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Boston.com Deploys Next Generation CMS Using Zope4Media

Boston.com was launched in October of 1995 and the site has grown into the most visited regional portal in the country. Integrating content from proprietary newspaper publishing systems (ATEX, AP Satellite, AP-over NNTP), as well as proprietary categorization software (Teragram) with original and third-party content presents a significant technical challenge.

Managing Feed-Driven Content

Zope Corporation tailored Zope4Media's feed architecture to flow content from disparate feeds (e.g., Associated Press, Reuters, The New York Times, CNET) into Boston.com's Z4M content management system. Content in these feeds comes in many forms:

  • NITF and NewsML (newspaper-standard XML dialects)
  • ATEX (the Globe's legacy editorial system)
  • Custom XML dialects

The feeds architecture normalizes this content, adding rich metadata using a custom categorization solution from a third-party vendor.

Each processing step may be written as a standalone Python or Perl script, leveraging Z4M's centralized configuration, logging, and event services. The steps are assembled into defined processes, using the feed specification application of the CMS, which also permits Boston.com's technical producers to schedule, monitor and control these feeds.

Assuring Feed Quality

Once imported into the CMS, Boston.com producers revise and approve Globe content via a sophisticated web-based interface. This interface provides access to all the rich metadata associated with each asset, organized and tailored to enhance producer productivity.

For Globe content, the approval interface organizes stories into daily editions, subdivided into physical sections for ease of comparison with the printed paper. Using this interface, one producer can review and approve an imported edition of the Globe in an hour.

Other feeds can be designated as "trusted", thus allowing their stories to be approved automatically on import, once they satisfy the business rules of the approval workflow.

Generating Pages

As each story is approved, Z4M automatically builds one or more pages for it, based on business logic and the article's metadata. These pages are further assembled, via additional business rules, incorporating related images, link boxes, and more. Each page is then put into a workflow, where it is published based on the availability of its article and other content assets.

Z4M also automates the assembly of "section front" pages i.e., "teases" for published pages are incorporated into "slots" on the section fronts using Z4M's event-driven business rules.

Adding High-Gloss

Producers manipulate pages using Z4M's browser-based layout tool. This tool enables the producer to rearrange and edit content, change the presentation of individual content elements, and slot new content elements using direct manipulation.

Delivering the Goods

The published stories are then served from Zope into a tiered caching architecture based on Squid. Z4M provides event-driven services for invalidating expired pages from the cache, providing the site with both excellent scalability and timely updates.

Squid also includes the Edge-Side Includes features, whose development within Squid was sponsored by Zope Corporation. ESI allows the Boston.com site to mix highly-cacheable content (e.g., Globe stories) and highly-dynamic content (e.g., poll results) on the same page.

Challenges

  • Integrate a growing number of heterogeneous content feeds into a single, centrally-managed system, expediting the delivery of this content to the public while ensuring the high production values, which are a hallmark at Boston.com
  • Enable Boston.com's content production and development staff to roll out innovative and exciting new site elements, including flexible site designs and interactive content elements
  • Scale the content delivery to meet Boston.com's current and projected demand (130 million page views/month current)

Approach

  • Tailor and extend Z4M to accommodate Boston.com's feed-driven content and high-touch production needs
  • Implement custom workflows, templates, and business rules, centered on Z4M's event-driven architecture
  • Publish content via Squid to meet Boston.com's scaling requirements
  • Sponsor incorporation of ESI into Squid, allowing producers to mix static and dynamic content within a scalable content delivery architecture

Benefits

  • Z4M streamlines the labor-intensive process of validating the import of each day's edition of the Globe, freeing overnight producers to focus on adding value to the delivered pages
  • Boston.com producers have access to a wide variety of content assets, all integrated into a metadata-driven storage and retrieval architecture, which encourages reuse
  • Templates separate the definition of the content form its presentation, allowing a centralized control of the site's look-and-fee, freeing the content producers to focus on content

We are very pleased with Zope Corporation's implementation of its content management system for Supportfolio. These tools provide quick and efficient access for various organizations within the company to manage and publish their own content, resulting in optimum delivery of support materials for our customers. Zope Corporation has delivered value beyond our expectations. They have demonstrated both creativity and professionalism, and their ongoing support has been exceptional.
- Satish Mirle, Engineering Manager for Electronic Services, SGI Technology Solutions