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The University of Edinburgh ITT UoE: EC0221/WEBMAN
THE UNIVERSITY OF EDINBURGH
COMPUTING SERVICES
WEB CONTENT MANAGEMENT SYSTEM
PRE-QUALIFICATION QUESTIONNAIRE
Ref. UoE: EC: 0221/WEBMAN
Closing date for receipt of responses
11.00am 9 March 2004
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CONTENTS Page
1 - INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................................. 3
2 – BACKGROUND TO THE UNIVERSITY ..................................................................................... 5
3– SCOPE OF THE SERVICE ............................................................................................................. 7
4—PRE-QUALIFICATION QUESTIONNAIRE ............................................................................... 8
5—RACE RELATIONS QUESTIONNAIRE .................................................................................... 47
APPENDIX A: COLLUSIVE TENDERING CERTIFICATE ....................................................... 52
APPENDIX B: CASE STUDIES .......................................................................................................... 53
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1 - INTRODUCTION
The University of Edinburgh intends to invite proposals for the provision of a Web Content
Management System (WCMS). The relationship with the selected supplier is expected to be for as
long as the WCMS selected meets the needs of the University.
This Pre-Qualification Questionnaire will be used by the University‟s WCMS Working Party to
produce a shortlist of suppliers, These suppliers will then be sent a sample website, and
subsequently be expected to carry out a presentation including a comprehensive demonstration of
their proposed system, using the sample website, to the Working Party. From this, reference site
information and the Whole Life Cost of the project , the final selection will be made, and those
selected will be asked to provide a final pricing document for the installation.
The key criteria for shortlisting will be:
Whole Life Cost of the Project
Existing client base
Customer references
Financial stability of tendering company, parent company and resellers if applicable,
How long the company has been trading
Company resources
Disability legislation compatibility how well the system will assist the University in meeting
new legislation, in particular disability legislation.
Compliance with standards
Integration with existing systems, e.g. search, authentication, portals
Ease of use in creating and managing web content
Devolvement and facilitation of editorial control
Value for money in relation to functionality offered
Ongoing support levels and support costs
The extent of any software development needed to meet the University‟s requirements
Maturity of the product in the marketplace
However, other factors may be taken into consideration at the discretion of the Working Party.
Please complete the Pre-Qualification Questionnaire and return, by 11.00am 9 March 2004, to:
George Reid
Procurement Officer
The University of Edinburgh
13 Infirmary Street
Edinburgh EH7 1LT
If you have any procedural queries relating to this document, please contact George Reid by email
george.reid@ed.ac.uk, or on tel: +44(0)131 650 8035.
Technical queries relating to this document should be addressed to: Charlotte Moon, email
C.Moon@ed.ac.uk, tel: +44(0)131 650 3347.
The PQQ will be opened by George Reid and Charlotte Moon , or their deputies at 11 am on
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the 10 March 2004 at The Procurement Office 13 Infirmary Street.
Responses received after the closing date cannot be considered.
Following issue of Pre-Qualification Questionnaires, the procurement process is likely to consist of:
- Evaluation of proposals by WCMS Working Party (mid March 2004)
- Successful suppliers‟ demonstrations (end March to early April 2004)
- Best and Final Offer (end April 2004)
- Award of business (early May 2004)
- Finalising contract / invoicing / procedural arrangements/Terms & Conditions (mid May
2004)
- System implementation and roll-out starts (June 2004)
This Tender will be subject to the Freedom of Information Act 2000.
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2 – BACKGROUND TO THE UNIVERSITY
General Structure
The University of Edinburgh structure consists of 21 Schools (each comprising a number of former
Departments) grouped into 3 Colleges: Humanities & Social Science, Medicine & Veterinary
Medicine, and Science & Engineering.
In addition, there are a number of academic and administrative support functions, such as
Computing Services, Library, Secretary, Academic Registrar, and Corporate Services.
Approximately 7,500 staff are employed by the University, of which around 3000 are academic
staff, and the rest are academic-related, technical, clerical and manual.
The University has around 21,600 students, of which three-quarters are undergraduates, and the rest
are postgraduates.
46% of the students are from Scotland, 34% from the rest of the UK, and 20% from outside the UK.
Three-quarters of the University‟s units of assessment are rated 5 or 5* by the RAE
(http://www.hero.ac.uk/rae/).
The main University website is at: http://www.ed.ac.uk/. Further information on the University can
be found at http://www.planning.ed.ac.uk/universityInfo.htm.
General IT infrastructure
The University of Edinburgh runs a mixed-platform infrastructure, based on the following
technologies:
Desktop computing
Microsoft Windows (a managed Desktop using Windows XP and Active Directory is
being rolled out)
Mac OS
Linux (Red Hat and others)
Solaris
Servers
Solaris
Windows NT Server, Windows 2000 Server or Windows 2003 Server
Network
The University‟s network (EdLAN) uses TCP/IP. Directory services were provided by Novell
Netware, but are now being handled by Microsoft‟s Active Directory 2000.
Databases
Supported databases are: Microsoft SQL Server 2000, Oracle, MySQL.
Email
IMAP (Internet Message Access Protocol) is supported for email.
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Document exchange
PDF is the supported format for document exchange.
Authentication
Both Active Directory and Kerberos are used for authentication. In addition, a project is underway
to choose a web-based authentication system linking to the Kerberos server, in order to provide
reduced sign-on capability (i.e. users will only need to authenticate once or at most twice). A final
decision on technology has not yet been made, but is likely to be one of: Yale CAS
(http://www.yale.edu/tp/auth/), Stanford WebAuth (http://webauthv3.stanford.edu/), or Cosign
(http://www.umich.edu/~umweb/software/cosign/).
Web infrastructure
Web servers
The University of Edinburgh runs several web servers for official departmental publishing.
