The Problem

This organization maintans several related web sites that address different issues and constituencies. Some of the content is common to all of them and some is particular to each. They required an integrated content management system that would enable a single-point control for all of their content, together with a hierarchical administrative system that would permit specific editing permissions to various sub-administrators. Additionally they required a variety of interactive featurs that each needed its own administrative control system to update materials and collect and manage user input.

Features required:

• On-line presentation of database-driven dynamic content.
• Multi-site integration
• Content management system (CMS)
• Insertable objects
• Search taxonomies
• Automated document parsing
• Cross reference migration
• Multiple classes of accounts with log-in protection
• Real-time e-commerce payment
• Multimedia galleries
• Dynamic contact lists
• Automated management of email lists
• Contact forms and mail management.
• Administrative screens

The Solution

For this project we chose Joomla, which is a flexible content management system running on a framework of PHP ( a web programming language) and MySQL (a database implementarion.) Joomla offers a number of utilities well-suited to the interactive functions of the site. We then created extensions to Joomla's basic capabilities to provide a multi-site management system.

Among the special items implemented were:

• Taxonomies - We created standard code modules for scanning the database and generating links to related articles, same author articles, , and most popular recent articles.
  
  
• Insertable objects - We created links to standard code modules that can be inserted on any page. When selected these modules perform the appropriate tasks which include:
  • Donation – a payment module for on-line donation by credit card. Most aspects are in common with other payment processing. A database of donations provides regular email letters reminding of a commitment (if selected) to donate at regular intervals.
  • E-protest - a module for creating and sending standard emails to selected lists of addressees. After clicking the link the user is able to identify the appropriate address list, add their own subject and personal addendum to the fixed content of the letter and email it to the selected list. After sending it they receive a thank you email.
  • Survey – a module for presenting and recording survey results. A survey may have anywhere from one (poll) to many questions. The administrative module permits the assembly of surveys including questions and answers. A user accessing the module is presented with the list of questions and choices. User responses are tallied in the database for every question.
  • News portal – a module to present a set of links to offsite news articles. Article title, brief description and link can be set up in the admin section.
  • Contact list – a module to provide a way to search the database for lists of contact addresses relevant to specific geographic regions. Regions can be selected by clickable maps. Data for the lists is generated off-site and uploaded daily. Registered users are able to save lists to a private directory list.

Additional features such as membership login, shoppping cart, contact forms and image galleries were added with traditional techniques.