Evaluation of Content Management Systems Performance: Maitanmi Olusola and Idowu Sunday
Evaluation of Content Management Systems Performance: Maitanmi Olusola and Idowu Sunday
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Department of Computer Science, Babcock University, Ilisan Remo, Ogun State, Nigeria Department of Computer Science, Babcock University, Ilisan Remo, Ogun State, Nigeria
Abstract: There are many web-authoring software like FrontPage and Dreamweaver, which are being used to
develop and maintain websites. These web-authoring software are becoming inadequate because websites are becoming more dynamic with different contents types. Content Management Systems (CMS) evolved as an alternative to such web-authoring tools because it escapes the burden of coding and enhances easy update of content. CMSs are both proprietary and open source, but due to cost, open source CMSs are preferred. Though, there are a huge number of open sources CMS available in public domain, it may be difficult to decide which of these would best suit a particular situation and yield best return on investment(ROI). Thus, this research work is aimed at evaluating some common CMSs in order to determine their usability. The problems that were addressed include selecting the right CMS based on some defined parameters, assessing ROI of the CMSs with respect to the needs of the content providers. Literature and industry research review of CMS was examined; extensive literature was carried out on the existing work on the subject matter to consider some CMS which were chosen based on popularity. A web-based survey was conducted using an online questionnaire. The responses were quantitatively analyzed using some statistical techniques. Considering a number of constraints in websites developments using CMS, report shows that joomla has the highest frequency of users, contents determine the choice of CMS while all CMSs ROI can be measured either tangible or intangible. Keywords:Content Management System, Comparison of CMS, Open Source Software, Return on investment (ROI).
I.
Introduction
As the World Wide Web (www) has matured, so have peoples expectations of their Web experiences[1]. After becoming familiar with what they find and how to find it, web visitors have begun to expect more and timelier information from the Web sites they visit. Web managers, in turn, have had to find new ways of meeting these expectations. Content Management System (CMS) is not only on Web development, although that is where it is mostly practiced today. CMS is about gaining control over the creation and distribution of information and functionality[2]. It is about knowing what value you have to offer, who wants what parts of that value, and how they want you to deliver it. A CMS is software that enables non-information technology (IT) users to change web site content directly without help from IT department or web master. With a CMS, these non-technical users can create, edit, and publish content via a browser-based interface. The research work aimed at the evaluation of content management systems, its cost, technical and other associated benefitsto both developers and clients[2]. A research carried out by [3]suggested that CMS is as old as when people started creating Web sites. They did so by typing hypertext mark-up language (HTML) into plain text editors (such as Microsoft Notepad and notepad ++). As time moved on, the need for better tools grew,fuelled by enterprising product companies, less technically adept users, more ambitious Web sites, and the need to automate tedious tasks. At first, these new HTML authoring tools did little more than help users remember the secret syntax of HTML. Later, they began to be true WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get) environments for creating Web pages. Today, some of these tools add just enough management to serve as a nominal Web CMS for organizations with small sites and no additional publications. In the last few years, however, several commercial applications have beenreleased that perform content management in one way or another. 1.1Static and Dynamic Content A research carried out by [4] gave a comprehensive meaning to static and dynamic web pages as follows:A static Website is a set of HTML pages and related file resources (such as images), all of whichare stored as individual files on a Web server. Static pages are pre-builtby definition; they are not created on the fly or personalized in any way, beyond the logic contained within the scriptfor each static page.
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II.
Review Of Literature
2.1Content Management System According to CMS buyers guide cited by [6]that content management provides many advantages over traditional methods of information editing. Many of the benefits are derived when distributed teams of people are responsible for coordinating and contributing to different content repositories which are listed below: 2.1.1 Content Empowerment Content empowerment according to [7]is a Content management (CM) solution that can help companies increase the number of repeat visitors and ultimately increase revenues, by offering timelier and more valuable content. Content Management solutions offer Web authoring, editing, and publishing capabilities. Empowering content involves making better use of information and putting control in the hands of content owners. These are further classified as follows: 2.1.1.1 Content Ownership:empowers business users to quickly and efficiently update their online information without technical intervention. Having full content ownership expands the opportunities for subject matter experts to make their information available to their specific audiences. 2.1.1.2 Content Accessibility: Content accessibility is powered by the CMS, which repurposes content into multiple formats, and helps ensure that disability compliance is met. Content repurposing takes a single source www.iosrjournals.org 63 | Page
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III.
