This is a case study written by Brenda on the redesign, development and migration of the Pier 21 National Historic Site website to the TYPO3 content management system. Brenda's responsibilities included:
• Selling the concept to investors
• Project managing the website's migration
• Copyediting the website at launch
• Copywriting the case study
Pier 21 National Historic Site Profile
From the twenties to the seventies, Pier 21 was Canada's 'front door' to over a million immigrants, wartime evacuees, refugees, troops, war brides and their children. They enriched our social and cultural landscape and uplifted the very soul of a nation.
In recognition of the significant role that Pier 21 played in Canadian history, the building was refurbished and reopened on July 1st, 1999 by the Pier 21 Society to pay tribute to those who passed through her doors and changed the face of Canada forever.
The Pier 21 Society is a registered non-profit organization based in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. Its inception in 1988 resulted from a concern among a small group of people, working in the areas of immigration and culture that the building, which had at one time housed a major immigration port-of-entry, was falling into disrepair. More importantly, the history surrounding Pier 21, a key port of entry into Canada, was in danger of being lost.
Today, a Board of 18 dedicated volunteers, as well as numerous other volunteers whose time and efforts make the development of Pier 21 possible direct the Society. A staff of approximately 25 run the facility year round.
The Project www.pier21.ca
Pier 21 approached Reuven Cohen to re-design their web site because they felt it was not being used to its full extent. Pier 21 was not only a museum dedicated to immigration but also a place where thousands of stories and archival images are collected. It offered a Wall of Honor/ Wall of Service where alumnus and relatives are able to purchase bricks and monuments for their loved ones.
Pier 21 National Historic Site offers conference space; specialized school / group tours, a gift shop carrying European artifacts available nowhere else in Canada. The Pier 21 museum, Exhibition Hall, offered a 4D multi media presentation like no other in the world. Pier 21 houses concerts, craft fairs, veteran celebrations and photo shoots, none of which were listed on the web site. Although there were many reasons why, it was three that stood out clearly.
Firstly, there was no way of keeping up with the information changes, as there was no one on site to make the changes on a daily basis. Secondly, the web site as it stood had been altered many times by different people and much of the information was incorrect and/or with dead links and dated pictures that none of the staff wanted to refer to. Thirdly, the price quotes for a re-design had been astronomical as the site was over 3000 pages and required a system that allowed room for constant change.
Being a not-for-profit society, Pier 21 did not have the funds available for these quotes. Reuven was approached because of his keen design eye but also because of his knowledge of the Typo3 system. The Typo3 system offered something that the previous quotes had not; a cost effective way to maintain content on a daily basis and the capabilities to house all that Pier 21 had to offer from online forms to e-commerce capabilities.
“I've been using Typo3 for almost 2 1/2 years and love it! Typo3 has given me the ability to compete with much larger CMS systems, while offering a cheaper and superior solution to my clients. It has also greatly increased the amount of "Perks & Features" I can offer with any web site I develop without having to do very much in the way of setup or programming.”– Reuven Cohen
The Content Management System: Typo3
Reuven offered the Typo3 Content Management System because it allowed the team at Pier 21 to update the web site and maintain the large amount of pages without having to hire a full time web developer knowledgeable in HTML to maintain the site. With Typo3, Pier 21 would have a full Content Management System (CMS) that was easy to use for even the most novice computer users at an affordable price.
Benefits of Typo3 for Pier 21
Costs
Being a non-profit society and museum with extensive over head, Pier 21 did not have the funds to spend on non-essential costs. Pier 21 needed a web site that was cost effective to create and more importantly cost effective to maintain. With Typo3, the Pier 21 Society was able to cut down on web site building costs for the actual creation of the site. Typo3 also eliminated additional salary costs because there is no need to hire a full time web developer to maintain the system, as it requires little programming knowledge. Typo3, being an open source program, offered the lowest cost yet still with more features than the Society would ever require. Typo3 is an open source product and licensed under GPL. This essentially means that Typo3 is available free of all cost allowing not-for-profit companies such as Pier 21 to have an advanced system at a low cost.
Timeline – Meeting Deadlines Within Budget
In order to complete the project for the launch of Pier 21’s 75th anniversary in January of 2003, the team had only 4 months to complete the project. Typo3 allowed the team to develop and implement 3000 pages with ease. Once the framework had been developed many of the pages where created by simply copying and pasting content rather than building each individually.
