Having sufferred a poor service and experience from previous partners, the Development Finance Group needed some  help bringing three websites in house. However, each site had to be in three different languages with 400 plus documents per language too. They were adamant that they wanted complete control over the content - they were keen to exericse their digital rights. 

After exploring Dreamweaver as an option, and costing it out, an opensource CMS solution was arrived at. Debt Relief International were outsourcing their web updates and waiting over 2 weeks for changes to complete. This is just not acceptable for any website - private or public or charity sector.

We were greatly relieved to have Alan work with us on bringing our multi-lingual sites inhouse. His patience and determination in finding us the solutions we needed were fantastic. Thank god!
Maria Holloway, DFG Group

The solution:

• Open Source CMS with multi lingual support
• Custom component for MSOutlook Imports
• Clear user management process
• Custom notifications for site users and web admins

As the project unfolded it became clear that revision of the solution was going to be necessary. Some of the additional surprises further in were;

• There are approximatelty a thousand documents with one of the sites.......
• Users need migrating from MSExcel spreadsheets into the web database (MySQL)
• Key Contacts for each site need importing regularly from MS Outlook
• All user interaction processes need templating into their relevant languages
• You can't change the structure as all the content has been translated and no further translation is budgeted for

The project was scheduled for 27 days work including training in the use of the CMS. This work spanned a few months and several fields of coffee beans later the three sites were launched on Feb 10th 2006. The design of the sites was unaltered from the original as requested by the client.

Post-launch review showed that the process of working together went well. The clarity and ease of explanation given to the clients was highly valued when compared with other candidates for this work. All objectives were met and smooth running of the sites with in-house management is continuing well.

Visit: www.fpc-cbp.org