Feasibility Report
Our mail company which mainly offers various services online is considering moving from the current content management system to either Alfresco which is part of the enterprise content management system (ECMS), Joomla, or CMS made simple. The current content management system has grown considerably, and therefore it is not that effective like it used to be. It is not also safe to retrieve information from this system skeptically when it is needed on time. This system has also become buggy. Due to the challenges posed by the current content managing system even marketing our services online has become a challenge. Other alternatives it will help our company to streamline its authoring process, update its website remotely, reduce the cost of website maintenance, customize our site to meet various needs of our business. It will also ensure consistency in the appearance of our website, and lastly, it will make it easier for the company to use non- technical staff in making updates in the site. After meeting our various teams in the company together with the chairman of the board of governors, multiple alternatives have been raised concerning the content management system. The IT department is in charge of the communication department in our organization.
After it held a few discussions with various staff members concerning the current content management system, it came up with new ideas which it proposed to the CEO of the company. The marketing department was also contacted to recommend the best CMS. Our IT director who has got perfect experience in content management system remembered that he once made two websites using Joomla. He proceeded to choose various individuals to help him conduct the research of the best CMS to use. The team mainly conducted its study on companies which are doing similar business. The team also connected with various other organizations in the company to identify the multiple functionalities they wished to have. This is through considering numerous aspects like how the site is to be updated, retrieval of information, and how the website can be used in different devices.
Criteria
The selection of the new CMS will ensure our companies challenges are solved and also it will perform some critical jobs. It will have to follow various processes before it is accepted for initiation, development, selection, and implementation. Many software vendors tailored to the pressure that a company must adopt new technologies choosing the best CMS is very much critical.A good software system ensures the success of a company, but it is still tough to have a good software system (Maass, 300). Research has shown that many enterprises are always unable to make the best selection of the CMS that fits their company needs This has been attributed to the failure in analysis during the period of selection. Based on our company requires the best CMS should have the following attributes.
It should be easier use
CMS is meant to be used by all the staff in the organization. The team includes managers, supervisors and all other subordinates
It should be flexible
Flexibility here implies that templates from the software can be changed. This depends on how the CMS is simplified as compared to the rest. This is because the more significant a CMS is, the more a designer likes creating a template for it. Take a close look at CMSMS and Joomla we can identify that Joomla is popular than CMSMS and therefore it has more sources of the model. The same difference is observed in companies using these two types of CMS
Extensibility
The fact that our company has outgrown the current CMS, the next to be adopted must not become baggy. On the other hand, our company’s website must look different and unique as compared to the rest of the websites. Therefore extensibility will help address these issues. The CMS to be used must have a lot of components and can be used when needed. This will make our company useful especially when it wants to add e-commerce, blog, newsletter, and forums on the website future.
Security
Information from the CMS must be secured. This is because company’s websites are at risk primarily from hackers and virus. Therefore the CMS to be adopted must have its system which can deter any stranger from accessing any information. It also needs to have a limitation when accessing it.
Usage and Accessibility
This means that our company’s website should be accessed when needed by customers also the CMS should ensure that information is retrieved when needed. This is why the website content makers must be well informed of the characteristics of the CMS that a company needs. Website administrators need to have control over all other users. Therefore, every other company needs to consider usage and accessibility of a CMS.
Community
Through CMS a community is created that provides guidelines, documents, and support for the work that the company cannot handle because of lack of knowledge.
Optimized Performance
CMS should be able to make our server and web pages accessible at high speed.
Research approach
Various types of CMS were studied before deciding which one was the best for our company. This included the CMS made simple, Joomla and ECMS. Also, literature that concerns this CMS was also studied to identify the best CMS that fits our company needs and construct a framework. This included the general factors and steps that affect change in the CMS. Later an interview question was developed based on the context. After the interview, the information was categorized using the coding method. Finally, the conclusion was made out of this interview questions.
Through website research, four companies were also selected there were contacted for their opinion based on the three types of CMS. It was discovered that a company that runs it website having its server could more information compared to a company that runs its site through a different server. Those who were interviewed must have had various experiences with the CMS. They also needed to be part of the IT team in their companies that selects CMS. These interviews were conducted through chat messengers, and sometimes questions were sent through emails.
Classification of the CMS
In recent times there are very many CMS that are being used. In total there are about 160 CMS that are based on different platforms. However content management systems can broadly be categorized into two one that is based on the license and, the other is based on functionality.
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By Functionality
Classification based on functionality tries to identify the goal and the platform that a CMS uses. We have three categories of CMS based on the feature.