Updating Content - RTE
The Rich Text Editor (RTE) allowed each of the individual departments to change text, images and links with the same ease as a basic word processor program. This enabled each department, such as Rental Space Sales and Public Relations to maintain their individual pages with ease in real time.
"As one who regularly updates the Pier 21 web site, the ease of use of Typo3 has allowed me to confidently edit, add or delete content and not be at all intimidated. The tutorial was very easy to follow and as one who prefers to learn as I go, the set-up was straight forward enough that I didn't need to refer to the tutorial. ” - Maria McGowan, Manager of Public Relations and Special Programming
Connecting People Through the Message Board
Typo3 enabled the creation of a Message Forum where visitors can leave comments, stories, and experiences. It connected people enabling Pier 21 to maintain its important living history. This section was so popular that comments were left before the site had officially launched.
Timed Pages
Pier 21’s Media Relations and Special Events departments took advantage of Typo3's convenient timed pages feature allowing users to put a start and end date for content. For example, the California Wine Fair was held at Pier 21 on April 10th, the news release automatically disappeared from the press section on the Pier 21 web site on April 11th.
Image Management
On top of being able to add images to the web site, Typo3 offers automatic management of images, ensuring correct size and quality for the web. This was key for Pier 21 as the resource center and historical database held a significant amount of large file archival images, Typo3 automatically down sized the images using “Image Magic” to a web friendly size. Searchable Database As the main target audience for Pier 21 is over the age of 60, the society wanted a full search engine making all content within the site easy to find. Typo3 offered an indexed full text search that searches pages and external media files like TXT, HTML, MS Word and PDF-files enabling content on the entire site to be searchable.
“It (the web site) looks beautiful and works like a charm for finding things. It should eliminate a lot of confusion.” – Carrie Ann Smith, Pier 21 Research Librarian
User Groups
It was important to the staff at Pier 21 to be able to work from home, the Typo3 system allowed for backend users and groups to be assigned private home-directories on the server so that you can log in to your information at home or on the road.
Easy to Create Hyperlinks
Pier 21 wanted a links page in order to increase their online presence and help heritage enthusiasts find related web sites. Typo3 makes links easy to install and ensures there are no broken or dead links within the system at any given time eliminating the need to constantly review the links page.
Online Forms
A variety of online forms were created using Typo3 for ordering products, rental space requests, testimonials, story submission etc.
“Due to the easy of using the new system we will be putting eight hundred first hand arrival accounts online this summer. This collection will allow people who visit our web site to search for people that crossed the Atlantic with them. It will also be a wonderful resource for researchers and student” – Carrie Ann Smith, Research Librarian, Pier 21
Consistent Page Formatting
Reuven created templates and text formatting that ensured any changes or additions would match the basic design settings of the page. This allows many users access to edit, cut/copy/paste and create pages within the web site while sill maintaining design consistency. The pages within the site are arranged in a hierarchic tree structure similar to that of the file folder in a computer system and work as a pre-arranged site map. These features allow for consistency in design, in page layout and formatting – something the former site lacked.
“In a nut shell, Typo3 is user friendly, flawless and a smart choice for anyone who relies on efficient results. This technology is bang-on!" - Maria McGowan, Manager of Public Relations and Special Programming, Pier 21 National Historic Site
Secure Pages
Every page of the site can be made secure or non-secure leaving room for independent departments to maintain only their sections or for sections to be accessible to all. This opens the opportunity for outside vendors to have pages hosted on the site for potential revenue. It also allows for complex page permissions and since Pier 21 has several editors (different departments) they needed different accounts to the web site with varying levels of permissions.
Training Made Easy
Reuven provided Pier 21 with a customized Typo3 manual created by Marlies, the web site producer. This manual enabled the staff at Pier 21 to learn at their own speed and have a manual to refer to. On top of the customized manual, Reuven referred the staff to the extensive online training located at the Typo3 web site for further questions.
“Although Typo3 does have a slight learning curve, once you master it, you won't regret spending the time. As a freelance web designer, I have gained a significant amount of work directly because of my Typo3 knowledge…. Basically, it is an out-of-the-box solution for me. There is quite a buzz building and I'm really glad I became involved.” – Reuven Cohen |
