Articles - Page 83

Bland Brands Beware: Optimizely’s New Identity Brings Human Creativity to its Agentic AI and AEO Ambitions

matt-garrepy

<a href="http://mobstac.com/"><img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/mobstac-trusted-by-screen-shot-2013-03-15-at-5_11_06-pm-620x582.png" alt="MobStac Is Trusted By" /></a> Click to visit MobStac
At present MobStac are the “only product in the world to offer mobile websites, tablet websites and native apps for every device“. When I received the MobStac information pack in an email I noticed, below the company contact info, the tagline “Mobile is the new Web“. According to their research there is an estimated 788 million mobile users predicted by 2015. In <a href="http://blog.newrelic.com/2013/03/13/mobile-appeal-why-the-future-is-mobile/" target="_blank">this infographic</a> by New Relic called Why The Future is Mobile they state that there are more Android phones being activated each day than babies being born. So making sure your web presence is mobile compatible is going to be crucial in the days to come; if it isn't so already.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/mobstac-home-page-screen-shot-2013-03-13-at-7_33_30-am-620x177.png" alt="MobStac Website Home Page" /> click to enlarge image
MobStac has done all the hard work so you don't have to try to comply with thousands of devices on top of the mobile learning curve. They provide a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_as_a_service" target="_blank">SaaS</a> mobile cloud that lets you easily manage your content from whatever device is at hand. It supports HTML 5, complies with Google's SEO guidelines and can integrate with all your content management systems and feeds; making you “mobile in minutes“.
<h2>Working With MobStac</h2>
MobStac is fairly easy to work with, but there are some occasions where it's not necessarily obvious how things work. You can navigate quickly around the dashboard; everything is broken down into manageable chunks that, for the most part, comfortably lead you through the process.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/mobstac-feeds-screen-shot-2013-03-13-at-7_36_15-am-620x341.png" alt="MobStac Feeds" /> click to enlarge image
You are given a sub-domain on MobStac that you can visit in a browser on your computer or a mobile device (if you open it in a mobile browser you may get prompted to download the app). The look of the mobile site will stay pretty consistent between devices and I was able to test it on a XP Laptop, iMac, iPad, iPhone and an Android S3. They provide built in analytics that shows you not only the number of site views, but also what devices were used to view your mobile site.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/mobstac-blog-feed-screen-shot-2013-03-13-at-7_31_05-am-620x248.png" alt="MobStac Blog Feed" /> click to enlarge image
One of the things I really like about MobStac is that it provides user accessibility through three buttons on the bottom of each page. There are two buttons to increase or decrease the size of the text and there is a button for alternative contrast, used when reading at night. It also remembers the settings you last used, so when you return to it you don't have to set it up all over again.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/mobstac-userability-screen-shot-2013-03-15-at-5_53_09-pm-620x217.png" alt="MobStac Userability" /> click to enlarge image
You can also change the look of your mobile site with themes. If you click on your MobStac page that lists all you mobile sites (if you are in a dashboard click ‘Your MobStac' in the top left to return to it). Towards the bottom of the screen there is a row called ‘Mobile site' or ‘Touch site' (iPad), clicking the ‘Preview' button next to ‘Mobile' will open up the theme for editing. You can alter the colours of the various font classes used, or enter your own CSS stylesheet. MobStac provides you with a wireframe as part of the preview so you can see what it will look like on a mobile device.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/mobstac-themes-screen-shot-2013-03-13-at-7_41_33-am-620x396.png" alt="MobStac Themes" /> click to enlarge image
The one thing you should note is that MobStac appears to strip out all photographs from your posts, presumably to reduce loading times and bandwidth costs. On mobiles it looks fine, you can see the text and share the post if you wish, but I personally find on the iPad (Touch site) the preview looks a bit empty with lots of whitespace, almost as if the photos haven't loaded yet. It also doesn't appear to follow the same theme that is used elsewhere. There are no theme settings under the Touch site preview page, so it could be this part of the system is still a work-in-progress.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/mobstac-ipad-preview-screen-shot-2013-03-13-at-7_42_03-am-620x396.png" alt="MobStac iPad Preview-" /> click to enlarge image
I only really had a couple of issues through out: I created a section based on an existing tag we used in the <a href="/" target="_blank">CMS Critic blog</a>, however I didn't see the section show up anywhere in the mobile site, so I was left a little confused about how it works. I looked into their support forum and a search for ‘Section/s' returned no results, even though if I scrolled down the main support page I was able to find a relevant post on sections. This explained that you have to tag a post with the section name for it to show up on your mobile site under that section. Since this was a tag that was already in use in our blog feed it's possible there is a bug here or the indented use needs some clarification.
I also noticed that when I clicked on the twitter feed link (<a href="https://twitter.com/cmscritic" target="_blank">@cmscritic</a>) on the main page of the mobile site I got a “link appears to be broken” error in my browser. I realised after some trial and error that you had to click the ‘+' symbol next to the feed in the dashboard for it to work, as it gave the impression it was set-up correctly without doing this. Therefore I think a few extra prompts, tips or guides might help when you are new to MobStac. Most of it was simple enough to get started, but a little clarity in certain contexts might help to light the way.
<h2>Create Your Own Mobile Domain</h2>
I'm sure many of you have seen the trend of adding a sub-domain with the single letter ‘m' to reduce the length of the URL for ease of use on mobile devices. MobStac allows you to do this too if you own a domain. It will connect your sub-domain to your MobStac site, which allows you to use your domain address instead (e.g. m.www.cmscritic.com instead of cmscritic.mobstac.com). The instructions below gives you the main details in order to set this up as well as details for WordPress integration.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/mobstac-m-domain-screen-shot-2013-03-14-at-4_45_37-pm-620x267.png" alt="MobStac Mobile Domain" /> click to enlarge image
All you have to do next is save and your done, the API Key will be different to ours so we didn't show it (besides security reasons). They also give you the code for a badge you can add to your blog, as well as some basic instructions on how to use some of the common features of MobStac.
<h2>Conclusion</h2>
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/mobstac-pricing-screen-shot-2013-03-15-at-5_16_29-pm-620x752.png" alt="MobStac Pricing" /> click to enlarge image
As you can see from the image above MobStac can integrate a whole host of things into your site. The settings section gives you a lot of options so you can include and configure all kinds of content just the way you like it. The information pack had a long list of features as well as comparisons between MobStac and other providers, and it is clear they are definitely ahead of the curve.
The ‘Starter' plan is free with certain limitations like traffic. When your website has grown enough to warrant upgrading, the price I think is fairly reasonable when you consider everything it can do. The professional and premium plans can be paid monthly, as shown in the image above, or you can pay annually to get a two month discount (the plans are on a ‘per website' basis).
By opening your doors to the mobile market you can increase your readership, improve your conversion rates, making it more likely MobStac will pay for itself. Since you can test <a href="http://mobstac.com" target="_blank">MobStac</a> out for free though the question really should be why haven't you gone mobile yet?