There are two main platforms:
Apache running on Linux or Solaris, with mod_perl, PHP and occasionally mod_ssl
and DAV installed.
Microsoft Internet Information Server running on Windows NT/Windows
2000/Windows 2003 Server, with FrontPage Server Extensions installed.
Web authoring tools
At present, web content editors use a variety of tools to create and update pages.
Dreamweaver and FrontPage are the most commonly used.
Web application development
Computing Services provides a ColdFusion hosting service (using ColdFusion MX on IIS 6
and Windows 2000 Server, with Microsoft Access or Microsoft SQL Server 2000 as the
database), and a PHP scripting service (using PHP 4 with MySQL as the optional database).
Other technologies in use within departments include Active Server Pages, .NET, JSP, Perl
and Python.
Web sites and web authors
General
Web publishing in the University is devolved to individual departments and units, both academic
and non-academic. There is a central corporate website, which is managed by the University‟s Web
Editor.
There are approximately 200 web sites in the University, held on a number of web servers. Virtual
servers are used to provide URLs of the form www.something.ed.ac.uk.
The volume of web content is difficult to estimate, but as a rough guide there are about 0.5 million
web pages currently in existence. The rate of increase in pages is also difficult to estimate, but can
be placed somewhere between 5-10% p.a.
Most pages are available from anywhere on the Web, but a significant number of pages are
restricted to access from the ed.ac.uk domain.
All but a very small proportion of the University‟s web pages are in English.
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Typical content types include: general information pages, documentation, committee papers and
minutes, regulations, newsletters, staff lists, research information, lecture notes, events calendars,
course information, prospectuses, publications lists, maps, timetables, alerts, news, graphics, video,
audio, press releases, job vacancies, links databases/lists, FAQs, reports, policy documents,
projects, exam papers, discussion forums.
Pages are indexed and searched using a search service based on Inktomi (http://www.inktomi.com).
Academic departments
These commonly have one person nominated as the web site administrator. He or she would be
responsible for organising the content, and controlling access for other contributors. Generally most
academic staff would be expected to contribute and maintain their own content, even if this is only a
description of their research interests. Departmental secretaries and admin staff are commonly
involved in maintaining content as well.
WebCT is in use as a Virtual Learning Environment, although some departments have their own
VLE systems.
Websites for academic departments generally have several components:
1. An outward-facing site for other University staff and members of the public. This commonly
has a list of events and a list of staff with their research interests.
2. Information for prospective students (undergraduate and postgraduate) - regarded as very
important in order to attract high-calibre applicants.
3. Information for current students (undergraduate and postgraduate).
4. An intranet for staff, containing committee minutes, health and safety procedures etc.
Subsets of this information may be restricted in access to individual groups within the
department.
Non-academic departments
A much wider range of information is contained in the websites for non-academic departments,
which span the Library, Human Resources, Finance, Computing, Registry and many other
centralised University functions.
Therefore it is not possible to generalise, except that departments will again have outward-facing
sites for other University staff and the general public, and intranets for their own staff.
Students
Students may publish websites as part of their studies, e.g. for a research project, or to support
leisure and sport societies.–
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3 - SCOPE OF THE SERVICE
The University increasingly makes use of the Web to provide core information to the following
groups of users:
1. University staff
2. Undergraduate, postgraduate and continuing education students
3. The general public
4. The business and research community
5. Prospective students
The University requires a comprehensive, cost-effective and efficient Web Content Management
System to:
a. Make it easier for all web publishers in the University to create valid, accessible web pages.
b. Make it easier for all web publishers to use templates and style sheets to create a more
consistent appearance.
c. Facilitate editorial control (both central and devolved), while making it easier for academic
units to provide accurate, up-to-date content.
4—PRE-QUALIFICATION QUESTIONNAIRE
To be completed by the tenderer (using additional pages if necessary) Where
applicable please supply additional information for any parent company or if
the service is for software additional information on the owner of the
software and the relationship between the parties including any termination
arrangements and length of agreed relationship to supply the software.
4.1 COMPANY DETAILS AND HISTORY
4.1.1 Company Trading Name(s):
Sapphire Technologies Ltd
Address: Globe House, Station St, Stockton on Tees, Cleveland, TS20 2AB
______________________________________________________________________
Telephone: 01642 702100 Fax: 01642 702119
Contact: John Caveney E-mail address: john.caveney@sapphire.net
4.1.2 Registered office address:
As above
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4.1.3 If member of a Group, please state name address and registration number of parent
company:
Read Holdings Ltd, Cleveland House, Norton Road, Stockton-on-Tees, Cleveland TS20 2AQ
Company No : 04056287
4.1.4 Nature of company (e.g. plc, partnership, etc) and registration number:
Limited Company : 03183935
4.1.5 Date of formation of Company:
10/4/1996
4.1.6 Total Number of employees:……….
Direct Indirect
Management 4
Sales and 4
Marketing
IT 22
Quality
Others 2
Note: Tenderers must state if any indirect staff are involved in the ongoing support and
maintenance of the software.
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4.1.7 Number of UK offices, listing locations in Scotland:
4 offices, with 1 in Stirling
______________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________________
4.2 FINANCIAL DETAILS
4.2.1 Bankers : Barclays Bank Plc
Address: _____________________________________________________________
Barclays House, PO Box 235, Teesdale Business Park, Stockton on Tees, TS17 6YJ
4.2.2 Provide details of County Court judgements against your company (or parent) in the
previous five years:
none
4.2.3 Within the last five years, please give brief details of any significant take-overs of your
company, acquisitions by your company, periods of cessation of trading, administration
and/or receivership: __________________________________________________________
33% of the company sold to venture capitalists in November 2000
4.2.4 What was your (and parent) Financial Performance over the last three years?
Year Annual Turnover Pre-tax Profit
2002-2003 £2,300k unaudited £4k unaudited
2001-2002 £1,670k £(358)k
2000-2001 £1,325k £(650)k
Parent
Year Annual Turnover Pre-tax Profit
2002-2003 Not yet available Not yet available
2001-2002 £28,767k £1,147k
2000-2001 £27,620k £234k
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4.2.5 Please provide a copy of your (and parent companies) latest Annual Report.
