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with limited training to push content into the world and a delivery system that makes sure it gets there. Technically speaking, a CMS can be used for internal communications, but in those cases, it’s basi- cally indistinguishable from collaboration software.
The three options with the
greatest presence on the web
are:
1. WordPress. It is easily the
most popular CMS. Virtually
every small-business website
sits on WordPress. Its major advantages are ease of use
and the broad universe of designers and developers
with WordPress expertise.
2. Drupal. It is the most pop-
ular platform in the federal government. Although often
less intuitive than WordPress,
it is considered far more
robust and secure. Even so,
the Drupal Association’s web-
site downplays the perceived
security advantages in favor
of touting other attributes, including speed to deploy-
ment, low cost and scalability. Drupal also enjoys substantial developer sup- port, and several Drupal-centric firms have teams dedicated to public-sector customers and sell through existing government acquisition vehicles.
3. Joomla. Second in popularity world- wide to WordPress, Joomla has yet to gain a foothold in government service. Its major strength is the expansive array of third-party components that can be used to customize the system.
All three platforms include account registration, menu management and page layout templates. They are also coded in PHP and available for free via a GNU General Public License. Host- ing and site maintenance, of course,
but the Trump administra- tion might favor proprietary systems such as Microsoft’s SharePoint, Oracle’s UCM or Percussion’s CM1, all of which have some presence at government agencies. The administration’s preference will likely be revealed if the White House website gets a new platform in the next few months.
The hurdles
There are three main chal- lenges to developing CMS solutions in the federal gov- ernment: security, expertise and accessibility.
When it comes to security, Drupal has the confidence of the Justice Department, the State Department and, for now, the White House. Even so, the Defense Department has not been as quick to embrace it.
In a 2013 alert that is par- ticularly critical of Joomla, the Department of Home- land Security’s U.S. Computer
Emergency Readiness Team said the security issue with CMS solutions in general is that malicious actors can “gain control of web servers and launch distributed denial-of-service attacks against critical infrastructure organizations.”
The alert states that the key to reducing the risk is for IT teams to stay up-to-date on patches for the CMS tools they use. More detailed instruc- tions for securing web-based servers and services are available in a technical paper published by US-CERT.
As big a concern as security is, however, it’s moot if you can’t build something worth securing. The Drupal community’s wiki defined the skill sets
There are three main challenges to developing CMS solutions in the federal government: security, expertise and accessibility.
are ongoing expenses, and there are upfront costs for the consulting, archi- tecture and design professionals who work on your CMS solution.
Security isn’t the only reason Drupal has deep government roots. Its propo- nents have been edging their way in ever since Howard Dean’s 2004 presi- dential primary campaign became the first major political organization to base its web presence on Drupal.
Within months of taking office in 2009, then-President Barack Obama’s team migrated the White House site to Drupal from a proprietary system developed on site. Drupal was select- ed in part because its developers favored open-source collaboration,
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