eZ Publish is an Open Source Content Management System chosen by thousands of enterprises and organizations world wide. It helps you build corporate websites, intranets, webshops and media portals. eZ Publish is 100% Open Source, available either as a free download or as an enterprise solution “eZ Publish Premium” with support, guarantees and maintenance.
eZ Publish is a PHP content management platform, now relying on the Zeta Components ( formerly known as eZ Components, more information here ), high-quality libraries.
More on the product : http://ez.no/ezpublish.
The community around eZ Publish started right from the moment the product was made open source : the first second ! It all began in Norway, where eZ Systems stems from, in a small place called Skien. This crowd of bearded developers kinda grew, and became international. Many users of the product popped up around the world : that was the first ages of the eZ Community. Since 2001, first scientifically acknowledged signs of community life around eZ Publish, the product and her community moved ahead together, landing today with :
eZ Systems is the world's largest Open Source Content Management software company.
eZ is a profitable company with more than 5000 paying customers from more than 100 countries around the world. We have a true global presence with employees from 23 nationalities and offices in Norway, Denmark, Germany, Japan, France, Belgium and North America. Our international team supports partners and customers at all continents.
eZ Systems is the creator of eZ Publish, an award winning Open Source Enterprise Content Management System, with more than 200 thousand installations and registered users in more than 130 countries.
eZ Systems was founded in 1999. The eZ philosophy of openness and information sharing is still the basic guideline for the company, employees and Ecosystem.
Here is a small sentence meant to give a long-term view of what we would like to achieve. This should be useful when thinking the design and ergonomy of the community's entry gate, http://share.ez.no :
"To create a vibrant ecosystem around eZ Software, constantly increasing openness, attraction, helpfulness, innovation and intensity of this place. This ecosystem should be the absolutely right place to daily step by when working with eZ Software, bringing knowledge, contact, help, indirect involvement in the product's evolution, business, and fostering a strong feeling of belonging."
This is the list of personas : the user types and what they are looking to get from the site.
This is a user who has no experience with eZ Publish and is evaluating CMS solutions. They are viewing the community site to help them decide if eZ Publish is the right solution for them. They will be looking at the thoroughness of the documentation, forum participation and level of help given to problems. They will also like to see the community is relevant and active in terms of code contribution, and sometimes be sensible to the presence of local communities.
They have downloaded eZ publish but don't know where to start. They may be having trouble installing the software or working out how to do some basic tasks. They are looking at the articles and tutorials for guidance, asking questions in the forums and possibly looking for assistance from a local eZ Publish practitioner. The ease in which they can find information and assistance will determine if they continue with eZ Publish or move on to another product.
These users have installed eZ publish and created there first sites. Their experience is limited to the functionality available via the administration interface e.g. creating new content classes, setting up users and creating templates. It's likely that they are using one of the standard eZ publish packages (eZ Flow, eZ Webin) as a basis for their sites. They sometimes struggle with some of the more advanced functionality and ask complex questions on the forums, which may go unanswered. They will reply to forum posts where the questions are within their ability to answer. They may provide blog posts, articles and tutorials. Custom functionality is added by installing extensions from the projects site. They start being able to customize existing extensions, and are learning how to create their own. They may occasionally file bug reports and comment on existing ones.
Experts have created several eZ Publish sites, custom extensions and have a very good understanding of the product. They are heavy forum participants and provide answers to questions. They are likely to hang around on the ezpublish channel on IRC, and be active in the "social media" surroundings (twitter, google wave). They are more likely to provide blog posts, articles and tutorials. They trigger projects (http://projects.ez.no) and/or are active in some of them. Their good understanding of the product naturally pushes them to use the issue tracker when they spot an issue or for proposing an enhancement. They are the kernel of the eZ Community, creating its attraction, gravitation.