Enclosed – Sapphire Technologies Ltd y/e Dec 2002
Read Holdings Ltd y/e Dec 2002
4.3 EXPERIENCE
4.1.3 Please provide details of contracts held during the last twelve months (including
contracts still held and those which have now expired) Tenderers should state which products
these companies have purchased, ideally they should relate to the goods being proposed in
Section 4.
Sapphire Technologies Ltd are recommending Shado MX Content Management System.
Shado is written and owned by Straker Interactive. Sapphire are Straker‘s partner in your
region. Shado is written in Cold Fusion MX.
Sapphire have been developing in Cold Fusion for 5-6 years. We have listed some of our
major Cold Fusion developments here.
Annual Contract Value
Start End
Client (named product where
Date Date
applicable)
Intranet
Contenet Management
System
NHS State Hospital for
Extra bespoke applications Mar 2002 July 2002
Scotland -Carstairs
including a Patients Menu
System.
Original Value = £61,000
MIDIS Motor Insurance Oct 2001 On-going
Motor Insurance Database Information
Information Centre System
•Provides the MIIC and all
UK solicitors access to
MID of all insured drivers.
••Allows the general
public access, to insurance
details of 3rd party after an
accident. (In line with a
European Directive)
••Provides access to stored
personal details under
DPA
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••Large CF Development
Original value = £64,000
Motor Data Solutions MIDAS Mar 2003 On-going
•Collects car insurance
details from insurance
companies, brokers and
fleet managers for the
MID
••Large CF Development
Original Value = £44,000
Legal Marketing •STARS system Sep 2001 On-going
Systems •
•Solicitors Tracking and
Recording system
••Used by Building
Societies I.e Halifax,
Abbey Nat.
••Allocates cases to
solicitors on performance
••General public can track
their case
••Large CF development
Performance Products Snooper Devices Apr 2002 On-going
•In-car radar and satellite-
based speed camera
detection system
••Collects camera
locations
••Registration and
Payment
••Master File distribution
••Large CF Development
Original value = £31,850
Let‟s Drive National •CRM Nov 2002 On-going
Advanced Driving ••Diary/booking system
School for Driving Instructors on
PC or PDA
••Large CF Development
Original Value = £47,000
4.3.2 Have any contracts awarded to your company during the last five years been terminated
early, i.e. before the contract termination date initially agreed?
____________________No______________________________________________________
If ‗yes‘, please describe the circumstances in each case:
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_____________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________
4.4 CLIENT REFERENCES
4.4.1 Please provide three references (preferably Higher Education or Government
institutions) who can be contacted to obtain a statement on the suitability of your company:
We have listed both Straker and Sapphire referees here.
Straker Referees.
REFEREE 1
Name of company: London Metropolitan University
Address: Holloway Road, London, N7 8DB
Telephone: 0171 753 3289
Name of person to contact: Mike O‟Reilly – Intranet Services Manager
email: m.oreilly@londonmet.ac.uk
REFEREE 2
Name of company: University of Hertfordshire
Address: College Lane, Hatfield, Hertfordshire, AL10 9AB
Telephone: 01707284076
Name of person to contact: Tom Short
email tshort@herts.ac.uk
Auckland University
John McMasters (Details can be provide on request)
Auckland, New Zealand
REFEREE 3
Name of company: Auckland University
Address: Auckland New Zealand.
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Telephone: Details On request
Name of person to contact: John McMasters
Sapphire Referees.
REFEREE 1
Name of company: Legal Marketing Services
Address: LMS House
Lloyd Drive
Cheshire Oaks Business Park
Cheshire
CH65 9HQ
Telephone: 0870 907 9400
Name of person to contact: Matthew Brown
email: matthew.brown@lmsuk.com
REFEREE 2
Name of company: Motor Insurers Information Centre
Address: Linford Wood House
6-12 Capital Drive
Linford Wood
Milton Keynes
MK14 6XT
Telephone: 01908 671660
Name of person to contact: Jackie Soltan
email Jackie@miic.org.uk
REFEREE 3
Name of company: Darchem Engineering Ltd
Address: Stillington
Cleveland
UK
TS21 1LB
Telephone: 01740 630461
Email : keithphillips@darchem.co.uk
4.5 QUALITY ASSURANCE AND RECRUITMENT
4.5.1 Does your company possess accreditation to a recognised quality assurance scheme, such
as ISO 9002? Please give details.
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Certified to BS7799 a globally recognised standard in information security management
4.5.2 Please provide details of any awards gained on relevant work produced within the last
three years.
None – but currently shortlisted for North East business award for Technology
4.5.3 Please outline here (or submit separate documents as appropriate) your company‘s
recruitment policy and procedures.
Please explain how you would ensure that the people you engage are suitably experienced and
qualified to undertake the duties required under this contract.
Sapphire uses a local agency exclusively for Software Developers. However, there is a very low
turnover of staff in the North-East of England and we have not lost a Software Developer for over
18 months.
We have a wealth of Cold Fusion experience gained whilst developing large software applications.
Shado based upon Cold Fusion and our developers are trained in its use.
4.5.4 Is your company a member of recognised trade associations or professional bodies?
Please give details.
British Computer Society
British Security Industry Association
CLAS ( a scheme run by GCHQ)
4.5.6 Does your company operate an Environmental Policy? (Please supply copy of Policy if
available.)
