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• 1 2023-03-24T14:00:48+00:00 WordPress 1 Wordpress is extensible, well documented, and has a lot of options for themes and styling. Wordpress is also probably the CMS with the easiest learning curve. Wordpress is perfect if you just want standard web pages with text and embedded images. Its strengths lie in displaying and organizing categorized content (like blogs), and could be used for applications like digital exhibits. However, if you wish to customize Wordpress to host digital exhibits, editions and translations, or other works with robust metadata, you may need to dig deep into plugins or customizations to get Wordpress to work the way you'd like. plain 2023-03-24T14:00:48+00:00

  Wordpress is extensible, well documented, and has a lot of options for themes and styling. Wordpress is also probably the CMS with the easiest learning curve. Wordpress is perfect if you just want standard web pages with text and embedded images. Its strengths lie in displaying and organizing categorized content (like blogs), and could be used for applications like digital exhibits. However, if you wish to customize Wordpress to host digital exhibits, editions and translations, or other works with robust metadata, you may need to dig deep into plugins or customizations to get Wordpress to work the way you'd like.

  Best For...

  • Projects where blogging and static pages are a major feature
  • Projects for newcomers or those who are not yet comfortable with new technologies
  • Projects where the content doesn't need to be automatically organized by a robust metadata schema

  Features

  • Widely used content management system with a lot of free plugins and themes
  • Extensively documented. Any problem you could think about has probably already been discussed and solved on a platform like StackOverflow
  • Easy-to-use GUI for customizing your site's design and content

  Challenges

  • Many features need to be added through plugins, which can sometimes get out-of-date or stop working
  • You can do so much with it that it can sometimes cause decision fatigue
  • Wordpress relies on tags and categories, so it can be challenging to implement more robust metadata, if you have content that needs to be organized according to multiple facets (such as location, subject, authorship).
• 1 2023-03-24T14:00:48+00:00 Other Platforms to Consider 1 Wordpress, Omeka, and Scalar address many of the use cases we see in the Office of Digital Research and Scholarship. However, there are other platforms available on CreateFSU (and dozens more we can add, if you would like to use them). The applications listed here may be useful to you if you have a very specific use case in mind, or if you really want to get into the web development side of things. plain 2023-03-24T14:00:48+00:00

  Wordpress, Omeka, and Scalar address many of the use cases we see in the Office of Digital Research and Scholarship. However, there are other platforms available on CreateFSU (and dozens more we can add, if you would like to use them). The applications listed here may be useful to you if you have a very specific use case in mind, or if you really want to get into the web development side of things.

  Commons in a Box

  Commons in a Box is designed to organize a particular community. It is often use for universities, consortia, and entire disciplines. It allows for community discussion, posting, and collaboration. Commons in a Box could be useful if you want to organize a discussion group for members of your discipline or provide a virtual meeting place for practitioners in your field. Keep in mind, though, that any open discussion place you create will need to be moderated, and that is a lot of work. If you want to keep the community small, though, this could be a great option!

  Drupal

  Drupal is a lot like WordPress in that it is a content management system that specializes in posts and pages. It differs from WordPress in that the layouts, content types, and themes are generally a lot more customizable. However, it is important to note that this flexibility is made possible by a steep learning curve. Drupal may allow you to create robust content types, add new metadata fields, change block layouts for your pages, and more, but there are many headaches involved in the process before that point. Drupal is probably the most famous for being the content management system that most of FSU's campus uses. So if you want to try your hand at Drupal, it could possibly help you be webmaster for your department!

  Grav

  Grav is a "flat file" content management system, which means that there is no underlying database. Remember the 1997 library website in the first part of this lesson? This was a flat file site. Grav brings flat-file sites into the 21st century by making them more aesthetically pleasing and easier to manage. Benefits of building a flat-file or static site are largely that the content remains pretty up-to-date with web technologies. The page is much less likely to stop displaying because of a broken plugin or out-of-date dependency. Additionally, if your audience has slow internet access, flat file sites can load faster. The downside is that there is less of a GUI than your other CMSs, and the structure can get a little confusing. If you want to start to experiment with the web infrastructure side of things, definitely give Grav a try!

  MediaWiki

  The entirety of Wikipedia is built on MediaWiki. It is a great platform for creating and editing documentation, especially if you want it to be edited by collaborators. While Wikipedia may have open editing, you don't need to have your site be open for all to edit. It could be a great supplemental site that includes data dictionaries, project procedures, or other documentation you want to share with your audience or collaborators.