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Web CMS
It is the most popular CMS because it uses various languages for storing, maintaining, creating and publishing website content. It gives authority to the clients to have control over files, content, web hosting plans and documents which are based on HTML.
There are three types of WCMS this is offline processing system, online processing system, and hybrid system. The main advantage of this kind of CMS is that it is usually made for non-technical users. It is preferred by organizations where employees are required to work on the website. These types of CMS include the Joomla, WordPress; CMS made drupal and straightforward Enterprise CMS to know what is a Drupal interview like.
This type of CMS is used by the organization in organizing, sharing substantial content and coordination. The material defined in this section ranges from files, images, and texts (Barker, 367). It becomes easier for businesses to handle a significant amount of content. ECMS uses different other tools like the media manager, content organization, and WCMS. The primary objective of this system is to enable employees to get companies information quickly instead of them searching through various software applications (Barker, 278). Through this, the company can simplify business process which saves time and money. This type of CMS can store information without it running out of date. Various kinds of ECMS includes SharePoint, IBM Lotus, RedDot, and Alfresco,
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Mobile CMS
The recent innovations in the mobile industry have given birth to new mobile devices like the smartphone. It is not a surprise for as having a CMS which is based on mobile phones. The fact that this type of phones are usually on high demand and to have every kind of users it becomes necessary to have a CMS on mobile phones to help in the management of ringtones, text messages, news and even games. Mobile CMS range from small ones to large ones which can hold the more substantial content of information. Others are just portrayed as features or ads. The main advantage of this kind of CMS is that it is easier to use, easier to read and navigate through because the mobile phone is small in size.
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Component CMS
This type of CMS creates documents from components parts. It mainly deals with links graphics, complete paragraph or even word. The main advantage of this type of document is that it can use content is various documents
CMS classified according to the license include
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Commercial CMS
This type of CMS is usually owned by a person, and one must ensure for a license to use it. It includes Amaxus and site core.
Joomla
Introduction
Joomla is one of the most popular content management systems with a robust extension system which is mainly used to develop other different application on the website (Barker, 100). Recently it has become one of the top three commonly used CMS globally together with word press and Drupal.
Joomla has two versions of the software. The first version is 2.5x which most of the people are recommended to use. The second one is 3.0x which is supported by developers and users because it has more features as compared to the first one. The number of time Joomla systems get to be downloaded 2.5 million. It happens to be the second most used CMS. Joomla content management is classified under open source software license (Maass, 46). It means that an individual can develop CMS software for a company without being charged anything (Addey, 32) .since it is free one can easily access its source code and one can quickly make changes. Joomla is made up of HTML, CSS, SQL, PHP, and MySQL.
Technical Requirement
It very significant for an individual to understand technologies those are associated with Joomla (Maass, 112). It will help an individual to understand the various components needed to develop a Joomla site. Different technologies used when developing Joomla are language interpreter, Database, and Web Server.
CMS made simple
It was developed to make CMS easier to use and to administrate
Technical requirement
It is clear that CMSMS does not fashion choices of the operating system because it is capable of running all the operating systems that exist. The various technologies that need to be considered are the web server, language interpreter, and database.
Alfresco
Alfresco is used to manage all contents within an enterprise. Alfresco systems have se4rvers that persist content, associations, full-text indexes, and metadata. proggramming systems have multiple languages where developers create custom solution and applications. Alfresco is suitable for systems that have java enterprise edition.