MobStac Review - Manage Mobile Websites and Apps Across All Mobile and Tablet Devices

niam-brown

LightCMS, a website builder capable of eCommerce, blogging and corporate set ups, has rolled out a couple of new enhancements.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/lightcms.jpg" /> 
Selected for coverage as one of the most relevant website builders <a href="https://www.websitebuilderscritic.com/website_builders/reviews/lightcms/" target="_blank">at Website Builders Critic</a>, LightCMS, is a website builder worth keeping tabs on. The platform already powers over 275,000 websites, and also picked up the <a href="/the-winner-of-the-2014-peoples-choice-cms-award-for-best-cloud-cms-for-smb/" target="_blank">People's Choice Award for Best Cloud CMS for SMB</a>.
Here's a quick look at what's new.
<h2>New &amp; Improved Source Code Editor</h2>
First up, LightCMS have introduced a new and improved source code editor. The old source editor was, “utilitarian in nature and limited on the features it offered.”
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sourceeditorsmall.png" />Now though, thanks to a new user-friendly and responsive user interface, the new source editor gives you an environment more closely related to what you would find in your favorite code editor. Here are some of the editor's new features:
<ul>
<li>A full screen editing window</li>
<li>Syntax highlighting</li>
<li>Display preferences such as dark editor, line wrap, show gutter, and show invisibles</li>
<li>Expand/Collapse template files list</li>
<li>Dark Editor: This option lets you select this option to use the editor with a dark background and light colored font, instead of a light background with dark colored font.</li>
<li>Line Wrap: This feature lets you turn line wrap on.</li>
<li>Show Invisibles: This feature display invisible characters such as tabs and spaces.</li>
<li>Show Gutter: Selecting this option displays the gutter, showing the line numbers and the expand/collapse button for parent-level tags.</li>
</ul>
<h2>New Role Page Tree</h2>
Previously, if you wanted to assign a specific role to a page, you had to first go to the manage roles page and create the role. Then, you had to head over to each page that should be assigned to the role and assign it. A time-sapping chore to say the least.
This feature though, makes it faster and easier for LightCMS users to assign custom roles to a page or group of pages. Users can create and assign custom roles to pages from one central location: the “Manage Roles” page.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/editrolespage478x0-is.png" />
The “Add Role” button, the Add Roles page is displayed and lets you enter a name and description for the new custom role. The Pages section of the screen displays a page tree similar to the page tree in the Page Manager.
For more information on this latest LightCMS release, check out their official blog announcement.
You can also get acquainted with LightCMS throughout CMS Directory.