| Objective | Definition | Goal | Review | Current Status | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Active Users | Help the community grow | An active users is someone who, at least in the past 6 months : - Initialized a new forum topic - Replied 6 times to existing forums - Fed back 1,5 issues ( = 3 times a year ) - Commented 2 times on an existing issue |
Increase the number of active users by 10% per month ( means 162 active users at the end of december this year ) | Monthly | 69 |
| New members | Increase findability of the community and increase systematic advocacy. | Amount of new registrations on the community portal. | Increase the amount of newly registered users by 5% each month | Monthly | March: 307 February: 280 |
| Page-views per month | Measure helpfulness and attraction of the community portal. | Page-views figure picked from Google Analytics. | Increase the amount of page views by 4% per month. This is equivalent to having 175000 page-views for next december. | Monthly | 122000 page views for the [08/03/2010 - 07/04/2010] period |
Here is the current information structure, represented as a tree. Currently the Articles and Tutorials sections are separated. They contain very similar content though, hence the merger below :
Home |-- Forums | |-- Forum 1 | | |-- Forum Topic 1 | | | |-- Forum Reply 1 | | | `-- Forum Reply 2 | | | | | `-- Forum Topic 2 | | |-- Forum Reply 1 | | `-- Forum Reply 2 | | | |-- Forum 2 | `-- Forum 3 | | |-- Articles & Tutorials | |-- Tutorial 1 | |-- Tutorial 2 | |-- Tutorial 3 | |-- Article 1 | |-- Article 2 | `-- Article 3 | | |-- Blogs | |-- Blog 1 | | |-- Blog entry 1 | | |-- Blog entry 2 | | `-- Blog entry 3 | | | `-- Blog 2 | |-- Blog entry 1 | |-- Blog entry 2 | `-- Blog entry 3 | | |-- Projects | `-- (RSS feed displayed, can be moved somewhere else) | | |-- Directory | |-- People | | |-- Member 1 | | |-- Member 2 | | `-- Member 2 | `-- Companies (Partners) | |-- Partner 1 | `-- Partner 2 | | |-- Community Program (structuring document for individuals and companies in the community) | |-- Team | |-- Who is who | `-- Development (development tool, available to the share.ez.no team only) | `-- About |-- Get involved |-- Etiquette and Usages guidelines |-- Get eZ Software `-- How to get support for eZ Publish
This is the way content is stored in eZ Publish. This tree can be easily reflected in the menu/submenus through eZ Publish's templating language (http://share.ez.no is built with eZ Publish). The hierarchy represented above is the one currently in place (at the exception of the merged Articles & Tutorials section). To better reflect the "What content matters ?" part below, the organisation/hierarchy can (should ?) be reworked. "Team" part should be moved under "About". A new top-level entry is likely to be added: "Events", a central event management system. This latter feature is however not thought through yet.
In decreasing order of importance:
(Currently : http://share.ez.no/forums)
The main exchange place, broken down into the following topics :
This is the central place for exchanging, it needs a strong focus and care. On top of forum threads (like this : http://share.ez.no/forums/setup-design/googlesitemapgenerator-and-ez-4.2), here are the key pages in the forum system :
(Currently : http://share.ez.no/articles and http://share.ez.no/tutorials)
Articles and tutorials are pieces of knowledge which bring great added-value to the eZ Community. Their typical content range from how-tos for beginners, to expert topics, through experienced-developers classical questions. They can take various forms: plain, multi-page articles, step-by-step tutorials with a concrete result in the end. So far, no multimedia screencast has been submitted, but they are encompassed in this category and much appreciated.
Three elements are important :
(Currently : http://share.ez.no/projects)
The eZ Community find its roots around eZ Publish, content management system (more on this : http://ez.no/ezpublish). Around this strong connection with the product revolve many an activity, key in the community's momentum :
A forge is available for any community member to create her own project (eZ Publish extension/solution most of the time), and trigger collaborative development around it. While this forge (http://projects.ez.no) should not be merged with the community portal, a strong link must be established between the two.
By the open source nature of eZ Publish (public SVN repository: http://pubsvn.ez.no/), and the regular pace of stable releases (every 6 months), testing and experimenting with the product can be part of any member's daily activities. This can take the following forms :
While this is not setup yet, a bunch of online polls, surveys and requests for ideas should soon be entering the community's life, on a regular basis. This will be a direct way for members to influence the product's evolution, making sure it better fits expectations.
(Currently : http://share.ez.no/directory)
White and Yellow pages of the community.
All community members are, as individuals, listed in the white pages (currently : http://share.ez.no/directory/people). In these pages, the members are ranked by decreasing activity level. It should be possible to have a global view on a member's profile. A dedicated page for this should be created. It could contain:
This page should also serve as a base for the "My Profile". It should only propose edition of settings/password/notifications, on top of displaying the elements described above, when the profile is viewed by its owner.
All companies (community partner and business partners) are listed in the yellow pages (currently:http://share.ez.no/directory/companies ). The companies are ranked by decreasing activity level, meaning the company having the most active members are listed first. Is is key to be able to find the right partner for a project. Several ways of filtering this list should be made available:
Each company has its own profile page (on current example : http://share.ez.no/directory/companies/webwiz) :
- Currently :
- Should be added :
All partners should be able to :
Posting to this section is reserved to partners (Community & Business). Viewing it is open to the public. This section does not exist yet, hence the total freedom on interpretation.
