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I installed the Hyper Cache plugin on the Satellite and measured improvements on WebWait.

1. Before activating Hyper Cache
2. After activating Hyper Cache
3. After placing define('WP_CACHE', true); in the wp-config.php file
4. After clearing cache in Hyper Cache settings.

Sure there's more to do but I'm closing out the Intranet project and opening a new project as Phase II.

Hours

I spent a whopping 350 hours since April of 2010. Uffda. But look at the result.

These are ingredients of a successful project. We tend to follow a process that blends Project Management phases with the Software Development Life Cycle lightly seasoned with User Experience protocols.

As a consequence, the following are not pure examples of the form. They too are hybrids — our process flows look kind of wireframey — but they work for us because we're small, we fill multiple roles, and urgency trumps formality.

Statements of Work (SOWs)

• Support Ticket Tracking
• Third Party Billing Report
• External Funding Database

Process Flows

• ISSS Exchanges
• Incident Tracking
• Lib Ed
• Orientation Registration

Wireframes

• Less Commonly Taught Languages
• Support Ticket Tracking

System Maps

• Intranet

Personas

• Intranet

Close-Out Meetings

• Orientation Registration
• Lib Ed
• Data Warehouse Connect aka Shadow Database

Here are the areas within the WordPress administration and which roles can access them.

These are the stock WordPress roles and how we're using them.

Administrator - Full access to everything. Dean's Office communications staff and IT will share the credentials to the sole administrator account.

Editor - Can create and publish their own posts plus edit and publish other people's posts. Can view analytics data plus work with Conference Rooms, Documents and the Knowledge Base. This role is assigned to Dean's Office communications staff.

Author - Can create and publish their own posts plus edit and publish other people's posts. These are key contributors in the various units.

Contributor - Can create their own posts and submit them for publishing. This is the majority of GPS staff.

Subscriber - Can read posts and make comments. We're not using this role but it may come in handy if we want to grant access to someone outside GPS (Robert Jones office? General Counsel's office?)

On Your iPad, iPhone or iPod Touch

Wordpress (free): Good for adding posts because you login only once and you can work offline. Install the app and I'll configure it. You do not need to create an account.

Twitter (free): Twitter is fully integrated with the iOS so you can tweet from Safari, Photos, Camera, YouTube and Maps. Get a Twitter account if you do not already have one. Install the app and configure it with your account. Tweets tagged with our designated hashtag will appear on The Satellite.

[slickr-flickr tag="thetagyouused"]

Instagram (free): Take photos, add filters, tag and upload. Install the app and use it to create your Instagram account. Photos tagged with our designated hashtag will appear on The Satellite.

I took the content inventory (did you have a chance to review that list?), and organized it into this system map. In the process I puzzled out how the data will be managed in WordPress and what rules govern how it appears on the page.

I watched much of a Lynda tutorial on choosing the right content management system (CMS). I rated the following features on how important they are to our project. 1 = not important, 3 = very important.

Other Things To Look for in a CMS

• Content editor - Can it elegantly handle text, images, pdfs an other assets?
• Template and Theme Use - Is it easy to implement your desired look and easy to change?
• User Controls - Can you build roles and access that benefit both users and administrators?
• Security - Can you regulate access to content and controls when necessary?
• Search - Can you search all kinds of content quickly?

What Do We Need Out of a CMS?

• Allow for several content providers across multiple units.
• Manage different types of content (text, rss feeds, photos, tabular data, calendars).

What's Our Skill Set?

HTML, PHP, CSS. Have experience with WordPress including building a theme from scratch.

Products

Here's what another University staff member says about Contao:

During the past year we began using Contao Content Management System for managing Disability Services websites. It is a great CMS and it just got even better. We now have a module for University web authentication with Shibboleth. This module allows authentication with the University Internet ID and password for website editors as well as for users allowed to see protected content (often used for Intranets). Permissions for authenticated users are configured within Contao user groups. Please get in touch if you are interested in this module.

• ModX - Seems too much for our little intranet.
• Drupal - Too complex and no expertise with.
• Concrete 5 - Patrick H says it's still good but recommends WordPress for us.
• Contao - Very tempting given the testimony above.
• Other Free and Open Source - There are many but none stand out.

WordPress

• I have experience with it.
• It meets our requirements.
• LAC already uses it and it works well for them.
• Patrick H, who has a lot of experience in web systems, endorses it.
• There's a huge online community including users here on campus.
• We should be able to make it work with Shibboleth.

Met with Liz yesterday and sketched out a rough timeline for this project:
October to Mid November: I work on database based on dissections of the current database.
Mid November to Mid December: Work with Liz, incorporating her feedback.
Mid December to Late December: Complete database.
Early January: Import data and implement.

I'm using WordPress for our intranet and incorporating the Less Framework template so our pages respond to the device. I learned that I need to add the following line to the header.php file. I added it after the stylesheet call.

<meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, 
initial-scale=1"/>

Also, I changed the tablet dimensions to the following:

@media only screen and (min-width: 768px) and (max-width: 1024px) { }

It's decided: WorkflowGen will be the new platform for CARLA's Conference Database. To review, the Conference Database is a web-based system built by Marlene using FileMaker 6 and CDML. It gathers conference proposals for review and approval by committees. People like it. It works. Each year Marlene prepares a new iteration of the core application — a task she's gotten very good at.

Why change?

• We need to decommission the FileMaker 6 server and no modern server can run FileMaker 6.
• We want to move away from decentralized bespoke systems to more widely-used platforms that can be understood and supported by Dean's Office IT.

Why WorkflowGen?

• We're already migrating GPS systems to it (Judd Fellowship, Travel Grants).
• Patrick has been trained on it.
• There is a growing community of users here on campus.
• It's supported centrally; though that's more emotional support. We need to cultivate our own expertise in building systems. It's thought that after initial setup in .net, people like Marlene can take command of the solution to set up processes and access levels.

Some concerns

• Can we set it up so it's flexible in the right places? Can we repurpose our initial solution and reuse year after year? Can it be genericized? A word we invented for this notion.
• Does Marlene need to learn .net to fully "own" the solution or can her work be accomplished in the GUI?
• Can it elegantly accommodate multiple tracks of submissions based on a theme?

Next Steps

• Marlene checks into RegOnline - a platform others in the department are exploring.
• Marlene works her magic one last time and prepares a solution in FileMaker 6 and CDML for the upcoming conference.
• Christopher plots the CARLA Conference system on the WorkflowGen work-plan. We should start in the Spring of 2012 in order to have it ready by this time next year.
• Soni backs away. Since this is neither FileMaker or PHP or WordPress or OBI, she's no longer involved.