A content management system is a tool that enables any staff member in an organization - with or without an IT background - to manage and update web content without the help of a webmaster or IT team. Users only see and work with two elements of a content management system - the 'front end' and the 'back end'. The front end represents the website as it appears when accessed by visitors, with its web pages, documents, images, forms, multimedia clips and other types of content that come with today's websites. The back end can be regarded as a control panel, or the interface with the system's databases that holds the content and the templates that define the 'look and feel' of the site.
Enterprise open source content management
Contactivity develops its website on the basis of eZ publish, an award winning, open source enterprise content management system, based on open standards. With over 3 million downloads, eZ publish is trusted by enterprises, e-commerce companies, magazines, governmental and non-governmental organizations around the world. eZ publish is developed by eZ systems, a Norwegian based software company. With over 80 professionals software developer in offices in Norway, Germany, France, United States and Ukraine, eZ systems is continuously improving the eZ publish software. Strict development processes and open standards ensure that the software has the quality and capabilities expected from an enterprise content management system. As with other Open Source software, a large international group of partners (the community of developers) helps with maintaining and further developing the software.ecms
eZ publish combines the freedom of an advanced open-source, open standard content management system with a business model that focuses on product responsibility, providing organizations with a full set of services and guarantees. These services and guarantees encompass the license model, support and partner program. It is the combination of freedom and reliability that distinguishes eZ publish from other open source content management systems.
Partner Network: There are almost 200 eZ Publish business partners around the world who supply expert consulting services and solutions. This partner network delivers the responsiveness of the top-tier CMS providers, while avoiding dependency on the goodwill of the Open Source community. By providing partners with service and support guarantees, eZ Systems ensures that they can meet enterprise support requirements. eZ Systems also offers training sessions and a range of workshops for end users, administrators and developers. Documentation is freely available online and books are available through the eZ Press, the publications division of eZ Systems. More specific questions can be posted to the active, community-driven forums or you can buy support hours for assistance direct from the eZ experts. A certification program also ensures that developers have the necessary skills to work with eZ Publish at advanced levels. Contactivity is a silver partner and active member of the eZ community.
Professional Support: eZ Systems provides reliable, professional support that is not available from any other comparable Open Source CMS. The company offers eZ Network, a yearly maintenance service with a range of support levels. This automatic maintenance and upgrade service eliminates many potential problems before they occur and quickly addresses critical issues when they arise. With a staff of about 50 developers across several countries, eZ Systems ensures a level of stability and support that is rarely achieved by other Open Source CMS providers.
Warranty: Contactivity provides a guarantee with respect to the proper installation of the eZ publish software, the template files and any additional functionalities (‘extensions’) that we develop specifically for our clients. The client can report in writing – within a period of twelve weeks after the delivery of the website –‘visible bugs’ that are the result of an incorrect installation of the eZ publish software, flawed functioning the template code and/or flaws in the extensions. For ‘invisible bugs’ this period is 24 weeks, provided that the bugs are reported in writing within ten days after there were noticed for the first time. We will repair the visible and invisible bugs reported by the client within a reasonable period of time – without charge. This guarantee does not cover the functionality as provided in the source code of the standard eZ publish release, downloadable from the ez.no website.
Licensing
eZ publish is available under a dual license model. The GPL license that accompanies the free download allows users to customize, modify and distribute all parts of eZ publish. No proprietary licenses are required for its implementation. However, in order to accommodate the needs of commercial enterprises, a Proprietary Use License is also available, through which custom modifications and enhancements can be protected with the right to license, sell and re-brand the software.
Under the GPL license, the risk as to the quality and performance of the program will be with the client. Should the software prove defective, the client will assume the cost of all necessary servicing, repair or correction. In no event unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing will eZ systems and/or Contactivity be liable for damages, including any general, special, incidental or consequential damages arising out of the use or inability to use the program (including but not limited to loss of data or data being rendered inaccurate or losses sustained by you or third parties or a failure of the program to operate with any other programs), even if such holder or other party has been advised of the possibility of such damages.
eZ publish is also available under a proprietary use license. Buyers remain owners of all changes or extensions to the software made by them and do not have to share the modifications with the eZ publish community. While eZ systems is and will be the owner and copyright holder of the eZ publish source code, amendments and new coding will be the property of the originating party.
Functionality
The simple, intuitive user interface of eZ publish minimizes the barriers to use its many features by those with little technical experience, returning control over content to those who know it best. The eZ publish software provides all the functional features required for enterprise web applications: flexibility, extendibility, scalability, multilingual support, open standards and reliability. The system is also sufficiently 'future-proof' to allow the integration of new technologies and functionality without it having to be rebuilt from scratch. If eZ publish is configured correctly, upgrades can easily be installed.
By default, the eZ publish content management system supports the functionality listed below. Please note that we will develop the Quest magazine site on the basis of a default installation of eZ publish. We will charge extra hours (and may require extra time) for any modification, enhancement or debugging of the default functionality.
Front-end:
- Display content items;
- Print version of all items;
- Search;
- Mail a friend; and
- RSS feeds (import and export);
- User login; and
- Multilingual support.
Back-end:
- Create, edit and delete content objects;
- Sort content objects;
- Hide and display content objects;
- Delete content objects;
- Restore content objects from the trash;
- Move content objects;
- Copy content objects and content trees;
- Manage content object versions;
- Workflow management and notification;
- Create drafts;
- Rich text editor;
- Add and remove object relations;
- Upload related objects;
- User and role management;
- User notification;
- Server-side cache management; and
- Collection of information from online forms.
Please visit "eZ publish –feature overview" for a complete overview of the available default functionality in eZ publish.
Internationalization and multilingual support
eZ publish is designed with internationalization in mind, and a complete translation system has been developed to ease the process. There are now many different language packages available for eZ publish. Each package contains information about date, time, number and currency formats used, and the character set used, in addition to the translated strings. Most of the translations are performed by volunteers. The most recent Russian translation available for eZ publish covers version 3.8.4. eZ publish supports native UTF-8 character encoding, allowing for multi-lingual sites without the need of having different character sets for each language. Please note that UTF-8 is not available by default in most CMS systems, for example Joomla!
All content in eZ Publish can be translated to multiple languages. This means that the same installation of the eZ publish content management system can be used to serve both the Russian and the English version of the site. eZ publish does not require a base language, so items may be publish in either Russian, English, or both Russian and English.
Hosting multiple sites on a single installation of eZ publish
The eZ publish content management system can host multiple multilingual websites on a single installation (kernel). This means that spin-off projects of the initial website may be hosted on the same content management system. A single eZ publish installation can support multiple sites in several ways.
- The separate sites may be set up using the same kernel (‘engine’) and a shared set of templates, but a different database for each of the spin-off sites.
- Alternatively, the various sites may share a single database but use different template sets, or share both the same database and the template set.
- In addition, minor differences in templates may be supported by using template overrides per site, rather than copying the complete set of templates for each site.
Since all sites share the same kernel, this allows for centralized updating of the eZ publish file system thereby reducing overall deployment and maintenance costs.