LightCMS Rolls Out New Source Editor & Role Page Tree

mike-johnston

Having a stellar content management system (CMS) isn’t enough. It needs the ideal match: marketing automation software.
In a world where customers expect a better and more personalized experience than ever before, running marketing automation software in tandem with your CMS is a must to ensure your enterprise thrives.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/person-731479_1280552x0-is.jpg" /> The world of “martech” is advancing quickly and can seem overwhelming at first blush. Fortunately, the best marketing software options are intuitive, user-friendly and designed to pair perfectly with the leading CMS possibilities.
Are you ready to take your enterprise marketing tactics to the next level? First, <a href="/dir/" target="_blank">make sure you have a premium CMS handling your content organization</a>. Next, take a look at these eight excellent marketing solutions.
<h2>1. Marketo</h2>
This marketing automation software giant brings together every single digital channel. Marketo marries science with digital marketing by offering email marketing, inbound marketing, upsell and cross-selling, lead generation, event marketing, optimized ad spending solutions and so much more.
With real-time personalization, on-demand webinars and even digital book clubs at the ready, you’ll have everything necessary for a killer marketing campaign just like fellow customers Curves International, Northeastern University and Canon Business Solutions.
Visit <a href="http://www.marketo.com/">Marketo’s website</a> to find out more.
<h2>2. Act-On</h2>
Both inbound and outbound strategies are highlighted, including SEO, a focus on landing pages, email management and help organizing events and webinars. Customers can depend on this software for programs and analytics, a comprehensive data studio, and seamless CRM integration. Over 3,000 clients use Act-On for marketing software, such as CobbleStay Vacation Rentals, the Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce, and US Fleet Tracking. See what <a href="https://www.act-on.com/">Act-On</a> has to offer you and your enterprise.
<h2>3. Oracle Marketing Cloud</h2>
Like “The Oracle” in The Matrix said, “We are all here to do what we are all here to do.”
For you, this means marketing to consumers in an engaging, smart way. This solution can be broken down into a few key critical umbrella areas: Cross-channel marketing, content marketing, social marketing and a fantastic data management platform. Combine that with Services &amp; Support that include strategic services, a creative studio, implementation services and campaign services, and it’s sure to be a win.
Oracle’s customers are in a number of industries, and include; Kirkland’s, Money Super Market and Whole Foods Market. Learn more at <a href="https://www.oracle.com/marketingcloud/index.html">Oracle Marketing Cloud</a>.
<h2>4. HubSpot</h2>
HubSpot lets you take care of every last online marketing campaign with ease and grace — which is no easy feat.
Those campaigns can be frustrating, but HubSpot puts whole marketing funnels into one simple to understand platform. All at once, you can enjoy more traffic via content that’s optimized, snag more leads with flawless lead conversion campaigns and attract more customers for good.
To reap the benefits of HubSpot alongside clients like; Whittington Consulting, Steam Creative and SmartBug Media. head over to the <a href="http://offers.hubspot.com/">HubSpot website</a>.
<h2>5. Pardot</h2>
You want a streamlined marketing and sales solution from the geniuses at Salesforce? Pardon? No, it’s actually Pardot and it’s become the “official B2B marketing automation app” for and from Salesforce.
Pardot is mobile ready and lets you design, deploy and oversee a slew of marketing campaigns designed to up your revenue, which clients like Arketi Group, SignUp4 and EPAY Systems have already discovered.
Check out <a href="http://www2.pardot.com/">Pardot</a> and see if it’s the right fit for you.
<h2>6. InfusionSoft</h2>
This automated sales and marketing software solution is created just for small businesses and gives you an all-in-one approach. Suitable for all industries, it promotes speed and efficiency.
InfusionSoft provides a stellar customer relationship management (CRM) solution, email and social marketing updates that are automated, real-time lead scoring and e-commerce shopping carts that deter abandonment. Current customers include Mint Social, Salon Success Strategies and CleanCorp Cleaning Service.
Take a look at everything <a href="http://go.infusionsoft.com/">InfusionSoft</a> has to offer your company.
<h2>7. LeadSquared</h2>
This software was created to increase your company’s revenues via stronger leads within a full marketing software suite. Complete with landing pages featuring responsive design, a slew of website widgets made just for enterprises, and the advantage of using every possibility to capture leads from inbound email to communication from online chats, emails or phone calls, lead nurturing can be more efficient.
LeadSquared customers include; Packages Worldwide, Reach Technologies, and Dominate GMAT.
Connect with <a href="http://www.leadsquared.com/">LeadSquared</a> to get your leads squared away.
<h2>8. Teradata</h2>
Move big data forward with easy management, deployment and integration. In big data analytics, you get a discovery platform, connection analytics, and aSNAP Framework, just for starters. Join fellow enterprises like 7-Eleven, Ace Hardware Corporation and Air Canada who have already chosen this software solution as their key marketing tool. The data warehousing is a great option, letting you tear your current “solution” up by discovering what <a href="http://www.teradata.com/">Teradata</a> can offer you.
<h2>The Perfect Partner</h2>
Marketing automation software is the perfect partner for a CMS.
Add any of the enterprise marketing solutions above to your business, and you’ll quickly see how invaluable it is — especially when you already have a solid CMS in place.
What do you think about the future of enterprise marketing software?