(Currently : http://share.ez.no/blogs)
While currently populated by eZ Systems' and the share.ez.no team's activity, this is meant to be open to the public in a short-term, after having fleshed out the edition guidelines. This place will be an intermediate medium in terms of conciseness of content and overall volume, between the forums and the tutorials section. Many community members already have their own blogs, most of them being aggregated in the so-called "planets" :
These planets must be integrated seamlessly in this section (can be done using RSS feeds for instance).
This entry is not existing yet. The translation activity is however a key activity in the eZ Publish Community. Community members participate to the translation of eZ Publish itself, but also of its extensions. The tools at disposal are a dedicated project ( http://projects.ez.no/ezpublish_translation ) and a forum for translators ( http://share.ez.no/forums/translation ). The translation process is for now explained on the project's home page ( http://projects.ez.no/ezpublish_translation ) but should be moved to this new top-menu entry. The translation home page should lead anybody willing to participate to quickly and easily put hands on translation.
Currently here http://share.ez.no/directory/community-program, this document explains how both individuals (aka 'community members') and companies (aka 'community partners') are integrated. It provides a structural basis for the whole community. This page contains a registration form for companies/freelancers willing to become Community Partners.
A persistent catchphrase should be added around the logo in the top banner, reading : "The eZ Publish Community Gateway". The top banner probably takes up too much room on the page.
A welcome panel, in a highly visible place on the homepage, should help anybody to understand, by reading a few sentences, what this portal is about (drupal.org does it well).
Also, the home page should really act as a dispatcher and an activity showcase. The drupal community website (drupal.org) is quite good in this regard. It should implement the content hierarchy presented in section "What content matters ?", and be flexible enough to allow for addition of potential new types of content. It is key that this homepage is exhaustive in surfacing the most relevant of all types of content / sections.
It should be easy to understand, at a glance, how to get and stay in touch with the eZ Community. This page currently serves as a How-to : http://share.ez.no/about/get-involved. It is broken down into two main sections :
The code of conduct is also present in this section. It currently lies here : http://share.ez.no/about/etiquette-and-usage-guidelines. It shall be fleshed out with a proper mission statement.
Community Program, while being a top-level entry in the menu, is currently mirrored here, under the "About" section. It is a structuring document, as described here.
The "Team" top-level menu entry should be moved under "About". It contains two subentries : "Who is who", presenting the team, public page, and "Development", only available to the share.ez.no team members, as a development tool.
Local communities do not always have a dedicated platform, and need the international community portal to exchange in their native language. This is currently the case for the japanese community. A forum is dedicated to hosting localized communication : http://share.ez.no/forums/localized-forums. A clear message should be placed under the "About" section (at least) about localized communities. One could think of other additional places for this.
In addition to hosting a few localized communities, pointers to otherwise existing local communities should be placed here. For example, the Brazilian and French communities have their own platforms :
Currently useless, it should reflect the key elements of content. It could contain, but not be limited to :
The remember me" functionality should lower the entry barrier to the portal. A proposal can be made in this direction, design-wise.
What (if anything) do we like, dislike about these sites? This can help drive the mockups in the right direction :
| Competitor | Likes | Dislikes |
|---|---|---|
| http://drupal.org/ | Robin: continuous updates with good content Nicolas: impression of liveliness |
Robin: homepage a bit crowded Nicolas: looks like a patchwork |
| http://community.joomla.org/ | Robin: Did you know and Featured articles Nicolas: Unified identity throughout all sites (www., community., forum., ) + clear guidance by menu |
Robin: too much space lost in top for navigation Nicolas: looks a bit too "corporate" |
| http://www.silverstripe.com/ | Robin: nice balance in design and content on homepage Nicolas: very good looking |
Robin: nothing specific Nicolas: unclear link to the product (no first-level entry menu). Impression of plain business-orientation (where is the community ??) |
| http://wordpress.org/ | Robin: consistent use of content and design Nicolas: design efficiency: great design, simple yet useful homepage (good pointers to resources) |
Robin: limited use of the homepage Nicolas: Few signs of activity/liveliness |
| http://cakephp.org/ | Robin: LOVE there retro design/colors Nicolas: i love the menu : "Learn | Interact | Read ..." AND the design Bruce : I quite like this site |
Robin: overall navigation Nicolas: not enough signs of community liveliness : links to "Bakery", "Planets" and "Contributions" are a bit hidden |
| http://wiki.alfresco.com/wiki/Main_Page | Robin: lots of documentation Nicolas: Pragmatic, exhaustive navigation (left column mainly) |
Robin: the use of a wiki for such a site Nicolas: too "wiki-style" |
| http://typo3.org/community/about | Robin: consistent content and navigation Nicolas : clear guidance through left-menu |
Robin: bit outdated design Nicolas: No dedicated landing page + looks dead. |
Focus on content and user experience.