Yes see enclosed
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4.6 General technical information
4.6.1 Does the proposed package use an underlying technology and design that will
form the basis of the primary supported version of the software for at least the
next 3 years?
Response
Shado is based on Macromedia Cold Fusion MX. Straker has recently redesigned
the product from Cold Fusion version 5 to MX. This was an enormous challenge,
which is now reaping dividends. Straker has no intention of moving from the
underlying technology in the next 3 years..
4.6.2 Who currently owns the package and for how long?
Response
Straker Interactive Ltd NZ owns the package and all associated IP. There are no
plans to move ownership of the package.
4.6.3 Who first wrote the package and when?
Response
Straker Interactive wrote version one of the package in 1999
4.6.4 What is the current fully supported version and when was it released?
Response
Straker ShadoMX Version 6.1 Professional or Enterprise.
Released June 2003
4.6.5 Give details of the next major version of the package and when it is scheduled for
release.
Response
Version 7 is due for release in April 2004
4.6.6 Are all modules/parts of the proposed package fully integrated? If yes, give
details on how this is achieved.
Response
Yes, some are licensed separately
4.6.7 Are all modules/parts of the proposed package using or running the same level of
technology? If not, provide details.
Response
All modules are running on the same version of Cold Fusion MX.
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4.6.8 Are there any components of the proposed package that have not yet run live at a
customer site? If yes, give details.
Response
No
4.6.9 Describe the package‟s licensing and pricing structure.
Response
ShadoMX is supplied on a per server licensing model as is not limited to Users.
Shado licensing is available for production / live servers , development, staging
and multiple front end servers.
Examples:
Shado MX Professional License - £17,000
Shado MX Enterprise License for Education- £26,000 (normally £49,000)
Shado MX Professional Development Server License (non-live) - £5,100
Subs @ 15% / annum
4.7 Version control
4.7.1 How do you keep customers informed of future releases?
a) major releases
Response
Yes
b) minor releases
Response
Yes
4.7.2 Explain your bug fixing procedures and whether you automatically inform all
users of all known bugs and available fixes.
Response
Update patch builds are released periodically if required, yes we inform all
users.
4.7.3 What is your policy for supporting previous versions of the package?
Response
We support up to 1 previous version
4.7.4 How much notice do you give when downgrading or withdrawing support for a
particular version of the package?
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Response
6 Months
4.7.5 How quickly do you produce new versions to support new releases of:
a) Server operating systems
b) Client operating systems
c) Databases
d) Web browsers
e) Development tools or programming languages
Response
9 – 12 month
4.7.6 How often do you bring out a major release? Provide the release history of the
package.
Respons
Straker commits to provide a minimum of one upgrade to Shado per annum. As
Shado runs on a number of operating systems it is not tied to the operating
system environment. Clients are required to upgrade to the latest version that is
provided if they require new features that have provided in a later build.
4.7.7 Are upgrades and new releases included in the annual maintenance charge? If
not, give the costing policy.
Response
All Shado software upgrades are covered under an annual maintenance
agreement.
4.7.8 Are new software releases installable by the customer? Please indicate typical
effort involved in installing new releases, and provide information on any
services offered for installation by the supplier.
Response
4.8 Package Development
4.8.1 What language(s) and/or tool(s) is the package written in? Are there any plans to
use new languages or tools?
Response
Shado MX is based on Macromedia’s Cold Fusion MX. There are no plans to
use new languages.
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4.8.2 If more than one language or tool is used, give reason and details of what each
one is used for.
Response
See 4.8.1.
4.8.3 Is the package supplied as source code or executables? If source code, specify
the required compilers.
Response
The core Shado engine is encrypted to protect the product IP an uintentional
compromise occurring from tampering with the core engine. Shado is open in
nature and the API provides all the tools a developer needs to extend the
application.
4.8.4 Provide details of testing and quality assurance stages of new versions of
programs and modules.
Response
All releases are fully QA’d and go through a rigorous beta testing program
including load and failover testing.
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4.9 Client Software – Content Authoring/editing
4.9.1 Describe the tool(s) available for a content author/editor to access the system to
create, review and update content.
Response
A key strength of SHADO is its built in editing tool, the SHADO Content Editor.
The web-based WYSIWYG editor, which generates HTML code is as easy to use
as MS Word. It offers the following features:
Spell checker
Bold, Italic and Underlined text
Font styles
Font size and colour options
Left, Centre and Right aligned paragraphs
Numbered and bulleted lists
Background colours and images
Linking within the site and to external sites
Image inclusion from the DMS. The DMS can be used to enable an editor
to add Images, Video, sound and multimedia files.
The system will attempt to bring through the styles from the original document
however there is also a “strip” button to remove original styles. Permitted styles
can then be applied to the text. The Shado Editor is entirely controlled by style
sheets. This ensures user cannot add any fonts or styles outside of the section-
approved fonts or styles. An administrator can add new styles or entirely new
styles sheets that can be applied at page or section level.
Site appearance is controlled by the use of page templates. The templates can be
developed using such tools as Macromedia’s Dreamweaver.
Editor is complient with IE 5.5 + and Mozilla (windows/Mac/Unix) 1.4 +
4.9.2 Can Dreamweaver, FrontPage or Microsoft Word be used to create or update
content in the system?
Response
Yes - See 4.9.1.
4.9.3 Is there an integrated spell checker?
Response
Yes - See 4.9.1.
4.9.4 Does the content author/editor require a knowledge of HTML or any other mark-
up language in order to be able to create and update content?
Response
No Knowledge of HTML or any other mark-up language is required.
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4.9.5 Can the tool(s) be customised by the University of Edinburgh (e.g. screen layout,
help text, menu items, toolbar)?