8 Enterprise Marketing Automation Softwares to Complement Your CMS

<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/senseiplugin.jpg" alt="Sensei" />
If you've ever taken an online course, you've experienced the fine work of developers and programmers who have worked very hard. CMSs for education are notoriously difficult to manage. WooThemes and their new plugin, Sensei, set out to change that. Their new tool, “the learning management plugin for WordPress, was released in January.
<h2>Introduction</h2>
Sensei is exclusively a WordPress plugin. Since WordPress is the world's most popular CMS, this is a great choice. Sensei is easy to use, even for someone who is not familiar with using a CMS. Anyone familiar with WordPress will find the plugin very easy to use.
Sensei a Japanese martial arts term, meaning “teacher” or “person born before another.” The term applies to this plugin.
<h2>Features</h2>
Sensei is not what you would call a “really powerful” plugin. In other words, you're not going to make Coursera. The features it does provide, however, are sufficient. Here's what you can do:
<ol>
<li>Create an unlimited courses</li>
<li>Create lessons within courses</li>
<li>Set course and lesson prerequisites</li>
<li>Create quizzes with required pass percentage</li>
<li>Set custom lesson length requirements</li>
<li>Embed videos of any kind to the lessons</li>
<li>User registration for students taking the course</li>
<li>Complete course analytics and student information</li>
<li>Learner access to dashboard to track progress</li>
<li>Custom theming options</li>
</ol>
The plugin interface looks and feels like many other plugin. Creating lessons and courses is easy using the familiar WordPress post creation.
<h2>Getting Started with Sensei</h2>
(Note:  I tested the plugin using a privately hosted WordPress 3.5.1 site using the<a href="https://www.e-junkie.com/ecom/gb.php?ii=606601&amp;c=ib&amp;aff=191721&amp;cl=64302' target='ejejcsingle'" target="_blank"> Standard Theme</a>.)
The first step to Sensei is, quite obviously, installing it. I navigated to my WordPress site's plugin page, selected the 253 KB zip file, and clicked “install now.” Within ten seconds, the plugin was successfully installed.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei.jpeg" alt="Sensei Plugin" />
After selecting “activate plugin,” I was redirected to my plugin page, where I was provided with a welcome message.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei2.jpeg" alt="sensei2" />
It was time to do some schooling.
<h2>Using Sensei</h2>
The plugin provides me with an icon in the sidebar with and five menu items. We'll go through each one of these.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei3.jpeg" alt="sensei3" />
Here's the screen I was looking at when I clicked on the Sensei icon.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei4.jpeg" alt="sensei4" />
The plugin page looks just like the main page for creating new posts. Instead of categories like “author” or “tags,” the Sensei plugin featured the titles  “course” and “prerequisite lesson.”
<h2>Add New Lesson</h2>
My first step was to add a new lesson.
This was familiar territory, since it mimicked the features and layout of typical post creation.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei5.jpeg" alt="sensei5" />
Unlike typical posts however, adding a new lesson displayed the following additional features below the main field:
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei6.jpeg" alt="sensei6" />
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei7.jpeg" alt="sensei7" />
I went ahead and wrote a mock lesson and published it. In doing so, it was necessary to create a new course and assign this particular lesson to that course. If this action is not completed, the course will not be available for viewing or taking from the main page.
When I visited my blog home page to take the course, the first thing I noticed was the addition of two category tags in my header menu:  “Courses” and “My Courses.”
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei8.jpeg" alt="sensei8" />
Clicking “My Courses” brings me to the main page for courses that I published.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei9.jpeg" alt="sensei9" />
Let's take the class.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei10.jpeg" alt="sensei10" />
What follows is a simple display of the lesson that I created. I clicked on the blue button to “start taking this class.”
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei11.jpeg" alt="sensei11" />
What follows is the lesson display, along with a progress bar.
It was unclear to me how to set the lesson to completed. The “In Progress” notification appeared on the lesson whenever I looked at the lesson.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei12.jpeg" alt="sensei12" />
“Create New Lesson” is where the real work of course development happens. You are provided with a full editor, plenty of options, and access to all the familiar plugins that you have installed. The nice thing about creating lessons is that there is no learning curve for typing or creating a new lesson.
<h2>All Courses</h2>
Next, I chose to view “All Courses.”
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei13.jpeg" alt="sensei13" />
The interface is familiar for those who are used to using WordPress. I created this course when I was in the process of writing up my lesson. The Course Creation was provided as one of the options underneath the lesson creation field. Editing a course takes me to page that looks just like a post or lesson creation.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei14.jpeg" alt="sensei14" />
<h2>Analysis</h2>
The analysis page provides a course instructor's perspective on all the necessary metrics for courses, grades, and learners. Here are the features you'll see when you click “Analysis.”
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei15.jpeg" alt="sensei15" />
This page provides a survey of numbers only. It is not possible to submit queries or display the data in any other way. Unfortunately, there is no way to manually change student grades.
<h2>Settings</h2>
The settings page is a complete way to design courses, lessons, and general settings. There are plenty of options for each. Here is a look:
General Settings
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei16.jpeg" alt="sensei16" />
<h2>Course Settings</h2>
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei17.jpeg" alt="sensei17" />
Lesson Settings 
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei18.jpeg" alt="sensei18" />
Editing the Sensei settings is a great way to customize the individual lessons and create a virtual school with specific images, appearance, and features.
After becoming familiar with the Sensei interface and features, I figured it was time to give it a go with additional features.
Adding a Quiz
Let's go ahead and create a quiz to test this feature.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei19.jpeg" alt="sensei19" />
After clicking “create a quiz,” I'm prompted to stipulate a pass percentage.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei20.jpeg" alt="sensei20" />
To proceed in creating questions, it is necessary to save the draft lesson. After this, quiz creation can commence.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei21.jpeg" alt="sensei21" />
The only questions that you can create are multiple choice questions. The help article states that there will be “the ability in the future to include multiple types of questions such as assessment, essays, etc.”
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei22.jpeg" alt="sensei22" />
After you create the quiz question, it appears in the “Lesson Quiz” area, with the option to add additional questions.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/sensei23.jpeg" alt="sensei23" />
After saving the question, you can go on to create additional questions. I created a total of four, then went to view my lesson.
When I clicked “take quiz” on the lesson page, I was redirected to a new page, still displaying my familiar blog template, and displaying a post with the title of the lesson and “quiz.”
At the time I tested, my quiz did not display. I presume this was due to a conflict with my theme's CSS. WooThemes is available for any WordPress installation but is designed to be fully compatible with Twenty Eleven and Twenty Twelve.
Using Video Courses
Sensei is primed and ready for video instruction. Each lesson provides the opportunity to add a video embed code. Doing so is as easy as using WordPress's oEmbed function and all its <a href="http://codex.wordpress.org/Embeds#oEmbed">supported codes</a>.
Changing the Plugin Appearance
For those who desire to customize the sensei template within their theme, there is a <a href="http://docs.woothemes.com/document/sensei-theming/">Sensei Theming guide</a> for doing so.
Charging for Courses
Although I did not test this feature, Sensei also integrates with <a href="http://www.woothemes.com/woocommerce/">WooCommerce</a>, allowing you to charge for courses. The process, apparently, is as simple as creating your course and then linking it to a product on the commerce plugin.
The Future of Sensei
This plugin is a work in progress, and Sensei makes this clear. There are good things in the offing. Thankfully, they provide a way to vote on future features in the <a href="http://ideas.woothemes.com/forums/191508-sensei">Sensei forums</a>. At the time of writing, there are dozens of suggestions for improvements.
Cost
A single license costs $99. For a five-site license, the cost is $149. For $299, you are allowed to use the plugin on an unlimited number of sites.
<h2>Conclusion</h2>
While Sensei is not a large and full-featured educational CMS, it does provide an easy-to-use plugin for those conducting small-scale educational courses on a website. It's the perfect solution for selling educational services from a blog or providing employee or subscriber training. It is not, however, designed for large-scale usage by educational institutions.
If you're looking for an easy way to add courses to your blog or website, Sensei is for you. Like anything from WooThemes, it's fun and virtually bug-free. Plus, it's got a bright future.
<a href="http://www.woothemes.com/products/sensei/">Visit the WooThemes Sensei plugin page</a>.

