TitanWEB WCM 4.0 now available
by Bill McNaughton, August 18
We're continuing to provide more ways to build easy-to-use, great looking web sites which leverage all of the strengths of Lotus Domino's architecture. In version 4, which is now available, we have added "Web 2.0" features, design wizards to change the look of your site without any coding, and faster, more direct content editing and administration.
New features include:
- Quick Editing: direct, in-context editing - update page content without opening the "full" edit screen. This capability enables direct, rapid changes by content editors when updating the full range of WCM page options (related links, search settings, archive dates etc.) is not required.
- Custom Forms: administrators can create custom, ad-hoc forms without requiring any design tools. These forms can be placed on any page, include fields of any type (except file upload) and specify which fields are mandatory. Captured results can be automatically displayed in Microsoft Excel format or e-mailed upon submission. This feature is very useful for adding surveys, self-serve inventory, registration, and other adhoc information-gathering applications to your TitanWEB site.
- Site Theme Editing: webmasters can now change the look of their sites using graphical wizards, without any need to specify CSS code. Specific style elements can be changed, custom styles can be added for use in page content, and styles can be extended using CSS if desired.
- Multiple Dynamic Lists can be placed anywhere on a page.
- RSS feeds can be placed anywhere in a page's content area.
- "Widget" Architecture: the Custom Forms, Dynamic Lists and RSS features all use a new architecture which allows specialized components to be integrated with other content in the body of the page. This approach of configuring a specific component then "plugging it in" to a page is a broad trend in the industry as seen with Google widgets, Lotus Notes 8’s sidebar widget support, etc.. The widgets provided with TitanWEB 4.0 are easily configured via wizards and do not require any further coding; look for more widgets in future releases. The previous method for adding Dynamic Lists and RSS Feeds will still be supported, for backward compatibility.
- Rich Text Editor Update: the WYSIWYG content editor has been upgraded from HTMLArea to TinyMCE, which has wider industry support and modular customization capabilities which can be extended. We used this capability in the buttons used to add widgets in TitanWEB.
- Site Administration and Page Editing Simplification: changes to enable the most common changes to be done quickly. Faster access to the most common editing functions on both content pages and the Site Administration page in the new "Basic" mode. A new style and icons also provides easier access to main options.
