Cms review and Summary

The following content management review and summary, is of five companies from across the industry. It is the goal of this summary to find the best fit for the model and goals that Seton Hall is looking to achieve, as part of the overall redesign of the web property.
"It’s important to understand that a CMS is more than just new software; it represents a culture shift for your organization." – John Kovacevich – Tendo’s Thought Leadership Newsletter
The seven systems that were selected for this review are as follows:
IBM – Lotus Workplace Web Content Management System
Paper Thin – Common Spot Content Management Server
Vignette – V7
Minds Eye – Element
Percussion – Rhythmyx
RedDot – ECMS
Open Source – OpenCMS
This review and summary will cover the following items:
A brief overview of the content management vendors and the reason they were picked.
A summary of the company, their system, educational customers and the pros and cons of using the system.
A detailed side by side comparison grid of each product.
Recommendations for top 3 products to review and demo.
“A content management system is a delivery system, not a content strategy” – Forrester Research
IBM - Lotus Workplace Web Content Management System
IBM was selected due to our relationship with the company and our current systems at the university.
The Lotus Workplace would be an extension of our current Lotus Notes and we should be able to integrate it into our environment.
PaperThin – CommonSpot Content Management Server
PaperThin was chosen because of their long list of university clients. They are one of the few CMS companies on the market that has taken that extra step to understand Higher Education.
The CommonSpot system is also fully compatible with out current systems.
Vignette – V7
Vignette was chosen for the flexibility of their systems and the ability to grow as the needs of the clients grow. Vignette has also done work with various universities and has an understanding of Higher Education
Percussion – Rhythmyx
Percussion was chosen because their system was developed and designed for use with the Lotus Domino server. The Rhythmyx system also allows for complete content control and re-use of objects across a web site.
RedDot – ECMS
RedDot was chosen because of their approach to the content management system. With ECMS all the information is compiled and edited on the ECMS server and then fed out to the web server.
Open Source – OpenCMS
OpenCMS was chosen because it is a free content management system that was design and developed by a community of users to bring together the best aspects of other content management systems. The system is based in Java and XLM and is full adaptable to any environment.
IBM - Lotus Workplace Web Content Management System
IBM Company Summary
IBM (International Business Machines) has been in business for over a hundred years now. From its start as a data recording company through to the high end technology products and services that it offers today, IBM has been one of the industry leaders for systems and software. IBM also is widely acknowledged as an expert, helping universities optimize technology resources worldwide.
System Summary
LWWCM (Lotus Workplace Web Content Management) is a relatively new but proven system in the IBM Lotus offering. The system was recently acquired from Aptrix, a demonstrated leader in content management and regulatory compliance.
LWWCM offers complete control over the site template, workflow process, approvals and user access, as well as content versioning and approval history. One of the key features is the fact there is no need for add on components or software extensions.
LWWCM is available for WebSphere, Domino and DB2 Content manager. It also takes advantage of J2EE giving applications increased reach and longevity.
Educational Customers
Given the new offering of this product as an extension of the Lotus suite, there are currently no university customers using the product.
Pros and Cons
Pros
LWWCM would integrate seamlessly into our current environment.
Given our educational discount, we should be able to obtain this product to the price of most of the other systems
IBM offers training and certifications with the product.
Fully supported on all operating platforms.
Cons
The system requires the use of IBM’s application server. If we were to switch from Lotus Domino or WebSphere (if we go in that direction) the system would not work.
There are no case studies or success stories on the university level. We would be one of, if not the first using the system on this level.
For the Domino edition, only the notes storage facility (NSF) is supported for the repository.
PaperThin – CommonSpot Content Management Server
PaperThin Company Summary
PaperThin is one of the top providers of content management and portal systems to both the corporate world and to higher education. They are a privately held business that has been in business for 11 years, which makes them one of the oldest web based CMS companies on the market.
PaperThin’s CommonSpot Content Server, provides empowering Web authoring, content management and knowledge sharing and discovery capabilities necessary in the development, deployment and maintenance of today’s business-critical Web sites.
CommonSpot System
CommonSpot is a complete and comprehensive web content management solution providing organizations with simple and sophisticated tools for creating, publishing and managing Web content in a controlled, distributed and collaborative Web development environment.
The editor interface is provided entirely through the browser, eliminating the need for client software, technical training or complex scripting. Create new pages, edit and approve content, assign security privileges and more without ever leaving the browser.
CommonSpot is fully compatible with our current systems and can grow and adapt as our technology and needs grow and change.
The CommonSpot server is based on Macromedia’s ColdFusion Application Server and is available in both standard and enterprise.
Educational Customers
Arizona State University
Babson College
California Department of Education
Canadore College
College of Notre Dame of Maryland
East Carolina University
Kent State University
National Louis University
Ohio University
Oregon Health and Science University
Parma City School District
Rhodes College
Santa Clara University
Stanford Graduate School of Business
Treasure Valley Community College
United Nations University
University of Alaska Anchorage
Pros and Cons
Pros
CommonSpot is fully compatible with our current systems and would offer a fairly seamless integration.
The editor interface is browser based and would not require client software to operate.
The system was designed to grow and change with the needs of the customer.
Offers full control over the page elements for editing.
Full training is offered for the product on 3 levels, depending on the role of the user.
Cons
Does not offer dynamic environment for Lotus Notes – this means that notes driven content would still generate from Notes.
All editing must be done from Microsoft Internet Explorer.
