Content management systems

DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1108/07378830610652068
Pages5-7
Published date01 January 2006
Date01 January 2006
AuthorMichael Seadle
Subject MatterInformation & knowledge management,Library & information science
EDITORIAL
Content management systems
Michael Seadle
Assistant Director for Information Technology, Michigan State University
Libraries, East Lansing, Michigan, USA
Abstract
Purpose – To introduce the special theme issue on “Content management systems”.
Design/methodology/approach – Each of the articles in the theme are described in brief.
Findings The articles cover a range of topics from implementation to interoperability,
object-oriented database management systems, and research about meeting user needs.
Originality/value – Libraries have only just begun to realize that their web presence is potentially
as rich and complex as their online catalogs, and that it needs an equal amount of management to keep
it under control.
Keywords Content management,Libraries
Paper type General review
A content management system (CMS) offers a way to manage large amounts of
web-based information that escapes the burden of coding all of the information into
each page in HTML by hand. content management systems are important to libraries
because the sheer mass of their public web presence has reached the point where
maintenance is a problem. Often the web pages grew out of the personal interes ts of
staff members, who have since left for other jobs for other responsibilities or simply
retired. These may not be mission-critical pages in the same sense as a library’s front
page, but often they have a dedicated set of users who regard them as part of the
library’s service mission.
Many libraries also want to customize their look and feel to emphasize consistency
and branding. That can be very difficult when it requires multiple authors to agree on
fonts, formats, logos, and other limitations on their creativity and individuality. A CMS
assists conformity by providing a centrally managed system for displaying the content,
which still remains under the control of library staff with appropriate subject expertise.
Dr Bradford Eden organized this Library Hi Tech theme issue to explore some of the
key issues in implementing CMSs.
.Matt Benzing’s article on “Luwak: a content management solution” describes an
“XML-based application developed by the Communication & Collaborative
Technologies division of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute ...
.Paul F. Bramscher and John T. Butler’s article on “LibData to LibCMS: one
library’s evolutionary pathway to a content management system” describes the
University of Minnesota’s extension of an open-source special-purpose CMS that
several libraries (my own included) have implemented: “the emphasis was to
approach CMS design more as a source or version control system for web
pages ...
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available at
www.emeraldinsight.com/0737-8831.htm
Content
management
systems
5
Received 3 December 2005
Revised 4 December 2005
Accepted 5 December 2005
Library Hi Tech
Vol. 24 No. 1, 2006
pp. 5-7
qEmerald Group Publishing Limited
0737-8831
DOI 10.1108/07378830610652068

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