. CMS does a really good job of defocusing everyone on what is important, namely measurably driving your online success. Content doesn’t help you do that. Management of content doesn’t help you do that either. And system surely doesn’t.
 
Secondly, the term is ambiguous since it is used as a cover for both the area of ECM (Enterprise Content Management) and WCM (Web Content Management). From a business perspective nothing could be farther apart. ECM should help you be more efficient in your internal business processes. WCM should help you measurably driving your online success. A lot of businesses unfortunately still believe that it is a great strategy to centralize the management of all content in a CMS. There is a big difference between the processes of creating and managing a legal contract, to creating persona optimized content that will dynamically drive a personalized experience for the marketing department. The only thing in common here is that you can use a keyboard to author your text.
Even with this ambiguous term, Sitecore is selling CMS for a broad range of clients with great success. We will change the name when the customers, market and analysts are ready to suggest a new industry term.
CC: As the CEO, you have no doubt seen a shift in the way content management has advanced in the last few years, what do you feel can be expected in the near future and where will Sitecore fit into this picture?
MS: CMS, as a platform for driving your online success, is undergoing a radical change. Content is shifting to a measurable experience – crafted around personas. Delivery is no longer just Web pages but spanning all digital channels. Marketers need measurable results and ROI ,while sales departments and customer service departments need to tie together what is happening in the offline world with what is happening in the online world. Customer relationship management databases are becoming a focal point for realizing this. Real-time personalization is finally a manageable reality that doesn’t need to involve huge IT projects.
CC: If you were to compare Sitecore with similar CMS in the marketplace, what would you say distinguishes it?
MS: Sitecore is the iPhone of the Web content management industry. We are fusing many of the technologies that are integrations in other platforms. Our vision is to deliver a powerful, coherent, easy-to-use platform. A platform focused on measurably driving your online success through personalized experiences across all online marketing channels.
CC: How has Sitecore fared in the face of the current economic situation facing the global economy?
MS: Remarkably, Sitecore grew global revenue last year at over 40%. Our team and partners responded to the economic environment by working even more than the 40% reflects, so I think we are well positioned to have that same hard work reap even higher rewards as the economy recovers.
CC: What successes has Sitecore had this year? Any new, large customers? What do you attribute these successes to?
MS: Fueled by our 40%+ revenue growth, we have opened up a number of offices around the world, perhaps most notably in Japan. We have a very solid team in Japan with significant Microsoft enterprise experience.
We also opened up an office in Australia, expanded our presence across Canada with service and sales people, and our UK and European operations have really bubbled up new and exciting business.
We inaugurated two global in-person events called Dreamcore, with our customers and partners that include Interactive Agencies, Web Development firms and major Systems Integrators – literally filling these events to capacity.
This year has also been the year of the Enterprise customers for us. I wish I could mention all of the fantastic companies, but they include the likes of Costco in North America, Lloyds of London, and ISS in Europe. Our technology delivers answers for marketing automation, for eCommerce, social community – all the key business needs that now go through a website.
CC: You recently introduced a new product called the Sitecore Online Marketing Suite. What can you tell us about this product? What made you decide there was a need for this kind of solution in the marketplace?
MS: The Online Marketing Suite (OMS) has generated enormous excitement with prospects for us. When people see how it connects measurable campaign results, the personalized experience, and marketing across digital channels they discover immediate value. The OMS is essentially transforming the CMS into a next generation business platform.
CC: As you are aware, there have been a number of fairly high profile acquisitions in the last couple of years that have affected both the CMS community and the IT community as a whole.  Some of these acquisitions have caused nervousness and a sense of insecurity within the “acquired” client base about the future of their chosen platforms. What is Sitecore doing to ensure a stable and secure platform for it’s users?
MS: Sitecore is both financially and by license revenue one of the global top performing WCM vendors on the market today. And we love what we do and see a very bright future continuing ahead.
Sitecore’s clear focus, cutting edge technology, extensive partner channel and strong developer support community make us a vendor to count on.
CC: What plans does Sitecore have to ensure that new customers can choose the platform with a knowledge that it will continue to be supported for years to come?
MS: Sitecore is the only WCMS vendor where 95% of our revenues come from the sale of software licensing. That obviously means that Sitecore has a very large partner channel and development community. Sitecore customers aren’t dependant upon Sitecore to implement it – they have many choices. There are thousands of certified developers worldwide. And remember, we are built with Microsoft technology.
The fact that Sitecore’s business model is not based on revenues from Sitecore’s own services means our products are scalable and crafted to be best of breed, usable by anyone with familiarity with Microsoft technology.
CC: Can you provide a sneak peak of what we can expect from upcoming releases from the Sitecore product line?
MS: Full blown large scale personalized email marketing tightly integrated to the CRM, CMS and online marketing suite is up next. Providing site level measurable results and instant ROI out of the box.
CC: Do you have any parting comments?
MS: The Web industry as it exists today will undergo a dramatic change over the next decade. New online marketing platforms akin to business level CRM and ERP will arise.