Teach Coursework with WordPress - Sensei Review

daniel-threlfall

Blogging is becoming increasingly important in terms of marketing and relationship building between company and customer.
Thankfully, blogging on <a href="https://www.squarespace.com/" target="_blank">Squarespace</a> is an option – but just how good of an option is it?
If you’re looking to use Squarespace to build a blog, you’ll need to assess just how much functionality the platform offers, and how easy it is to blog on Squarespace on a regular basis.
To explore exactly those areas, read on.
<h2>Blogging on Squarespace: Good Enough for Your Blog?</h2>
Squarespace’s blogging feature can be found within the “Content Manager”, accessible from the left-hand sidebar.
From there, you can click “Add Page”, and then select “Blog”.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/blog.png" alt="Squarespace Blogging" />
Once your blog page is set up – which takes you a matter of seconds, SquareSpace allows you to start blogging straight away. Which is also just as simple. All you need to do is click “Add Post” in the top right-hand corner.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/untitled-1024x195700x0.png" alt="Squarespace Blogging" />
You can then type in your blog post title, and all of your required text.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/bpost700x0.png" alt="Squarespace Blogging" />
Furthermore, you can start experimenting with Squarespace’s extensive content block options.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/blocks700x0.png" alt="Squarespace Blogging" />
These content block options include inserting more text areas, products, maps, menus, videos, galleries, social buttons, Flickr widgets, Instagram widgets, and much, much more. It’s all as easy as selecting which content block you wish to use.
Once you have finished inserting your text, videos and other blocks, you’re all set to publish your blog post.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/publish700x0.png" alt="Squarespace Blogging" />
All you need to do is click “Save &amp; Publish”, and you’re done.
After creating a few blog posts, your blog management page will begin filling up. The neatly laid out list displays all of your posts, along with some minor details and an option to edit them further.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/bloglist700x0.png" alt="Squarespace Blogging" />
<h2>Squarespace Blogging Extras</h2>
Some handy extra options are also available for blogging on Squarespace. These include:
<ul>
<li>Post tagging</li>
<li>Categories</li>
<li>Geo-tagging</li>
<li>Post by email</li>
<li>Podcast support</li>
<li>Customizable URLs</li>
</ul>
These additional options really help round off the Squarespace blogging experience, allowing it to go above and beyond standard blog post publishing.
<h2>The Verdict</h2>
To give you an overview of the good and bad which Squarespace blogging has to offer, check out the pros and cons below.
<h3>Pros</h3>
<ul>
<li>Incredibly simple to put to get started with, with no tricky controls or menus.</li>
<li>The blog list view is easy to understand and thus easy to manage.</li>
<li>Huge amount of content blocks which make embedding videos, maps, menus and so forth a piece of cake.</li>
<li>Long list of optional extras like tagging and customizable URLs to add some depth to your blog if necessary.</li>
</ul>
<h3>Cons</h3>
<ul>
<li>No toggle option between HTML &amp; Visual mode, as with most other blogging platforms.</li>
<li>No blog post preview option.</li>
</ul>
All in all, blogging on Squarespace is – like the rest of the platform – simple. There aren’t any technical options to get confused with, whilst all the additional extras are completely optional.
What’s more is, Squarespace’s trademark content blocks make adding elements like videos and social buttons to blog posts a breeze.
If you’re on the hunt for a sophisticated blogging platform, Squarespace’s lack of HTML and post previewing action may hold you back. However, when it comes to straightforward blogging, there isn’t much Squarespace can’t do.
You can also get started with your Squarespace website today, thanks to the <a href="https://www.squarespace.com/templates">Squarespace 14-day free trial</a>.

How Effective is Squarespace as a Blogging Platform?

LightCMS have announced a major security update that relates to connecting with your LightCMS website via FTP.
Used by more than 175,000 people around the world, LightCMS makes us of standardized code and a vast array of tools to make up a powerful suite capable of building corporate websites, eCommerce websites, Blogs, and more.
With this FTP Secure protocol update, which is due to roll out on June 2nd, 2014, LightCMS users will experience a far safer connection. Connecting to websites via FTP is a popular method of making changes to web property, and so many LightCMS users will likely be affected by this change.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/ftp-secure700x0.jpg" alt="LightCMS FTPS" /> 
Once the upgrade is in place, all LightCMS FTP connections will need to be made via FTPS. This will change a few of the settings you use with your FTP clients when connecting to your LightCMS website.
To guide you through that short process, the LightCMS team have thrown together an easy-to-follow guide to connecting with LightCMS via FTPS. The guide covered popular FTP clients such as FileZilla, WinSCP and Transmit.
To find out more about LightCMS, check out their website. Full details of this scheduled FTPS update can be found via the LightCMS Blog.
Also, be sure to explore more of LightCMS via our CMS Directory.