Response
Yes
4.9.6 Indicate what skills would be required in order to carry out such customisation.
Response
Basic HTML
If the tool is browser-based:
4.9.7 Which web browsers are supported? Specify versions and platforms.
Response
Minimum browser specification for editors is IE5.5 and Mozilla 1.4. These
minimum specifications apply to Windows, Mac and Linux operating systems.
Using a low level browser would impose limitations on the use of the system but
it is possible to write alternative interfaces into the system if required.
4.9.8 Are any browser plug-ins or additional software required?
Response
No.
4.9.9 Can a Microsoft Installer (msi) package be created for any required plug-ins?
Response
Shado ships with its own custom package deployment architecture
4.9.10 Does the editing tool work with screen reading software and/or an audio browser
such as JAWS?
Response
Unsure
4.9.11 Is the tool written in XHTML?
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Response
SHADO comes with various methods for generating content in XML format.
SHADO comes complete with an HTML 2 XHTML parser object. This object is a
derivative of the jTidy Java object that has been integrated into a ColdFusion
Object for SHADO. The parser object is available through the tools menu in
SHADO and piecemeal code can be entered in a form for conversion or the
object can parse an entire SHADO site and ensure all code in containers is
XHTML compliant.
There is also the option to determine HTML is converted whenever content is
edited or updated. The above processes take care of content that is editable and
stored in the SHADO database. To ensure a site is 100% compatible then all
templates in the system must also be coded to the correct XHTML standard. The
parser object will parse to XHTML 1.0 Transitional XHTML. As with the Dublin
Core Meta Data Standards the XHTML parser has been encapsulated into a
ColdFusion Component and is accessible via a fully exposed API to give
developers freedom to use the parser in any way the feel.
4.9.12 Does the tool require the use of frames?
Response
Yes
If the tool is separately installed client software:
4.9.13 What are the system requirements?
Response
Not Applicable.
4.9.14 Can a Microsoft Installer (msi) package be created for it?
Response
Not Applicable.
4.9.15 Does the tool work with screen reading software?
Response
Not Applicable.
4.9.16 How does the tool communicate with the server?
Response
Not Applicable.
4.9.17 How does the tool support printing?
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Response
Not Applicable.
4.10 Client Software – Administration
4.10.1 Describe the options available for a web site administrator to carry out tasks such
as creating new users, modifying roles, setting up workflow rules, and so on.
Response
Workflow has been developed to meet the needs of the majority of clients. Users
are classified as:
1. Administrators - who can edit and publish immediately
2. Editors – edit content only
3. Publishers – approve, re-edit or decline content changes made by Editors
Workflow items are created such as spell checking, legal sign-off, and proof
reading. Workflow items are then grouped together so that differing Workflow
Groups can be created. Each page can be assigned with a Workflow Group. The
Group publisher is then required to confirm that all items have been checked.
If the Editor/Publisher roles are being utilized the page owner is emailed once
content has been changed. Additional users or groups can be added to the
notification process.
Any Publisher who has permissions to that section can sign-off the workflow
items and approve the content for go-live.
4.10.2 Can the administrative tool be customised by the University of Edinburgh (e.g.
screen layout, help text, menu items, toolbar)?
Response
Yes
4.10.3 Indicate what skills would be required in order to carry out such customisation.
Response
Basic HTML
If the administrative tool is browser-based:
4.10.4 Which web browsers are supported? Specify versions and platforms.
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Response
Minimum browser specification for editors is IE5.5 and Mozilla 1.4. These
minimum specifications apply to Windows, Mac and Linux operating systems.
Using a low level browser would impose limitations on the use of the system but
it is possible to write alternative interfaces into the system if required.
4.10.5 Are any browser plug-ins or additional software required?
Response
No.
4.10.6 Can a Microsoft Installer (msi) package be created for any required plug-ins?
Response
4.10.7 Does the administrative tool work with screen reading software and/or an audio
browser such as JAWS?
Response
4.10.8 Is the tool written in XHTML?
Response
See 4.9.11.
4.10.9 Does the tool require the use of frames?
Response
If the administrative tool is separately installed client software:
4.10.10 What are the system requirements?
Response
Not Applicable.
4.10.11 Can a Microsoft Installer (msi) package be created for it?
Response
Not Applicable.
4.10.12 Does the administrative tool work with screen reading software?
Response
Not Applicable.
4.10.13 How does the administrative tool communicate with the server?
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Response
Not Applicable.
4.10.14 How does the administrative tool support printing?
Response
Not Applicable.
4.11 Server software
4.11.1 Describe the server software components required, including any database
software, and how they interact and communicate with one another.
Response
Shado will work on the following Server Operating Systems;
Windows 2000 and above,
Linux RedHat 7.2 and above
Solaris
Shado will interface with the following Relational Database Management
Systems;
Oracle,
MS SQL Server,
MYSQL,
DB2.
Shado will interface with the following Web Servers;
Apache 2 and above,
IIS,
Zeus
Shado will interface with the following Application Servers;
Cold Fusion MX
Java Runtime.
Jrun
Weblogic
Websphere
SunONE
4.11.2 What are the system requirements for each server software component?
Response
4.11.3 Can the server software components be installed without the assistance of the
supplier?
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Response
Yes
4.11.4 Can content be published to multiple web servers? If yes, describe how this is
achieved.
Response
Yes, via the integrated syncronisation and deployment wizards ( Enterprise
version only)
If the package can use or requires a web server:
4.11.5 Which web servers and versions are supported?
Response
Apache 2 and above,
IIS,
Zeus
4.11.6 Does the package require special settings for the web server, or specific
modules?
Response
Only standard mappings
If the package can use or requires database software:
4.11.7 Which DBMSs and versions are supported?
Response
Oracle,
MS SQL Server,
MYSQL,
DB2.