Interview with Sitecore CEO, Michael Seifert

After several months of research and engineering, Softeng Portal Builder™ has become Spain's first enterprise platform for web projects and content management operating on Microsoft Windows Azure. With the new developments made possible from the union of Softeng Portal Builder™ with Azure, customers and IT departments can have to the best technologies, providing them with security and a rapid return on their investment.
What is Microsoft Windows Azure
Microsoft Windows Azure is a state-of-the-art hosted operating system which allows you to develop, manage and run remote applications and services in the cloud, as well as offering computing power, storage and connectivity . Azure's main aim is to provide clients with a remote datacenter where they can host their Web applications in order to benefit from the following cloud-computing and. NET Framework advantages:
<ul>
<li>No need for investment in hardware / software.</li>
<li>The client does not need their own staff to manage the infraestructure.</li>
<li>Customised computing, storage and connection.</li>
<li>Unlimited scalability.</li>
<li>Reliability.</li>
<li>Information Security.</li>
<li>Interoperability. Tools with which developers are familiar.</li>
<li>Pay per use.</li>
</ul>
More options than ever
With Azure, SOFTENG has expanded its range of innovative SaaS Anywhere flexible hosts, which can host web projects together with the content management platform at Softeng Portal Builder™:
<ul>
<li>The client's own Datacenter : For large accounts who preffer to host their applications on their own infrastructure.</li>
<li>A trusted ISP : For clients with web applications with moderate availabiilty and scalability needs, who for various reasons prefer to manage and have at their disposal one or more dedicated servers servers.</li>
<li>Microsoft Windows Azure: This offers all of the benefits of the cloud and is ideal for those companies which have web applications with high availability and scalability needs.</li>
<li>Combined Solution: For companies which, for reasons of efficiency or security policy (e.g an intranet), require an on-premise application together with a public web in the cloud or an ISP to meet their availability, connectivity and scalability needs.</li>
<li>Microsoft and SOFTENG are working toguether to publicise the advantages of the combination of Softeng Portal Builder™ + Azure, as the solution offers businesses the opportunity to choose where to host their Web applications, whether it be on cloud-based services, on servers located in their own on-premise data centre, or through combining these options to meet their own specific needs.</li>
</ul>
About SOFTENG
Founded in 1997, Softeng is a Spanish software engineering company and creator of the first Web projects platform. Softeng Portal Builder™ helps individuals and businesses to build, manage and connect enterprise web business solutions. If you would like more information about Softeng, please visit the website at <a href="http://www.softeng.es ">http://www.softeng.es </a>

Softeng Portal Builder™, the first platform for Web projects operating in Microsoft Azure

The Joomla Project, a free, award-winning PHP-based content management system that enables users to build websites and powerful online applications, today announced the beta release of Joomla 1.6. Designed to offer enhanced site control and a more polished user experience, Joomla 1.6 will deliver a variety of new tools to improve website management and access, a more robust organizational structure for content control, and various other user-experience improvements throughout the software.
“The release of Joomla 1.6 will raise the bar of success for our community’s users, and enable our developer community to build even more exciting and compelling solutions,” said Ryan Ozimek, President of Open Source Matters, the not-for-profit organization that supports The Joomla Project. “New features and capabilities – such as the hierarchical design of the access control system, semantic XHTML layouts and one-click extension updates – usher in a new set of tools that open doors for more effective online engagements. Whether building a personal website or a next-generation Web application for an enterprise environment, Joomla 1.6 offers the most compelling solution for easily building and managing powerful online solutions.”
Joomla’s ease-of-use and extensibility has made it the most popular and downloaded open source website software in the industry today (it has been downloaded more than 16 million times). It is used for everything from small personal websites to the backend management for some of the largest enterprises and highest traffic sites on the Web, including sites operated by Citibank, IHOP, Harvard University, the Baltimore Police Department, Linux.com, Smart Car of America, The Guggenheim Museum, and <a href="http://community.joomla.org/showcase">many more</a>.
Key Features in Joomla 1.6: New Access Control System – Allows site administrators control over who can view and manage content. Unlimited Depth Organizational Model – Gives site administrators and content creators user-defined category levels that allow for the creation of a category tree with as many or as few levels for organizing articles and other content as needed. One-Click Extension Updates – Allows users to keep sites secure and controlled by simplifying the process of updating extensions. Semantic XHTML Layouts – Provides a better baseline for content presentation.
In addition, developers and implementers will enjoy the new ability Joomla 1.6 provides in allowing extensions to be built with granular control and permissions. This will make it easier to create more advanced, enterprise-focused applications and extensions for Joomla. Furthermore, there are numerous improvements in areas like code reuse, and considerable success in ensuring the stability of application programming interfaces via unit testing.
“With the release of 1.6, The Joomla Project is transitioning the development process to a more iterative, time-based release cycle,” said Louis Landry, a lead developer and community member of The Joomla Project. “This new approach will help streamline the production of new code and better ensure timely releases around product updates. I’m very excited about the beta release and look forward to working with the entire community as we continue to refine the system.”
Visit <a href="http://www.joomla.org/">www.joomla.org</a> and download Joomla 1.6 beta today!

Joomla! 1.6 Beta Released – Download the World’s Leading PHP-based Content Management System and Easily Build Websites and Online Applications

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