[Techtalk] Opinions on Intranet / Groupware / Forum software

[jennyw]

Maybe it'd be best to start with your requirements -- a CMS system (which is
often a document management system) is a lot different from Groupware (which
usually includes e-mail and calendars).

That said ...

I'm looking at Plone for two projects.  I like Plone better than other CMS
projects I've seen becuase it has workflow, allows editing of documents via
WebDAV, supports the creation of different types of documents, is accessible
(complies with U.S. sec 508 and WAI-AA), and more. For discussions, you can
add CMFForum or CMFBoard (there are others, too). Or a Wiki page.

The thing I like best about Plone, though, isn't how much it can do, but how
little it does (the above are add-ons). A lot of other projects that call
themselves CMS systems include a plethora of features (most of which I don't
have a need for), but without depth when it comes to the most basic thing of
managing documents. With Plone, you get to add various document types which
go through a common workflow.

Plone isn't perfect -- it can take a bit of work to make the navigation
simple. Also, the search feature could be better. And versioning won't be
supported until Plone 2.1 (2.0rc6 is the current version and will be 2.0
unless a major issue is discovered -- not sure when 2.1 will hit). But Plone
is still a very effective way to share documents (in a very generic sense)
with a group.

Jen

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Rasjid Wilcox" <rasjidw at openminddev.net>
To: <techtalk at linuxchix.org>
Sent: Saturday, March 20, 2004 7:50 AM
Subject: [Techtalk] Opinions on Intranet / Groupware / Forum software


> I'm setting up an Intranet for a community group I'm involved with, and am
> trying to work out what pieces to put into the setup.
>
> The problem is not the lack of software.  It is too many choices.
>
> For the 'do everything' type of solutions I'm currently looking at Plone
and
> Mimerdesk.  I'm sure there are about another 50 others I should look at.
>
> I'm also considering building it from separate 'pieces', since I already
have
> a few stand-alone CMS (MySource, OpenCMS etc) and DMS components (MyDMS,
Owl
> etc).  In which case I think the main thing missing is a good Forum
> component.
>
> Anyway, really just looking for suggestions along the lines of 'Xyz is
good'
> so I can narrow the focus a little.  All the components need to be usable
by
> the non-computer literate.  Initial setup can be of course be more
complex.
> :-)
>
> Cheers,
>
> Rasjid.
>
> -- 
> Rasjid Wilcox
> Canberra, Australia (UTC +11 hrs)
> http://www.openminddev.net
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