Open Source Content Management - Researching Options

Lately we have been exploring open source Content Management Systems. As we are in the process of updating our main website (www.docstrats.com) and need our own CMS support, we thought this would be a good opportunity to see what open source content management software is available and how capable it is.

After researching websites such as CMS Review, (www.cmsreview.com) and using another valuable website to test drive some of the packages (www.opensourcecms.com) we decided to give Alfresco a try. (dev.alfresco.com)

Alfresco is an open source Enterprise Content Management (ECM) system and as such is a bit more robust than the typical CMS, encompassing features like document management in addition to web content management. Although we were new to the open source world, we were able to set up an application server running Apache Tomcat and JDK SE 1.5.

We were impressed with Alfresco’s document workflow management process and the ease with which we could set up business rules. The collaborative features also worked very nicely. It’s very handy to be able to send a request to a co-worker for help on a document from within Alfresco.

Unfortunately, Alfresco is not yet rated to work on Vista and we ran into hardware compatibility issues when trying to access the server from our Vista-based desktops. We are looking forward to exploring more open source content management systems and we will keep you aware of our results!!

-- Adam Geyer, Project Analyst, Documentation Strategies

High profile women in business - Ann Moynihan profiled

The President of Documentation Strategies, Ann Moynihan, was recently profiled in an article on women in business in the Albany-Colonie NY Chamber of Commerce magazine Visions.

The article can be seen at http://www.ac-chamber.org/pdf/visions_JUNE07.pdf

Content Management - a quick explanation

For readers who need a quick summary of what content management is and why their boss or co-workers should care, we humbly present the following...


Content management enables organizations to reduce the amount of work necessary to create, edit and publish documentation of any kind. Content management stores content in one location yet enables it to be published in multiple formats to multiple locations. Content only needs to be created once, and updated in one spot, while formatting rules created and maintained by the user allow for it to be published in accordance with its end purpose. Content management also allows for pieces, or chunks, of content to be stored in a database and retrieved and added to a document when necessary. ‘Chunking’ allows for a great deal of reusability.


Content management systems often provide workflow process tracking so users can see whether a document has been created, edited or fact-checked. Check-in, check-out features enable all users to see if a document is being modified and by whom. This process lets staff spend more time generating value instead of reviewing tasks that have already been completed. Using content management less time is spent rewriting or re-editing older versions of documentation. Content management is capable of streamlining your documentation workflow from creation to publication.