4.11.8 Does the package require special settings for the DBMS, or specific modules?
Response
No
4.11.9 Is a full database schema provided?
Response
Yes
4.12 Backups
4.12.1 What back-up and recovery mechanisms are provided within the package?
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Response
These are generally handled by the internal systems of clients although version
of templates and contents are stored on the server.
4.12.2 What back-up and recovery mechanisms outside the proposed package does a
customer have to carry out?
Response
Backup the database and site folder on the webserver
4.12.3 Can users continue to access the system while backups are running?
Response
Yes
4.13 Performance
4.13.1 What volume of content can the system handle?
Response
Dependant on the hardware running the system, we have a number of sites
running over 10 Million users sessions per year
4.13.2 Describe any content caching features in the system.
Response
File system and database level caching as well as an in-memory caching
mechanism.
4.13.3 How is performance when serving content or updating content affected by the
volume of content in the system?
Response
Should not have any significant impact if the caching is configured for live
content
4.13.4 How many customers with a comparable content volume are currently using the
system?
Response
150
4.13.5 How many content editors can be logged on simultaneously?
Response
Dependent on server hardware but no reason why 1000 could not be logged in at
once.
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4.13.6 How is performance when creating or editing content affected by the number of
content editors logged on simultaneously?
Response
Shouldn’t’ have any significant impact providing the server has sufficient RAM
4.13.7 Describe any performance monitoring or measurement functions provided by the
package.
Response
Server Metric Data (load, threads in use ect) and uptime monitor integrated into
application.
4.14 System Security
4.14.1 Describe the data security mechanisms provided within the proposed package.
Response
Shado has a number of security features available out of the box. These include;
Login attempt timeouts (X counts and lock out) - Aids against brute force
attacks.
Unique session ID generation - Prevents multiple users using the same account
at the same time.
Can be run in distributed mode - Application server runs remote from live web
server.
Shado admin users log in to back end admin server. - Enables Web server to be
locked down completely.
Cross browser scripting protection - Anonymous user can not hijack the session.
Supports SSL encryption
Support integration with LDAP
4.14.2 What security measures outside the proposed package does a customer have to
carry out?
Response
None specific to Shado but the customer should adhere to BS7799 guidelines.
4.14.3 Does the package support secure websites (https) and SSL? Provide details.
Response
Shado Supports SSL encryption.
4.14.4 What kind of encryption for communication between the client and server is
supported?
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Response
https
4.14.5
Has the package undergone a review using a framework such as ISO 17799?
Provide details.
Response
Sapphire are BS7799 Certified for Secure Application Development.
Shado has Not formal certification but Deloittes has carried out a client
requested audit on the product. Some changes were made as a result of that for
Shado 6.1 in September 03 and a repeat audit is to be carried out March 04.
4.14.6
How are security notifications, patches and updates provided?
Response
Email
4.14.7
Are there security specific guidelines for implementing the package?
Response
Sapphire are a security company certified to BS7799 and have CHECK and
CLAS consultants. All security issues during implementation would be deal with
in the appropriate way.
4.15 Training, documentation and support
4.15.1 Does the proposed package come with test and training facilities? If yes, give
details.
Response
We allow access to our test servers for you to test Shado. We would prefer to
demonstrate Shado to you prior to the testing
4.15.2 Give details of all standard training courses and schedules relevant to the
proposed package. Please indicate the type of user or technical person each
course is aimed at.
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Response
We would recommend that Developers attend the Standard Shado Developer
Training Course (2 day)
We would recommend that Editors and Publishers attend The Shado Editor
Course (1 day).
Courses are provided at our premises or on yours. We often tailor our training
to develop your own templates during the course. We find clients find this more
productive.
4.15.3 What documentation and how many copies are provided as standard? What
optional extra documentation may be purchased and what are the costs?
Response
User on-line help documentation and e-books to provide tutorials are available.
4.15.4 Is there an online version of all or part of the documentation?
Response
See 4.15.3.
4.15.5 Can the documentation be provided in an electronic form?
Response
See 4.15.3.
4.15.6 Are you prepared to take part in benchmark and performance testing?
Response
Yes
4.15.7 Is there an independent user group for the proposed package? If yes, please
provide contact names, addresses and phone numbers.
Response
Subscriptions and maintenance fees allow the University access to Shado
upgrades, access to forums, access to the developer zone etc.
4.15.8 Does your company operate a Help Desk? If yes, provide details and indicate
whether a customer can communicate with the Help Desk via email.
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Response
Yes.
Please see 4.5.9.
4.15.9 Provide details of standard Service Level Agreements for response to Help Desk
calls logged.
Response
Level of Support (Example)
To be provided between 08:30 and 17:00, Monday to Friday.
Calls should be directed to the support desk by telephone, fax, e-mail or via the web support form.
Tel: 01642 702100
Fax: 01642 702119
Email: helpdesk@sapphire.net
URL: Choose Helpdesk from Home page
The requester must give at least the following information.
Company
Contact telephone number
e-mail address
Brief Description of fault
Out of hour calls should be directed to option “Internet” on the normal support desk number
above.
Calls will be redirected.
Other available support numbers :- Jon xxxx 07976 000000
Chris xxx 07976 000000
Lisa xxxx 07976 000000
John xxxx07976 000000
Quantity of Support (Example)
Response to call within 2 hours.
Communication – From the initial call the requester will automatically be informed by e-mail of
the log number for future reference. The response to the call will be from an Engineer via,
telephone, fax or e-mail.
Those authorised to raise incidents with the Sapphire Helpdesk are: xxxxxxxx, and any others that
from time to time are authorised by xxxxxx. Authorisation to proceed with any incident that incurs
an additional change cost must be authorised by xxxxxxx.
