Pre-conference Workshop Descriptions

Gilbane Boston Pre-Conference Events – Tuesday December 2, 2008 9:00 CM Pros Fall Summit 12:00 Lunch & Roundtables 1:00-5:00 CM Pros Fall Summit Workshop A: How to Select a Web Content Management System Workshop B: Taxonomy, Thesaurus, Ontology: Building and Maintenance for Search Workshop C: Buying and Implementing Content Management and Global Translation Management Systems Workshop: D Making SharePoint Work in the Enterprise

Our half-day in-depth workshops are just what you need when you need to immerse yourself in a topic and get up-to-speed quickly. Our instructors are not only highly-regarded experts in their field, but proven educators.

A: How to Select a Web Content Management System
Instructor: Seth Gottlieb, Principal, Content Here

Selecting a CMS is not like your typical software selection. Unlike other software categories, the CMS marketplace has no clear winners and there are hundreds of viable solutions. You have options of commercially licensed software, software as a service, and open source software and the systems themselves are all highly configurable frameworks so it is difficult to tell what is an aspect of platform and what is an aspect of the demo. There is no one size fits all solution because your content is tightly bound to business processes and structures that are unique to your organization. Unlike accounting and other operational aspects of your business, there are few industry-accepted standards for managing web content. Maybe the problem with the system you are replacing is not the technology but how you are using it. Selecting a CMS is hard but it is not impossible. In this session Seth Gottlieb will offer pragmatic advice for conducting an effective CMS selection and will walk through a process to help you to:

• Analyze your requirements to the optimal level of detail
• Understand what you need in a software supplier
• Evaluate potential solutions
• Know what to expect through implementation and beyond

B: Taxonomy, Thesaurus, Ontology: Building and Maintenance for Search
Instructor: Lynda Moulton, Lead Analyst Enterprise Search, Gilbane Group

These three vocabulary controlling and defining mechanisms are the foundations for many search applications. Increasingly, content management systems and search engine products provide administrators with tools to enhance embedded vocabularies or to add totally new ones. Content managers need fundamental understanding about what each is and how it can be applied to search. Clear guidelines are needed for building, deploying and maintaining the most appropriate vocabulary for a particular business need. Lynda Moulton will clarify each of these elements to help attendees define when and how to tackle any of the three vocabulary options. This workshop is for team members and leaders of content management projects with a search component who lack previous experience building or linking specialized vocabularies to the technologies being planned or in use. Those needing a refresher about newer technologies may also benefit. The session will give:

• Basic definitions and defining characteristics of vocabulary types
• An overview of how various content and search systems work with user defined vocabularies
• Guidelines for buying, building, maintaining and supporting vocabularies
• Specific guidance for select cases submitted at least a month before the workshop

C: Buying and Implementing Content Management and Global Translation Management Systems
Instructor: Andrew Draheim, Principal, Kidd & Draheim Inc.

Rather than writing and translating the same thing many times, companies and organizations that have a presence in more than one country are looking for ways to streamline the management of "enterprise content". Content solutions aim at improving time to value and time to market while keeping costs under control. This workshop helps you to understand the individual challenges of your organization, identify the technology needed to address them, and to effectively implement your solution. Two of the most experienced implementers will provide you with a toolkit that will help you to make informed and profound decisions for business models and processes in order to take advantage of the significant cost and savings (and consequent business opportunities) global content management can offer. Managing content that will be created, used, and published in many parts of the world can be a daunting task, and companies are frequently faced with questions like:

• What information is needed, and by whom?
• How will information be published around the world and delivered to customers?
• What information should be translated, and into how many languages, and when and how?
• How can content be localized, even if it's not translated?
• How do we make sure the content is ready on time, when and where it's needed?
• Can we streamline the processes we're using today, and save time or money, or do we need new processes?
• What technologies can help us meet our global content needs on a realistic budget, and will they work for real-world applications?
• What lessons have early adopters learned and what solutions have they arrived at? How can new adopters take advantage of this experience?

• review application scenarios to define the "must haves" and "wants" for good global content management
• learn best practices and implementation techniques from experts in the field, as well as what present technologies can and cannot deliver
• share experiences in managing content on a global scale and strategies for managing change and enhancing user acceptance
• understand how language-technologies can help manage global content
• develop individual requirements and guidelines for procuring and implementing technology for their own companies

D: Making SharePoint Work in the Enterprise
Instructor: Shawn Shell, Principal, Consejo, Inc.

SharePoint has become virtually ubiquitous in many organizations. Whether through inclusion in an Enterprise Agreement with Microsoft or a definitive business need that can be satisfied with the technology, SharePoint is popping up everywhere. However, organizations are still struggling with how this technology will complete "integrated" with their environment. Whether it's real integration with other line of business applications like SAP, PeopleSoft or Oracle Financials, or how SharePoint can be used in concert with other portal technologies like PlumTree, WebSphere, Broadvision and others is still a major challenge. To compound these challenges, not all aspects of SharePoint's technology suite are created equal or well understood. During this day seminar, Shawn Shell, founder of Consejo and internationally recognized SharePoint expert, will help attendees better understand the latest version of SharePoint.

Key Points:

• What is SharePoint (it's not just one product)
• What are SharePoint's strengths and weaknesses
• How can you integrate SharePoint with other Portal Technologies
• Performance and Scalability
• Governance