Implement the content hierarchy described earlier ( cf "Core content" ).
Stimulate participation and involvement :
Establish a clear connection with eZ Publish / eZ Software, primary engine of the community. Everything revolves around it. New comers should easily understand where to find this connection, and existing members should have easy access to it anytime.
Content classes (content types) are the main tool to describe a content taxonomy in eZ Publish. A content class defines a series of fields (a structure), each of which is typed (datatypes). A given piece of content (a content object) necessarily meets a content class' structure (an object is an instance of a class).
Below are described, per functional group, the involved content classes. For every content class a distinction is made between :
Note that some content fields, like titles, can be used to build the page's <title> or <meta>.
| Content Type | Metadata fields | Content fields |
|---|---|---|
| Forum | 1/ Title [text line] Used to describe the main general topic of the forum 2/ Intro [formatted text] Used to give a more thorough description of the forum, what topics can be addressed in it. |
|
| Forum Topic | 1/ Sticky [checkbox] Whether this forum topic should stay on top of the list 2/ Tags [keywords] 3/ Solved [checkbox] Whether the author has received a satisfying answer to her initial question. |
1/ Topic [text line] One-liner to know what the forum topic as about 2/ Message [formatted text] The forum topic's body |
| Forum Reply | 1/ Message [formatted text] Body of the reply |
| Content Type | Metadata fields | Content fields |
|---|---|---|
| Article | 1/ Author [object relations] Display name of user account who created the article 2/ Tags [keywords] Used for tagging the article, visible in full view 3/ Enable comments [checkbox] Back end feature for author to allow/disallow comments on the article |
1/ Title [text line] Title for the article, single line 2/ Image [object relation] Intro image for the article, also shown in the intro part of the content 3/ Intro [formatted text] Introduction part of the article, content shown before the read-more link 4/ Body [formatted text] Remaining part of the article, content shown after the read-more link Note that the body, although contained in one single field, is often visually broken down into several pages. Every page is given a title, used as label for the "Previous" or "Next" page links, as well as for displaying the outline of the article. |
| Content Type | Metadata fields | Content fields |
|---|---|---|
| Blog | 1/ Short title [text line] Short title of the blog, used for url aliases |
1/ Title [text line] Title for the blog, single line 2/ Body [formatted text] Description of the blog |
| Blog Entry | 1/ Tags [keywords] Used for tagging the post, tags are visible in full view 2/ Enable comments Back end feature for author to allow/disallow comments on the blog post |
1/ Title [text line] Title for the blog post, single line 2/ Intro [formatted text] Introduction part of the blog post, content shown before the read-more link 3/ Body [formatted text] Remaining part of the blog post, content shown after the read-more link |
| Content Type | Metadata fields | Content fields |
|---|---|---|
| User | 1/ User account [useraccount] Used by the system for login 2/ Master ID [integer] Used by the Single Sign On system 3/ Points [integer] Total amount of community-activity points a user gathered when contributing to the community's activity. |
1/ First name [text line] 2/ Last name [text line] 3/ Signature [text block] 4/ Image [image] User's profile picture 5/ Short description (author) [formatted text] Used as mini-bio when the users writes knowledge for the community (tutorial, article) 6/ URL (author) [url] As "Short description": for authors to give a link to their blog, corporate site. 7/ Photo (author) [image] As "Short description": for authors to provide a better quality image, usually different than their profile's. Displayed for instance next to an article, on all pages of it. 8/ Country [text line] |
| Partner | 1/ Vertical Selection [Selection] The business vertical the partner is mainly working in. Can be Examples : - Science and Education - Public Sector - Non Profit - IT/Telecom ... 2/ Business partner [checkbox] Used to know whether a partner is "Business" or "Community" 3/ Community points [integer] The total amount of community-participation points for a partner. Used to rank the partner in the Yellow pages. Sum of every partner member's points total. 4/ Business partner page link [url] If the partner is "Business", the link to her profile page on eZ's corporate website : http://ez.no |
1/ Company name [text line] 2/ Company description [text block] 3/ Contact person (name) [text line] 4/ Contact person (email) [email] 5/ Company Address [text block] 6/ Main Country [text line] 7/ Website [URL] 8/ Phone number [text line] 9/ Fax [text line] 10/ Company logo [image] |
| Reference | 1/ Name [text line] The label of this eZ Publish reference 2/ URL [URL] Address of this eZ Publish reference 3/ Description [formatted text] Few lines of description of the eZ Publish reference: what were the ins and outs of the project, the functional and technical challenges, the website's activity... |