Vignette – V7
Vignette Company Summary
Vignette has built its leadership position in content management through a focused, customer-centric business philosophy. By enabling enterprises to achieve real-time advantage by rapidly building and deploying enterprise Web-based applications.
Vignette is also one of the original web based content management providers in the industry.
V7
V7 provides a graphical work environment that is built in Microsoft Visio that provides an easy to use shape-based modeling.
V7 manages any object on the site through a workflow process.
V7 is a standards based solution built around Jave, XML and web services which makes it fully scalable as the business needs grow.
Educational Customers
Ball State University
KlickNet
University of California at San Diego (UCSD)
University of Miami
University of Wisconsin-Madison
Pros and Cons
Pros
The system is fully expandable and can grow as our needs grow
It can be full integrated with our current system
Vignette is one of the oldest web content management companies in the industry.
Cons
Vignette is modular, which means that depending on the need defines how many modules you will need to purchase.
The V7 interface is not easy to use for non technical people.
Vignette can run in excess of 1 million dollars for the full system
There is no exact URL string that can be re-used. The system places everything as a string. For example:
http://www.vignette.com/contentmanagement/0,2097,1-1-31,00.html
Percussion – Rhythmyx
Percussion Company Summary
Percussion’s portfolio of over 2,500 customers includes Fortune 1000 companies as well as other global, industry and public sector leaders, including Armstrong World Industries, Bank One, Bayer, Colgate, the FAA, Hitachi, HUD, IBM, ICI Paints, Intel, Jefferson Health System, Mastercard International, McKesson, Merck, MetLife, Motorola, Northrop Grumman, Prudential Insurance, Shell Chemical, the Dept. of State, 3M, Thrifty Car Rental, and Toshiba. Founded in 1994, Percussion Software is self-funded and profitable.
Rhythmyx Summary
Rhythmyx is the first Enterprise Content Management (ECM) solution to provide cost-effective, multi-channel delivery of easily reusable content. Rhythmyx 5 provides the industry’s only De-Coupled Delivery architecture for cost-effective scaling; the industry’s first Intelligent Relationship capability for proactively managing content dependencies and connections; and Active Assembly, a unique graphical user interface for enabling business users to easily reuse content.
Based on industry standards, such as XML, XSL, Java and Web services, Rhythmyx enables organizations to better manage all of their enterprise content, including documents, Web sites, digital assets and images.
Educational Customers
Bowling Green University
Broward Community College
Classwell
Education Networks of America
Penn State University
Pros and Cons
Pros
Rhythmyx is fully compatible with our current systems and would offer a fairly seamless integration.
The editor interface is browser based and would not require client software to operate.
The system was designed to grow and change with the needs of the customer.
Offers full control over the page elements for editing.
Percussion also offers a product for Lotus application management called Lyrix
Percussion has been in business for over 10 years
Cons
Rhythmyx is currently only supported on Windows or Sun Solaris.
Requires Java to integrate with any web server
RedDot – ECMS
RedDot Company Summary
RedDot Solutions provides software to create, manage and act upon the content that drives business processes and collaboration. Recognized throughout the industry as the fastest to implement and easiest to use, RedDot's Extended Content Management Suite (XCMS) is a scalable and personalized solution for Web content and document management that is used by more than 1100 organizations worldwide. Companies including Federal Express, The New York Times, March of Dimes, Bank of New York, Kraft, Honda and Starbucks rely on RedDot to increase productivity, improve operational efficiency and reduce risk. Founded in 1993 in Oldenburg, Germany, RedDot Solutions is headquartered in New York City with offices in Santa Clara, Toronto and throughout Europe.
ECMS Summary
The RedDot Extended Content Management System (XCMS) offers an ideal solution for the creation, maintenance and administration of content, personalization and integration of business processes. RedDot XCMS is a scalable, end-to-end enterprise infrastructure that can grow and evolve with a company’s online objectives.
Educational Customers
Penn State AIS Department
San Jacinto College District
Shipley School
Southeast Missouri State University
Southern Illinois University Carbondale
Texas A&M University, Qatar
Trident Tech College
University at Albany
University of Arkansas
York College of Pennsylvania
Pros and Cons
Pros
Full user access administration for each piece of a template or file.
Media catalog for digital asset management
System has a lot of neat features and full multi-lingual support, but nothing that stands out about other CMS systems in the class.
Cons
Requires the use of a separate server running Windows 2000 and IIS as the storage, edit and compiler. This then feeds the content to the web server.
Separate server required for content personalization and document management.
Interface seemed somewhat confusing with all of the little red dots defining what could and couldn’t be edited.
Open Source – OpenCMS
Summary
OpenCms is an enterprise - ready content management solution build in Java and XML from open source components. OpenCms can easily be deployed on almost any existing IT infrastructure and provides powerful features especially suited for medium and large enterprise internet or intranet applications.
OpenCms runs in a "full open source" environment (e.g. Linux, Apache, Tomcat, MySQL) as well as on commercial components (e.g. Windows NT, IIS, BEA Weblogic, Oracle DB).
Educational Users
*No other educational users were listed.
Pros and Cons
Pros
The software is completely free to download and install on the system.
Support is available through Alkacon Software and other companies.
There is a large user support group.
The system was created and is updated based upon user input.
Cons
Most of the users and support companies are in Europe.
Updates and the continuation of the system is dependant on the users.
There is no formal training available.
Philip Wojcik March 18, 2004 (Draft)
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