Scott Berkun has a list of the The list of ten (now fourteen) reasons ease of use doesn't happen on engineering projects.
Any development project must have clearly defined goals that team leaders agree to. One of these primary goals needs to be ease of use for the end-users of the product. These goals should also be combined with a set of tradeoffs the project should make to ensure these goals (will the schedule slip? Will resources be dedicated to ease of use? Etc.). If the problem is convincing managers that ease of use can be made actionable during a project, keep reading.
E-Learningpost has an interview with Bob Boiko. Bob is the author of the Content Management Bible (and a professor of mine at the UW Information School). Bob mentions some potential uses of a CMS in a learning context:
The other benefits of a CMS is that once you have given structure to the content, you can use the system to automatically arrange the sequence of your learning object depending on the particular context in which you are going to deliver them in. For example, a CMS will allow you to use the exact same pieces of content for delivering a standard course (manuals) or an electronic course (website or CD-ROM).
You could, in theory use a CMS to support some simple online courses in addition to a more general website. Granted, its not going to be a Blackboard, but not everyone needs that level of functionality.
For those interested in the mid- to high-tier commercial products, PC Magazine published an article on CMSs in September. The article provides an overview of content management, and details on products from Ektron, RedDot, Microsoft, Stellent, and Vignette. They even cover weblogs.
Carl Sutter writes about Harmonizing Search and Content Management. Given the title, Sutter doesn't spend a lot of time on content management. But the article is a nice introduction to the different ways to structure the technical side of a search engine.
A new Boxes and Arrow's article: Practical Strategies for Creating a Successful Intranet by Shiv Singh. Singh's strategies are:
Strategy #1: Your users sit next to you; use that to your advantage, but be careful
Strategy #2: Measure quantifiable results, not just user satisfaction
Strategy #3: Use fewer vendors and take them more seriously
Strategy #4: Deploy your features with your users in mind… but you can't please everyone
Strategy #5: Cultivate multidisciplinary collaboration
Macromedia has a nice little article entitled Five Steps to More Professional Web Pages with Dreamweaver MX. The steps are:
Step 1: Export your JavaScript and CSS to external files
Step 2: Export your site without template mark-up
Step 3: Future-proof your site with XHTML
Step 4: Tidy up your code with the Apply Source Formatting command
Step 5: Validate your page to find basic errors
I think that 1, 3, and 5 are really important. As someone who frequently edits (in BBEdit) pages created in Dreamweaver, I think number 4 looks good, too. Number 2 doesn't seem to be a big deal. Nevertheless, I commend this article to all Dreamweaver users.
Laura S. Quinn explores the concept of a vision prototype in her Boxes and Arrows article: Defining Feature Sets Through Prototyping.
One of the main reasons to create a Vision Prototype is to allow the rest of the project team and the client to understand, review, and provide feedback on the vision. Because the prototype makes the ideas under discussion visible and concrete, it's common for new needs or concerns to come up at this point--even in areas that might have been completely covered in previous conversations. It's simply hard for many people to think abstractly about the same things that are made obvious by the prototype.
This looks like an interesting tool for the early stages of any development project.
An article from Netscape's DevEdge: Gecko's "Almost Standards" Mode. Eric Meyer explains a third rendering mode for Gecko-based browsers (Netscape 6/7, Mozilla, Chimera, etc). This mode will render the page like IE, which is helpful for designs which feature images within tables.
Thanks to a mention in Column Two, I came across an article about learning objects: Learning Objects 101: A Primer for Neophytes. From the article:
Ask any three educators what a learning object is, and you're liable to get three different answers. For some, learning objects--small reusable chunks of learning--represent a major paradigm shift away from the traditional unit of learning that has dominated formal education for the last two centuries--the course. In its place, we will erect monolithic databases that can be searched in the blink of an eye to create discrete learning that is highly flexible, individualized, and personally relevant. For others, learning objects are just a fancy new handle for something that teachers have been doing for years--sharing.
There seem to be a lot of parallels with content management. This is an interesting concept, and I'll try to keep my eye out for more info.
ZDNet features an overview of four well-known open-source content management systems. They looked at Zope, Midgard, OpenCms, and Red Hat CCM. I think that the python-based Zope looks the most promising right now. I'm hoping to explore it a bit more in the future.
Check out the very funny flash movie from Squiz.net. They managed to make the normally boring genre of content-management-related-flash-demo and made it fun. I haven't had a chance to check out their product, MySource, but it does look interesting. Its a PHP/MySQL-based open-source product, which, according to the movie, is so easy to use even a monkey could do it.