The research design used in this research work is the descriptive survey method; it involves the use of a representative sample from the population. The population of the study is the entire nation. A sample size of 100 using the convenient sampling procedure. Only Computer literates were included in the sample since they are the one that can respond independently to the questionnaire. The method used to collect data for this study is online web survey using a structuredquestionnaire. A total of 100 copies of thequestionnaire were broadcasted online out of which 55copies were returned. The responses from the respondents were collated and analysed using the simple percentage procedure.
IV.
Analysis Of Data
The responses to the questions in the questionnaire provided the basis for the following analysis. Table 1, below show frequency and percentages of CMS and users experience.
Evaluation Of Content Management Systems Performance Table 2Frequency of respondents rating CMS usability Source: Field survey
Non Te chnical rate Very Good Good Not very good Poor N/A Total
70.00% 60.00% 50.00% 40.00% 30.00% 20.00%
Fre que ncy %Fre que ncy 18 32.73 35 63.64 0 0.00 0 0.00 2 3.64 55 100
10.00%
0.00% Very good Good Not very good Poor N/A
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Evaluation Of Content Management Systems Performance Table 3Opinion onReturns on Investment Source: Field survey
ROI of sale s Very Good Good Not very good Poor N/A Total
70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 Very Good Good Not very good Poor N/A
Fre que ncy %Fre que ncy 18 32.73 32 58.18 4 7.27 0 0.00 1 1.82 55 100
4.2 Table 4
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Evaluation Of Content Management Systems Performance Table 5 Features of some Selected CMS Continued
V.
From the analysis above, it appearsthat credibility of a website is most often not valued by the freshness of the content. A frequently updated content goes a long way in not only retaining old customers but also play a big role in gaining new customers. Fresh and updated content not only ensures a dedicated fan base for a site, it also does the site a world of good when it comes to the Search Engine Optimization of a venture, ensuring that the site is most valued by the most coveted Search Engines which in turn increases the users ROI. It also appears that an efficient CMS ROI is not only tangible but can also be an intangible benefit based on satisfaction received. Despite the fact that Table 1 shows that Joomla has the highest frequency of users, the researcher would have like to test for the global awareness of CMS which time didnt permit. The researcher therefore proposed this for further consideration. 5.1Recommendations In addition to the above and based on the analysis, the researcher would also recommends to all new and prospective users of CMS that there are quite a lots more valuable information such as volume of contents, types of network, frequency of update among other that would have to be considered before settling down for a particular CMS. The research was not meant to promote one CMS type over another but to point attention to various support features which they possess.If users needs are not very complex, if a user is planning to hire someone to build a site that is less than several hundred pages, and hierarchically arranged, any of the available CMS will work fine. But if a developer is trying to build a site for the banking sector or any financial institution where there is a need for strong security and reliability, then the developer can compare these CMS security wisely and settle down for the one which is less prone to attack.
VI.
Conclusion
Choosing a CMS can be a long and difficult process, especially since there are a large number of content management systems available. Sourceforge.net alone lists around 600 active open source CMS projects one can choose from. The selection of a content management system depends on a variety of criteria such as content, structure, complexity of work among others.
References
[1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] Gay, L. & Robinson, J.(2001).Content management: The Quest, Presentation at the CUMREC Annual Conference, http://www.educate.edu/ir/library/pdf/CMROI32.pdf retrieved on 20/10/ 2010 Bachmann, D., John, E., & Gary, V. (1996). Tracking the Progress of E-Mail vs. Snail-Mail, Marketing Research: A Magazine of Management & Applications, 8(2), 30-35. Boiko, B. (2002). Introducing the Major Parts of a CMS: A CM Domain White Paper.http://206.253.219.101/biblev1/Whitepapers/Boiko_Whitepaper_WPMISC1.pdf retrieved on 27/12/2010 B. BoikoContent Management Bible, Second Edition, Wiley Publishing Incorporation Canada, 2005 Byrne, T. (2005a). Oh What A Feature: Functional usability of web content management systems. EContent, 28(5). Business link, (2008). Calculation of ROI http://www.elcnetwork.ca/ebusiness/pwt_return_on_investment.pdf retrieved on 12/10/2010 Suchitra P. ( 2002). Effective Web Content Management: Empowering the Business User Workshop on Information Resource Management 13th-15th March 2002
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