LightCMS Prepares Website Security Update Through FTPS

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<a href="http://www.wellmetrics.com/">WellMetrics</a> is a new information management solution for the Oil &amp; Gas industry brought to market by <a href="http://www.m-files.com/en">M-Files</a> partner, <a href="http://www.tsg.net/">The Strickland Group</a>.
What does WellMetrics do?
WellMetrics provides oil and gas companies with a single solution for accessing all structured and unstructured information related to their wells, ensuring authorized staff can quickly locate the exact content they need, regardless of the business application in which it resides. With fast access to structured content, such as production, land and operations data, as well as unstructured documents, such as drawings, technical specifications, contracts, correspondence and other information needed by scientists and operational staff, exploration and production firms can better optimize their oil and gas assets at the well, lease, reservoir, field and corporate levels. This directly enhances decision making, leading to improved value of assets in the areas of exploration, drilling, waterflooding, completions, recompletion and reservoir engineering.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/wellmetrics-booth-web.jpg" />
Watch this introductory video to get a feel for what WellMetrics offers:
<iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Dq5J3TmoH8E?feature=oembed" frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>
WellMetrics features include:
<ul>
<li>Fast access to all well data and documentation from a single, unified system.</li>
<li>An integrated GIS interface based on ESRI that allows users to easily find, view and manage data and document collections by each well, or by groups of wells, using intuitive maps and aerial photography.</li>
<li>Integration with commonly-used commercial oil and gas industry applications such as Aires, Excalibur, LandWorks and Rio.</li>
<li>The ability to centrally manage both structured data (data residing in database applications) and unstructured documents (Word, Excel or PDF files, for example).</li>
<li>Comprehensive document control capabilities for ensuring only authorized staff can access confidential information and for supporting regulatory compliance requirements.</li>
</ul>
For more information on WellMetrics, <a href="http://www.wellmetrics.com">visit them on the web</a>.

Introducing WellMetrics - An Information Management Solution for Oil & Gas

<a href="http://www.pikock.com/" target="_blank">Pikock</a> – a website builder that lets you create and animate your responsive website without any coding skills – has just released a brand new <a href="http://www.pikock.com/21/new-features-of-pikocks-website-builder" target="_blank">Drag-and-Drop editor</a>. 
 Founded in Paris in 2012, Pikock have recently been working hard to improve their relatively young platform. 
 In fact, just a few weeks ago, Pikock released their <a href="/the-first-of-its-kind-pikock-launch-layout-slider-to-simplify-website-building/" target="_blank"> one-of-a-kind Layout Slider</a>, which enables you to build web pages with the hep of a carousel-like interface.  
 Now though, Pikock have added to their user-friendly platform with drag-and-drop capabilities. Also, they have introduced a “page versioning” feature, allowing you to preview different page types. 
<h2>Drag, Drop, Slide and Preview</h2>
Pikock's drag-and-drop editor works just like any other similar system, allowing you to pick up page elements from the editor sidebar, and drag them into place on your web page.  
 Such elements include galleries, videos, Google Maps, forms and so forth. 
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/size_4_drag-and-drop-feature.png" alt="Pikock Drag and Drop" /> When moving elements into place, a Blue line will indicate that the move is valid, whilst a red line indicated that the move is invalid.  
Furthermore, Pikock's Page Versioning feature allows you to create a page, choose to create multiple versions of it, and the publish the one you prefer most. 
 <img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/size_4_more-versions-of-page.png" alt="Pikock " /> Along with Pikock's <a href="/the-first-of-its-kind-pikock-launch-layout-slider-to-simplify-website-building/" target="_blank"> layout slider</a>, these new features will fit nicely together to make up quite a unique website builder. After all, there isn't a great deal of mind blowing innovation in the website building market at the moment, so it's nice to see Pikock trying their level best to be different without skipping the essentials. 
 To find out more about Pikock and to sign up for a free trial, visit their  <a href="http://www.pikock.com/" target="_blank"> official website</a>.