On completion of a call an automatic e-mail completion will be sent to the requester.
Our escalation process is part of our Help Desk procedures, which are in turn certified to BS7799 standard.
4.15.10 Does your company operate an online support or bug database that customers
can access?
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Response
See 4.15.7
4.16 Timescales and experience
4.16.1 We anticipate having the service in operation by the end of July 2004, and
moving the first website (around 3000 pages) into the system by the end of
December 2004. Please state whether these timescales are acceptable.
Response
Yes, other Universities have achieved similar implementation times with
ShadoMX
4.16.2 Describe what experience you have of providing Web Content Management
Systems to higher education institutions.
Response
We have a number of Universities world-wide using the system including
London metropolitan, University of Glouster, Adelaide University and
Massey (NZ).
4.17 Page and site management
4.17.1 Describe the options for maintaining audit trails of changes to pages and
sites.
Response
Shado incorporate a complete Audit Trail of all User access and functions
on the site.
Shado has an Audit trail tracks all changes to the system providing an audit
trail of what changes were done when and by whom. This powerful feature
also enables webmasters not only to track changes but to also undo and
reverse some changes.
Shado audit trail archives all data. A complete range of queries can be
written to retrieve selected data and report against certain events or user-
defined queries.
4.17.2 Describe the options for version control, e.g. check in/out of pages, locking.
Also state whether these options can be activated for individual websites or
are set system-wide.
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Response
Shado incorporates check-in/check-out functionality which allows for staged
editing of content. This ensures that only one editor can be editing a
container at a time When the edit icon for a container is selected it will
check-out the container. This means that the content is temporarily stored in
the database as content in progress and allows the following:
• Users with Editor roles that require publisher sign-off can change content
as often as they like before committing the content to the publishing queue
• Publishers can change content as often as they like before committing the
content to live
Shado also checks out a file or content container while this is being worked
on. Another user can clearly see the container is checked out and by whom.
Content and pages can be scheduled to go-live or expire on a given date.
This can be incorporated into the Workflow process if required or simply by
and Administrator as well.
4.17.3 Is it possible to roll back to earlier versions of a page?
Response
Yes
4.17.4 Does the package have event-driven workflow features? Describe these, and
the options for sending workflow messages.
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Response
Shado incorporates an Object Builder, which provides a framework for the rapid
development of applications that you can then deploy in your Shado site. It is a
true Object Orientated development environment within Shado and is one of the
products strongest and most unique features.
The framework provides a way to develop applications in Shado which can utilise
an object orientated methodology and constructs. With a comprehensive web based
administration, webmasters can develop basic applications with a minimum of
training. More experienced developers can create more complex applications by
only writing code that deals with the behaviour or use of objects, rather than how
they are implemented. It is a powerful tool, enabling rapid development within
Shado that focuses on what the system does, not how it does it.
The object framework is based around a programming approach called Object
Orientation. This methodology decomposes an application into entities or objects
that reflect things. These 'things' may be; an order, a customer, a product etc.
These objects are given properties which represent their data and state. The
developer then uses behaviours (or methods) of these objects, and their interactions
to develop the system.
The object framework provides many building blocks for developing quite complex
applications. Besides the basic object orientated implementation through Cold
Fusion components, there is also:
a) Properties - object properties are based on classes and types. The
class provides functionality for re-usuable properties, whilst the type
reflects the basic data type.
b) Event handling - event handlers can be written which are configured
to run on certain events and allow you to program event driven
applications
c) Rules engine - rules can be written and used across properties, to
enforce business logic within an object and across an application
d) Persistence layer - different persistence engines can be written to
allow the underlying data store of the objects to be a file system,
database or any other repository
e) Templating - templating is used as way to enforce an Model View
Controller (MVC) methodology and also to provide for
standardisation of components, such as form fields for properties
f) Administration - the administration area allows you to manage and
develop your objects and applications using them from one place.
You can develop basic applications and more advanced ones
completely in the admin, by creating classes, adding properties and
writing and configuring, events, functions, rules and templates
The object framework can be used to link to an existing database or create new
tables within the Shado site database that can be populated by data from the
external database. Whether it is a direct ODBC connection or population of data
accessible to Shado depends on the preference of separation of the website
internally. This can be achieved by writing a custom persistence engine,
which makes calls to the external database, but still runs within the object
framework. Alternatively, using events and custom code, you can mirror your
external data within Shado Objects by propagating updates to the external
database.
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4.17.5 Can the system provide a staging area for websites to be reviewed before
publication? Please give details.
Response
Yes, using archive/deploy mechanisms integrated into application.
4.17.6 Can static pages be published?
Response
Yes
4.17.7 Can tasks such as content publishing and archiving be scheduled?
Response
Yes
4.17.8 Does the system support virtual web servers?
Response
Yes
4.17.9 Describe how HTTP access to groups of pages (e.g. department intranets,
team intranets, university-only pages) is controlled.
Response
Integrated permissions structure controls these functions
4.17.10 Describe how pages are deleted from the system.
Response
Moved to recycle bin and then file is deleted and database record is deleted
when page is finally deleted from recycle bin.
4.17.11 Does the package have tools for checking internal and external hypertext
links?
Response
Shado's WYSIWYG editor allows for the creation of internal and external
links.
Link checking is a batch process accessed via Shado’s reporting section. It
is also possible to do dynamic checking by scripting on event actions from
the API.
4.17.12 Describe any reporting tools included with the system. Can content authors
and site managers develop their own reports?
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Response
To ensure organisations can interpret their web site usage, SHADO comes
with a comprehensive graphical reporting package.
