This page lists requirements for a relaunch of the Oekonux websites.

Content requirements

Existing content must be retained

Requirement:Content present on the old sites must be retained.
Reason:Most of the current content makes sense so it should be retained in one way or the other.
Priority:High for most content
Solutions:Old content must be transformed to a new technology.

Content available in multiple languages

Requirement:Important content must be available in multiple languages.
Reason:At least the most important like a general introduction should be available in multiple languages.
Priority:Medium
Solutions:See Multi-language pages.

Technical requirements

Keeping old URLs working

Requirement:Old URLs should continue to work.
Reason:Existing URLs pointing to Oekonux sites should be not affected by a relaunch.
Priority:High
Solutions:If the current structure is retained at least partially then it should be easy to set redirects in the Apache configuration.

Using reStructuredText as source format

Requirement:

reStructuredText as source format.

Reason:
  • reStructuredText is an extremely well designed ASCII based syntax where easy things are easy and complex things are doable.
  • reStructuredText can be converted to a lot of output formats so texts for the websites can be reused for other purposes.
  • reStructuredText is supported by an active community and spreads out more and more.
  • Old content exists as reStructuredText or can be converted to this format easily.
Priority:

High

Solutions:

Many Python based solutions offer use of reStructuredText (such as this Wiki).

Monitoring possible by e-mail

Requirement:Monitoring of changes must be possible by e-mail.
Reason:E-mail can be used on-line and off-line.
Priority:Low..Medium (depends on the technical possibilities of those who need monitoring)
Solutions:Depends on the framework used.

Fine tuning of write access

Requirement:For all parts of the website it must be possible to fine-tune write access.
Reason:If the website should be partially open to the public then there need to be methods to grant write access to specific persons.
Priority:Medium (depends on the anticipated uses of the website)
Solutions:Content management systems and Wikis offer fine grained access.

Speaking URLs

Requirement:

Each page on a website must have a URL which consists of speaking words and may not contain an URL parameter.

I.e. /topic/sub/page is fine while /content.php?page=7 is bad.

Reason:

Speaking URLs are easier to recognize and to remember.

Priority:

High

Solutions:

Contemporary content management systems usually offer this.

Using existing domains

Requirement:All existing domains must be covered by a relaunch.
Reason:The domains exist to be used.
Priority:High
Solutions:Websites on all domains must be transformed to new sites.

Off-line reading must be possible

Requirement:

It must be possible to use the website offline in a most original state with little effort.

Reason:

For relevant persons online access is often not possible. For reference purposes these persons need to be able to download the complete website with minimum effort.

Priority:

High

Solutions:

In general two models are thinkable:

  • Mirror the website on HTTP basis

    For this the HTTP time stamps of pages need to reflect the last edit. Otherwise the mirroring effort is too high.

  • Mirror the backend system

    The backend system then needs to be replicated which is an option.

Off-line editing must be possible

Requirement:It must be possible to edit the website offline and synchronize the results back to the main site.
Reason:For relevant persons online access is often not possible. If these persons shall be able to edit the website then it is necessary that they do it offline.
Priority:Medium
Solutions:The backend system could be mirrored and re-synchronized by automated means.

Multi-language pages

Requirement:

It must be possible that a page is available in multiple languages. It must be possible that more languages are added step by step.

Reason:

See Content available in multiple languages.

Priority:

Medium

Solutions:

Some pages should be available in different languages but all should be hosted on the same site. English should be the leading language and pages in other languages could be linked from there.

Plone offers multi-language support. It needs to be checked out in detail what is possible here.

Oekonux/Project/WebSite/Analysis/Requirements (last edited 2009-09-14 18:14:50 by StefanMerten)

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