Pikock Introduces Drag and Drop Editor

Simplified editing. Improved WYSIWYG experience. Ready-to-use mobile-first starter sites. Editing on iPad. The list of enhancements to Composite's .NET open source CMS, Composite C1, continues to grow with each release. Version 4.2 takes this to a completely new level.
<h3>Build richer web experiences</h3>
This release has specifically focused on improving an editor's experience by making the content creation and editing process faster, more intuitive and ultimately more satisfying. The outcome is a much richer web experience for visitors on the website.
<blockquote>
“We take the author experience extremely seriously and aim to make our CMS as simple and user-friendly as possible for them. If we improve their processes and the way they go about creating and maintaining content we cut down on the time it takes to complete a task. More than that, we hopefully provide them with a satisfying experience. They can trust we've always got their best interests at heart, which we do,' said Composite Founder and Product Manager, Marcus Wendt.
</blockquote>
<h3>Locate elements that need updating easier</h3>
Made possible thanks to a simplified interface for changing C1 Function settings and ‘pixel perfect' previews of C1 Functions in the Visual Editor. This makes it straight forward to locate dynamic content elements that need updating. Editors will see a simple form when tweaking settings.
<h3>Enjoy a better WYSIWYG experience</h3>
Because version 4.2 is able to analyse a website's HTML templates and CSS it doesn't matter where an editor places content in the Visual Editor – column width will automatically be sized to match the live site. Editors are shown how sentences will wrap, rich in-content elements will be sized and images will fit.
<blockquote>
“It's important editors get a realistic idea of how their content will appear when it's published on their websites. That's why we focused so heavily on this aspect in the version 4.2,” said Composite CEO, Oskar Lauritzen.
</blockquote>
<h3>Begin with a mobile-first starter site</h3>
Composite recently launched Venus (<a href="http://venus.c1.composite.net/">http://venus.c1.composite.net/</a>), a ready-to-use mobile-first starter site that can be easily adapted. Created with the express purpose of providing web professionals with an easy-to-use starting point for their web projects, Venus is one of many similar sites – based on the latest version of Bootstrap, LESS and ASP.NET Razor – that will be rolled out in the near future.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/venus-front677x0.png" />
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/venus-mobile-first.png" />
<blockquote>
“The beauty of Venus – and the starter sites in the pipeline – is that you don't have to be a gun developer to create a website. We've done all the hard work for you. Venus comes with step-by-step instructions that enable you to adapt and customize it however you like. Marketers will love it and feel empowered as they work their way through it,' said Composite CEO, Oskar Lauritzen.
</blockquote>
<h3>Edit on an iPad</h3>
Although users have been able to use Composite C1 on other tablets (Windows 8 devices such as Microsoft Surface and Android devices) it's only with the release of version 4.2 this can now be done well on iPad.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/ipad677x0.png" />
<blockquote>
“You should be able to update your Composite C1 website from whatever device you want. More often than not these days it's not a desktop or even a laptop, but a tablet. It's very pleasing to us that we can now offer this facility on iPad,” said Composite Founder and Product Manager, Marcus Wendt.
</blockquote>
<h3>Two more cool things available with this release</h3>
<ul>
<li>Developers get the latest tooling with .NET 4.5 and latest version of ASP.NET Razor</li>
<li>Grid editor – View and edit your data in tabular form (<a href="http://www.composite.net/Add-on-Market?query=grid">http://www.composite.net/Add-on-Market?query=grid</a>)</li>
</ul>
<h3>About Composite</h3>
Based in Copenhagen and Kiev, Danish software company Composite has been making content management software since 1999. The precursor to C1 was a commercial product. In 2010, after a total rewrite, a decision was made to distribute the new version, Composite C1, as open source.
Today Composite C1 is a free open source content management system built for marketing and web professionals looking to create new websites for companies using the latest Microsoft technologies.
Composite C1 is recognized for being an easy-to-use professional system that fulfils the needs of hardcore developers, but remains accessible to editors. Out of the box users have access to a fully functional CMS and the option to add free packages such as an SEO-assistant and social add-ons or commercial packages including newsletter services and event calendars.
Composite C1 consistently receives a top rating on the .NET Open Source portal CodePlex.
More than a thousand users from all over the world install Composite C1 every month. Total installs currently sit at almost 46, 000.

Composite C1 4.2 - Faster and more Intuitive Content Management

How Do You Get a Blog?

As you may know, the reason I chose to start the CMS Awards was to help give projects around the world that may not necessarily have a huge marketing budget, an opportunity to get noticed.My hope with the awards was that projects that won would feel energized, appreciated and that it would give them the pat on the back they deserve for all their hard work. We think everyone who develops content management systems should be given the chance to showcase it and gain recognition for their contribution to the industry.The best part of the People's Choice Awards is that the winners are chosen by our readers. Recently, Sageframe (a great .NET CMS) won <a href="/2014-best-open-source-net-cms/">Best .NET Open Source CMS</a> in the People's Choice CMS Awards and here is how they celebrated:<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/10846102_10152906805673139_5563455122676357614_n.jpg" />Seeing this picture absolutely made my day.  These kind of great moments inspire us to keep on trucking with the Critic awards as it shows us all that not only is the community given a chance to give back in a way that obviously matters, they are also embracing it enthusiastically. I want to personally thank Sageframe for sharing this picture with me. It's good to know that they are sharing and celebrating their success.This folks, is why we do what we do here on CMS Critic. The awards are constantly evolving and we're always striving to do more but in the end, what matters is that those who win get to experience the joy of having created something special and for that, I'm eternally grateful.Cake. Matters.~Mike

This is why I started the CMS Awards

In a move that's bound to cause speculation in the social media world, Twitter, the popular micro-blogging site, has snapped up staff from an email marketing startup named RestEngine. While we're not 100% clear what exact services or products RestEngine offered, we did find this diagram on their site which might help clear things up for some people:
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2023/08/strikingly-1-1_ktc0m3.png" alt="product_vinn_diagram" />
According to a statement published on their site (RestEngine.com):
<blockquote>
We're very excited to announce that the RestEngine team is joining the Twitter flock! Just over two and half years ago we founded RestEngine to help social app publishers send targeted one-to-one emails based on a subscriber's social graph. It's been an incredible journey where we had the opportunity to work with some of the leading social app publishers. With our customers, we've iterated on our social marketing automation platform while defining a new set of best practices for this brand new world of outbound social marketing. We're thrilled to now focus our email skills and marketing automation know-how on a much larger scale at Twitter.
</blockquote>
What does this mean for Twitter? One can only guess but we're excited at the future prospects.