Decision Matrix
| System Requirements | Alfresco Enterprise + Community | CMS Made Simple 1.9.4 | Joomla! 2.5.4 | |
| Application Server | J2EE | Apache | CGI | |
| Approximate Cost | $15,000 or $20,000/CPU/year (depending on SLA). Also per user pricing through Red Hat Exchange | 0 | Free | |
| Database | Other | MySQL | MySQL | |
| License | Open Source | Open Source | Open Source | |
| Operating System | Platform Independent | Platform Independent | Platform Independent | |
| Programming Language | Java | PHP | PHP | |
| Root Access | No | No | No | |
| Shell Access | No | No | No | |
| Web Server | Any | Any | Any | |
| Security | Alfresco Enterprise + Community | CMS Made Simple 1.9.4 | Joomla! 2.5.4 | |
| Audit Trail | Yes | Yes | No | |
| Captcha | No | Free Add-On | Free Add-On | |
| Content Approval | Yes | No | Yes | |
| Email Verification | No | No | Yes | |
| Granular Privileges | Yes | No | Yes | |
| Kerberos Authentication | Yes | No | No | |
| LDAP Authentication | Yes | No | Yes | |
| Login History | Yes | Limited | Yes | |
| NIS Authentication | No | No | No | |
| NTLM Authentication | Yes | No | No | |
| Pluggable Authentication | Yes | No | Yes | |
| Problem Notification | Yes | No | No | |
| Sandbox | Yes | Limited | No | |
| Session Management | Limited | No | Yes | |
| SMB Authentication | Yes | No | No | |
| SSL Compatible | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| SSL Logins | Limited | No | Yes | |
| SSL Pages | No | Yes | Yes | |
| Versioning | Yes | No | Free Add-On | |
| Support | Alfresco Enterprise + Community | CMS Made Simple 1.9.4 | Joomla! 2.5.4 | |
| Certification Program | Yes | No | No | |
| Code Skeletons | Yes | Free Add-On | Free Add-On | |
| Commercial Manuals | Yes | No | Yes | |
| Commercial Support | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Commercial Training | Yes | No | Yes | |
| Developer Community | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Online Help | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Pluggable API | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Professional Hosting | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Professional Services | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Public Forum | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Public Mailing List | No | Yes | Yes | |
| Test Framework | Yes | No | Yes | |
| Third-Party Developers | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Users Conference | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Ease of Use | Alfresco Enterprise + Community | CMS Made Simple 1.9.4 | Joomla! 2.5.4 | |
| Drag-N-Drop Content | Limited | Yes | No | |
| Email To Discussion | Yes | No | Free Add-On | |
| Friendly URLs | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Image Resizing | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Macro Language | Yes | No | Yes | |
| Mass Upload | Yes | Limited | Yes | |
| Prototyping | Yes | No | Yes | |
| WYSIWYG Editor | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Zip Archives | Yes | No | No | |
| Performance | Alfresco Enterprise + Community | CMS Made Simple 1.9.4 | Joomla! 2.5.4 | |
| Advanced Caching | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Database Replication | Yes | No | No | |
| Management | Alfresco Enterprise + Community | CMS Made Simple 1.9.4 | Joomla! 2.5.4 | |
| Advertising Management | No | Free Add-On | Yes | |
| Asset Management | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Clipboard | Yes | No | No | |
| Web Statistics | No | Free Add-On | Yes | |
| Web-based Style/Template Management | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Web-based Translation Management | Yes | Yes | Free Add-On | |
| Workflow Engine | Yes | Limited | No | |
| Interoperability | Alfresco Enterprise + Community | CMS Made Simple 1.9.4 | Joomla! 2.5.4 | |
| Content Syndication (RSS) | Yes | Free Add-On | Yes | |
| FTP Support | Yes | No | Yes | |
| iCal | No | No | Free Add-On | |
| Flexibility | Alfresco Enterprise + Community | CMS Made Simple 1.9.4 | Joomla! 2.5.4 | |
| CGI-mode Support | No | No | Yes | |
| Content Reuse | Yes | No | Yes | |
| Extensible User Profiles | Yes | No | Yes | |
| Interface Localization | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Metadata | Yes | Limited | Yes | |
| URL Rewriting | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Built-in Applications | Alfresco Enterprise + Community | CMS Made Simple 1.9.4 | Joomla! 2.5.4 | |
| Blog | No | Free Add-On | Yes | |
| Chat | No | Free Add-On | Free Add-On | |
| Classifieds | No | No | Free Add-On | |
| Contact Management | No | No | Yes | |
| Data Entry | No | Free Add-On | Free Add-On | |
| Database Reports | No | No | Free Add-On | |
| Discussion / Forum | Yes | Free Add-On | Free Add-On | |
| Document Management | Yes | No | Free Add-On | |
| Events Calendar | Yes | Free Add-On | Free Add-On |
Recommendation
After considering all other types of CMS and decision matrix, I would recommend our mail company to consider Joomla since it is one of the most popular CSM this makes it easy to find a developer besides, the software keeps updating which will help since the technology keeps changing. It is also preferable because it has got many users who can also help with extensions and components (Addey, 108). Lastly is that it is fast as compared to the rest of the software and it well helps in solving the challenges our company is facing with the current content management system.
Work cited
Barker, Deane. Web Content Management. O’Reilly Media, 2016. Internet resource.
Maass, Wolfgang, and Tobias Kowatsch. Semantic Technologies in Content Management Systems [recurso Electrónico]: Trends, Applications, and Evaluations. Alemania: Springer Healthcare Ltd, 2012. Internet resource.
Web Content Management Systems (cms): High-impact Strategies – What You Need to Know; Definitions, Adoptions, Impact, Benefits, Maturity, Vendors. Australia, 2011. Print.
Addey, Dave. Content Management Systems. Birmingham: Glasshaus, 2003. Internet resource.
