When Code & Content Meet

by Doug Henschen

People often draw parallels between document management and Web content management, but to StarBase, managing information for the Web is much like managing software code. The similarities and crucial differences led this Santa Ana, CA-based company to add ExpressRoom, a Java-based Web content management system, to its extensive bag of collaborative software development tools.

ExpressRoom was developed by WorldWeb.Net, an Alexandria, VA-based company that StarBase acquired in February. With the August release of ExpressRoom Version 2.5, StarBase has integrated the software into its StarBase Collaboration Suite, a modular system designed for the development, management and deployment of both content and code.

When does it make sense to manage code and content together? Whenever organizations routinely develop software applications and customizations. IT programmers use StarBase tools to handle everything from software requirements management, analysis and design to change management and code testing. ExpressRoom adds a template-driven interface in which ordinary business users can write, design, review, approve and deploy content for delivery via the Web, print, wireless devices or other media.

While the two types of functionality have only recently been joined, StarBase says customers now acquiring both products include Viant, the Boston-based e-business and collaboration solutions vendor, and Intermountain Health Care, a Salt Lake City-based insurer and health network that develops care applications and also hosts a portal site at www.ihc.com.

Another StarBase customer testing ExpressRoom is Feedroom.com, a New York-based aggregator of video content. Feedroom uses StarBase's software development tools to create customized Web-based channels of local and national content as well as corporate sites such as cisco.feedroom.com.

"I've always treated Web content development with the same care and sense of risk as with enterprise software development," says Michael Flickman, Feedroom's CTO. "Any time there's content development or a change in content, we go though a traditional [software] build process with check-in, check out and change management control."

Flickman says Feedroom's "central nervous system" is StarTeam Enterprise, the core StarBase product that handles software configuration management, defect tracking, change management, source code control and collaborative software development.

Flickman says he is considering ExpressRoom for its content authoring and XML templating tools, which would allow Feedroom to create a different look and feel for its various channels dynamically rather than through its current manual process. Meanwhile, StarTeam addresses the crucial code management needs. "If you're running multiple sites that run off a bunch of core Enterprise Java Beans, now you've got to manage the dependencies on the same code across different sites," he explains. "That kind of control is not present in a conventional Web content management system."

StarBase has added the ExpressRoom Web content management system to an array of tools used for application development and system customization.

ExpressRoom provides core functions including content contribution, management, deployment and delivery. Content creation options include browser- and FTP-based contribution clients as well as optional connectors to Microsoft Word and Mac- and Windows-based versions of QuarkXPress. Publishing options for Word and Quark include file-by-file generation or batch conversion of legacy content.

ExpressRoom's Asset Manager provides user authentication, access control, check-in/check-out, versioning and a file-system-like interface. The repository itself runs under file systems, Oracle, Sybase or SQL Server. The Asset Manager includes a deployment engine that supports content replication to multiple servers to ensure robust delivery in high-demand applications. A snapshot feature records the state of all content at a given time, while rollback lets you return a site's structure and content to a given snapshot. ExpressRoom delivers content through a J2EE servlet that can run on Web application servers, Apache or IIS.

The upgrades to ExpressRoom 2.5 include standard integrations with BEA and Sybase application servers, LDAP support, customizable workflow tasks and support for Java Server Pages and XSL/T as coding languages for page-server extensions (in addition to the Java server classes already supported). While the system supports Web- or FTP-based content contribution, review and approval are currently handled only through conventional thick clients.

Some functionality is provided through integrations with third-party tools. For example, Web search and retrieval are supported through Inktomi's UltraSeek full-text search engine, while personalization is provided through servers from either BEA or Net Perceptions.

ExpressRoom user Sara Glines, managing director of Lagardere Active, the New York-based multimedia affiliate of magazine publisher Hachette Filipacchi, says her company chose ExpressRoom in part for its minimal IT support demands. "We had three criteria when we started looking at content management systems," says Glines. "First, we wanted it to be XML-based, because even back [in early 2000] you could see that that's where things were headed. Second, it had to be flexible enough to accommodate emerging business models. Third, we needed something that wouldn't require a lot of technical support. If I wanted to add a button or a new section to the site map, I didn't want that to mean that the templates had to be recoded."

Lagardere Active implemented ExpressRoom in April 2000, and the system is currently used to manage the sites of Cycle World, Women's Day and Car & Driver. The largest and busiest of these sites is www.caranddriver.com, which attracts two million page views per month.

Glines says ExpressRoom has allowed Lagardere Active to launch new content and business models such as an insurance area on the Car & Driver site. "We had it up and running within days without having to go through programmers," she says.

Whether deployed in stand-alone fashion or as part of the larger StarBase Collaboration Suite, ExpressRoom provides the essentials of Web content management in an affordable package. Pricing starts at $50,000 for staging and production servers and five full clients with review and approval access (conventional site access is limited only by server performance). The optional Word or Quark connectors each add 10 percent to the cost of the full clients.