Twitter picks up staff from Email Marketing startup RestEngine

Strapi, an open source headless CMS, just the release of <a href="https://strapi.io/" target="_blank">Strapi v4</a>. The platform's latest version offers a reworked core, allowing users to expand Strapi with plugins and boost API performance with greater ease. It also sports a slick UI and a new design system that's worth diving into.
The latest version of Strapi follows several critical upgrades with key features. Last year, Strapi introduced a stable Strapi v3 with <a href="http://strapi.io/features/custom-roles-and-permissions" target="_blank">role-based access control</a>,<a href="https://strapi.io/blog/announcing-a-new-draft-and-publish-feature" target="_blank"> draft and publish features</a>, and <a href="https://strapi.io/blog/v3-5-sentry-plugin-sso-authentication" target="_blank">SSO authentication</a>. Shortly thereafter, the company launched its v3.6, which introduced free content <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/strapi-headless-cms-announces-v3-6-with-free-content-internationalization/" target="_blank">internationalization</a>. 
According to Strapi, its <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/top-free-headless-cms-platforms/" target="_blank">headless CMS</a> is designed to power experiences across websites, mobile applications, and IoT devices, and is an ideal fit for the <a href="https://www.cmscritic.com/top-jamstack-static-site-generators-for-2021/" target="_blank">JAMstack</a> (JavaScript, API, and Markup). Strapi's headless posture also enables it to power front-end frameworks such as React, Gatsby, Vue.js, Next.js, and other static site generators. It also supports multiple databases as well as both REST and GraphQL APIs. 
With more than <a href="https://github.com/strapi/strapi/" target="_blank">40 000+</a> Github stars, 600 contributors, and 3.5 million+ downloads, Strapi is the fastest-growing <a href="https://nodejs.org/en/" target="_blank">Node.js</a> CMS. They held their first online global user conference, <a href="https://conf.strapi.io/" target="_blank">StrapiConf</a>, in April of 2021, with more than 2,500 live attendees. The company's <a href="https://strapi.io/blog/save-the-date-strapi-conf-2022" target="_blank">2022 conference</a> will be held March 16-17.
<h2>What’s new in Strapi 4?</h2>
New Design System 
Strapi got a complete makeover, primarily around its visual aesthetics and navigation. This includes a refreshed admin UI, which improves accessibility to the admin panel and makes the entire flow more efficient.
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2021/12/strapi_v4_screenshot_5cb222faff-e1639090146670.png" alt="New Admin Panel" />
Along with the updated admin panel interface, Strapi released the first version of its new <a href="https://design-system.strapi.io/" target="_blank">Strapi Design System</a> with the goal of enabling everyone to extend and customize their Strapi applications with plugins. To ensure design consistency and provide the best experience to users, Strapi created a component library for plugin developers. 
<img src="https://cmscritic.com/ms-content/uploads/2021/12/components_a32c1d133a-e1639090227330.png" alt="New User Interface" />
In the new design, Strapi focused on making all the pieces of the interface consistent. They also increased the contrast ratio and created elements with adaptive sizes to render the UI more accessible. 
New API to create plugins without pain
Strapi aims to scale its ecosystem and let users choose among a wide variety of high-quality plugins. Conversely, the company also wants to give plugin creators a bigger stage to showcase their work. Overall, Strapi seems focused on giving users more control to customize and integrate with other tools.
Strapi's plugin capabilities have evolved from complex to simplified. For example, in Strapi v3, plugins were loaded based on a file structure, requiring users to configure multiple files. In v4, Strapi took a more programmatic approach, allowing plugins to have their own file structure. Instead of configuring multiple files, plugin developers only need to configure two files at the root of the package:
<pre>strapi-server.js for the Server.
strapi-admin.js for the Admin panel.</pre>
While v3 plugins won’t be compatible with v4 and will require migration, this is a big leap in overall functionality. 
More powerful REST and GraphQL API
Strapi added new features to its content API such as pagination, a better filtering format, and the ability to choose what relations to load. Structurally, the Content API and the Admin API are now split, providing greater control over each channel. Overall, Strapi seems more invested in enhancing the value of their REST and GraphQL APIs, both of which deliver on its promise as a headless CMS platform. 
<h2>Try Strapi 4 </h2>
There are a number of other noteworthy changes in Strapi v4. To see the complete list, head over to their v4 announcement page. 
Strapi says they will continue supporting v3 and fixing critical bugs for at least the next six months. However, they will stop delivering new features for v3, and they encourage users to upgrade to v4 for all new projects. 
One thing we'll say is that Strapi makes it very easy to get started on its platform. Once <a href="https://docs.strapi.io/developer-docs/latest/setup-deployment-guides/installation/cli.html#preparing-the-installation" target="_blank">Node.js and npm are properly installed</a> on your machine, simply copy and paste the following command line in your terminal to create your first Strapi v4 project:
<pre>npx create-strapi-app

my-project --quickstart</pre>
<h2>About Strapi</h2>
<a href="http://strapi.io" target="_blank">Strapi</a> is a leading open-source headless CMS, giving developers the freedom to use their favorite tools and frameworks while helping editors easily manage their content and distribute it to any device or channel. The remote-first company has offices in Paris and San Francisco, and is scaling its team globally. Strapi, Inc. is venture-backed by Index Ventures, Accel, and Stride VC, as well as notable angel investors and open-source experts.

Strapi Releases v4 of Headless CMS, Enhances Plugins and API Performance

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