One danger with any software purchase is that an organization can be trapped by the cost of their investment, and the use of proprietary formats. This can mean that even when the needs of the organization change, it remains locked into the use of an inappropriate tool by the size of the original investment and the difficulty of extracting material which can be used by other systems.
Pay as You Go, Go as You Please
Mantranet has two big advantages in this regard. Firstly, there is no large up-front investment: customers pay only for what they use. Secondly, the use of XML to store content, as well as url-rewriting to generate HTML output pages means that content can easily be stripped out for re-use in other systems, or simply as a static website. Our customers are free to take their content elsewhere at any time: none have chosen to do so.
One danger of giving personnel without specialist experience and training the ability to author web pages is that the site design can easily become amateurish and chaotic. A good CMS will ensure that authors have control of page content, but not page design.
A Place for Everything, and Everything in Its Place
Mantranet uses XML templates to separate page content from page design. Your organization could choose to have one template for the entire website - or many different templates, creating sections with different looks, but the same consistent feel. Design elements such as page layouts, colors, fonts, navigation, and graphics, are already set up according to your specifications. Templates assure that web pages look right, part of the site it belongs to, without any need for users to remember rules, or follow non-automated procedures.
This separation of form and content means that content providers can concentrate on their message, while designers can create the look and feel of the website. The webmaster can choose which templates to assign to which pages, and ensure that the website presents the organization as it wishes to be presented. What is more, mantranet allows for an entire site design to be changed at any point, with existing pages being automatically updated to the new look and feel.
Web pages can be dynamic (created programmatically) or static (simple text files). A good CMS will use dynamic pages, as these can easily be tailored to suit different needs, and allow different content display for different users.
The Best of Everything
Mantranet uses dynamic pages. The content is stored as XML, and converted to HTML as part of the process of page generation. This allows mantranet to display the same underlying content both in pages which take advantage of the most attractive web technologies, and in pages which are simple and disabled-friendly.
Static pages can also have advantages, however - primarily performance. Mantranet combines the best of dynamic and static pages by creating the pages dynamically whenever there are changes, then storing "static" versions of the page to get the flexibility of dynamic pages with the speed of static.
When a user makes a change to a page, it may have implications on other pages: change a page title, and navigation will need to change on other pages. A good CMS will automate this process.
Like A Pebble in a Pond
Mantranet manages the entire process of linking pages together. Change a page title, and it automatically changes in the navigation as well as on the page; delete a page, and it disappears from the section navigation. This is all part of the organic philosophy behind mantranet. There is no limit to the depths and complexity of structure you can choose to create for your website. It grows automatically to match the structure of your organization; and if you change your structure - no problem: the webmaster can move pages and entire sections about using a simple point and click wizard. All the necessary changes on multiple pages - not to mention resetting permissions and workflow - are managed automatically.
Even with hundreds of authors contributing, mantranet makes it easy to organize and present web content consistent with your organization: departments, chain of command, geographical location, and so on.