[Blog] It's All About Content

Coming soon — a CMS where content is the priority and a web page is just one place where content is displayed:

Some thoughts on how we're approaching content in Sutra CMS:

1. Content stored as key/value pairs
2. Content is a top level entity
3. Content meta data
4. Interactive content
5. Content versioning
6. Content statistics

1. Content stored as key/value pairs

Every type of content — from a news item to a video to an interactive map to a mini application — is stored the same way.

Benefits:

• describe content any way you like
• data structures can easily change to accommodate new requirements
• one user interface to manage data
• standardized approach to programming a new content type
• no need to manage multitudes of backend tables

2. Content is a top level entity

Content is stored and managed independent of a website or page.

Benefits:

• content can be copied or linked between pages, websites, eBooks, print, etc
• minimize duplication and reuse
• one source for content management tools such as audits, translation/localization, SEO, branding, custom business workflows, etc

3. Content meta data

Storing meta data along with your content can enable your content to do more.

Examples:

• adapt content to different contexts with configuration data
• enable custom business workflows such as licensing, the creation process, notifications, etc

4. Interactive content

Interactive elements can increase the value of content. Commenting, drilling down, user input, sharing, rating, purchasing, searching, etc — these are the drivers of the interwebz 2.0 era.

In Sutra CMS, content blocks can be placed anywhere on a page in any order to create a page. What each content block does is entirely up to what you have programmed for a content type.

Benefits:

• you can create any content type without worrying how it will affect the cms or other content types
• content types can be as powerful as a full-blown application
• great way to combine functionality and data from resources outside of Sutra CMS

PS: I won't list all the advantages of developing custom functionality with Servoy here except to say: server-side Javascript baby....

5. Content versioning

Sutra CMS allows you to version content now as well as pages.

Benefits:

• update your content in one place and all linked pages will see the latest active version
• roll back to previous versions of content
• compare different versions of content 

6. Content statistics

Where is content displayed? When was it last edited? When was it viewed? How long was it viewed for? What paths lead to the content?

If you are a content analytics geek, Sutra CMS tracks a lot of data about how your content is performing.

Final thoughts

Content is not just about your website: it is about your business. And with Sutra CMS, we're trying to do more than just get your content onto a web page.

If you're interested in content strategy, check out this google group devoted to the subject:

Content Strategy at Google Groups