Website From Open and Closed Source to Managing Your Institutional Knowledge with a Content Management System, (CMS) Upside Down

making the purchase Looking under the hood... After you buy a car, it’s all yours, from bumper to bumper. You can repair and make mods! Transforming your clunker into…

…a super car (ferrari :-) Car ownerships includes the right to change the car as you wish and make any modifications. …What about other purchases such as homes? Need new parts?

the 30 year fixed Owning a home includes the freedom to make many repairs and modifications (at least some) Your neighbors may have ideas… What about software?

software purchase If you purchase the Windows 7 Operating System, do you own it in the same way you may own a car, boat or home?

no, you don’t own the code The infamous Windows End-User License Agreement ( EULA ). You don’t own the source code. So, your ability to make modifications is limited. (The EULA is for copy protection.)

open and closed source open source software : available in source code form; users may study, change, improve, distribute the software; collaborative development; cost=free closed source software : under the exclusive right of the copyright holder; the licensee is given the right to use the software and not much else; restricted from other uses, modifications, distribution, reverse engineering; cost=from ~$0.00 to unlimited Not just operating systems, but also Web Frameworks, Content Management Systems (CMS) can be open or closed

a legal aside…go UCB! One of the first court cases regarding the nature of source code as free speech involved University of California mathematics professor Dan Bernstein, who had published on the internet the source code for an encryption program that he created. At the time, encryption algorithms were classified as munitions by the United States government; exporting encryption to other countries was considered an issue of national security, and had to be approved by the State Department. The Electronic Frontier Foundation sued the U.S. government on Bernstein's behalf; the court ruled that source code was free speech, protected by the First Amendment.University of CaliforniamathematicsDan Bernsteinencryption munitionsnational securityState DepartmentElectronic Frontier FoundationU.S. government

some costs for code Windows 7 Pro: $79.00 (close) Apple OS Leopard: $ (closed) Apache Web Server: $0.00 (open) Windows IIS Web Server: $ (closed) Windows SharePoint (2005): minimally ~$ or $5, plus $71.00 per device and up (closed) Drupal Content Management System: $0.00 (open) Zope: $0.00 (open) Plone: Content Management System: $0.00 (open)

drawing conclusions Every software purchase includes the decision to go with an open or closed product. What are the potential advantages and disadvantages of both? Think Microsoft v. Apache Web Server Cost Reliability Someone to turn to or call In-house expertise ?

Website Upside Down

website upside down Introducing Content Management Systems (CMS) How are websites for institutions, planned and constructed? Once implemented, what is the workflow for changes to the website ?

web maintenance workflow Request for changes are typically made via or trouble ticket system. ← Sample request. Now your web developer is a content editor … a total waste of everyone’s time.

why the web anyway? Benefits for vendors and customers: global, publically available, nearly instant access to information, allows for all kinds of transactions, including financial. Great, but how does this model fail ? What if your organization has sensitive or restricted data that you want to be web-accessible but not publicly available? Is there anything you could do? Answer: How is a web server not like a file server?

file servers Allow for granular, permissioned control over files and folders Thus, access to files is limited. Ex. The sales department only has access to sales files…

web server The web workflow, performing web maintenance tasks…

web + file Content Management Systems (CMSes) provide all the benefits of the web, plus the granular permissions control over files and folders of a traditional file server They allow for multiple users to be content creators, thus breaking the web development workflow paradigm and bottleneck Using a CMS turns traditional web-site development upside down. This is a good thing. You don’t want your tech people doing non-tech things.

take a CMS test drive… Go to: Login with first initial + last name for username; your password is ` temp4you’ Sample: Jason Christopher username: jchristopher Password: temp4you

31+ flavors of CMS There are many content management systems available, including open-source CMSes CMSes can be extended in infinite ways and connect seamlessly with databases

next time: “Power-owning the Universe: A Gentle Introduction to Programming” (finally ) Quiz - Nov. 29 on Chapters 1 and 2 of “Head First Programming”