Standard Reports
Visitors by IP address
Visitor sessions
Most popular pages over a given time period
Slowest pages
Fastest pages
Path visitors take through a site
Page views over a given time period
Referring sites
Browser breakdown
Operating system breakdown
User Screen resolution breakdown
Visitors by country
Advanced Reports
An Advanced Reporting Module is also available which allows the following
additional reports:
Permissions based report viewing – users can only see reports for
the sections they have permissions to.
Export graph data to Excel
Export graph images in 3 formats
Report filtering by section
Content about to expire
Broken links
Current logged in users
Search words and phrases
Currency of content
Entry and exit points
The Advanced Reporting Module is an add-on to Shado Professional and is
priced separately.
4.17.13 Can reports be generated on a complete website or a subset of a website?
Response
Either.
4.17.14 If the system runs the live website, are any page access and error log
reporting tools provided? Describe them.
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Response
Yes fully logging is integrated into the system
4.18 User management
4.18.1 Describe how user access is set up and managed.
Response
SHADO has a unified User and User Groups model, allowing the same
scheme to control access for site managers, contributors and end users.
Specific properties can be logged against users and groups. User session
maintenance is handled transparently.
Content editing and publication is limited by permissions. Content Editors
can only edit content they have appropriate permissions to edit, and Content
Publishers can only publish content for which they have permission. There is
also a super user role, called the ShadoMaster. ShadoMasters can edit and
publish instantly, bypassing normal workflow processes. This allows
efficient site updates by trusted users, such as Webmasters.
Any user can be given granular access to specific content objects. Specific
permission levels control object creation, deletion, modification, read and
write access. User Group Permissions can be assigned to site objects at a
Section, Page or Container level. As with other properties, permissions
respect the Site Tree's inheritance model, making permission management
fast yet flexible.
The user permission roles are fully customisable via the API.
4.18.2 Describe how users can be assigned to roles, and how roles are created and
managed.
Response
See 4.18.1
4.18.3 Describe how many levels of control can be established.
Response
Unlimited custom levels can be established
4.18.4 Can user management be devolved to the level of individual websites?
Response
Yes
4.18.5 Describe the options available for authenticating users of the system.
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Response
LDAP integration is integrated into the system
4.18.6 Describe the options available for authorising users of the system.
Response
Session/cookie based authorization based on shado permission architecture
4.18.7 Can the system operate with any of the proposed technologies for reduced
sign-on (see section 2, Background). If not, could it be modified to do so?
Response
ShadoMX can be configured to leverage an LDAP directory (such as a
Windows 2000 network Active Directory Service) for user- and login-related
tasks.
There are currently two main facilities provided with ShadoMX/LDAP
integration:
1. Existing LDAP users and groups can be imported into ShadoMX to
become user logins for Shado Central. This greatly expedites the
set-up of the roles and permissions system within ShadoMX.
2. ShadoMX can utilise an existing network login to authenticate a
ShadoMX user. This removes the necessity to login to both a
business network (such as a LAN) and then again into ShadoMX. If
you're logged into the network, and your LDAP account has been
imported into ShadoMX, your ShadoMX login will be completely
transparent.
Shado is preconfigured for LDAP authentication. Authentication is done
against the LDAP directory and authorisation is controlled within Shado.
Synchronisation of the user accounts between Shado and the LDAP
directory can be customised to fit the client's network configuration. The
Shado user directory would need to contain at least one identifier stored in
the LDAP directory.
It should be noted, however, that whilst user information can be derived
from LDAP, the roles within an NT directory might not map directly onto the
Shado roles required. An Administrator in the NT Directory may not get
Administrator rights in Shado.
4.19 Integration
4.19.1 Can non-HTML documents (e.g. PDF/Microsoft Word/RTF) be stored in
the system? If not, what facilities are there for managing these documents?
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Response
The SHADO Document Management System (DMS) allows you to store all
files and images used within the site in a central repository. File types
included all commonly used files. Once files have been stored in the DMS
you simply use the content editing tools to add files or images into the site. It
possible to add display behaviours to files pulled from the library giving
content editors a large design toolset, while enforcing design guidelines.
A file in the DMS consists of two parts. The first is a file object, which in
turn contains one or more file instances. In this way the DMS contain
different versions of a file, multiple resolutions of an image or a document in
different formats for example. Meta data can be added to uploaded files,
such as captions, usage guidelines, text descriptions and source information.
Files can then be assigned to one or many user-definable search categories.
In this way, digital assets can be tracked, syndicated, and reused in a
controlled manner.
4.19.2 Can non-HTML documents be imported into the system and converted to
HTML?
Response
Users can copy and paste from MS Office applications into Shado but there
is currently no other direct support. New additions planned for the DMS
include a Shado toolbar in Office apps to allow for the easy upload of
documents to Shado from MS Office apps.
4.19.3 Can the system interact with other databases (ODBC-compliant) to display
or import data?
Response
Shado supports database Web application development with high-
performance database connection pooling and support for ODBC, OLEDB,
and native drivers.
Shado offer offers enterprise application integration through major
component standards, including COM,CORBA, and EJB as well as support
for the extensive and growing library of third-party ColdFusion Extensions
(CFXs) written in C, C++, .Net or Java.
Shado has integrated with a wide variety of applications and its open
structure and standards based architecture allows for this. This ranges
from integration with ERP systems, stock systems, financial systems, CRMs
utilising a range of database structures.
4.19.4 How are pages containing non-HTML scripting code (ColdFusion, Active
Server Pages, JSP, PHP) handled?
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Response
ColdFusion, JSP supported
4.19.5 How are CGI scripts handled?
Response
Via the web server and integraed into templates
4.19.6 Describe any features for importing or exporting content as XML
documents.
Response
XML
SHADO comes with various methods for generating content in XML format.
SHADO comes complete with an HMTL 2 XHMTL parser object. This object
is a derivative of the Tidy Java object that has been integrated into a
ColdFusion Object for SHADO.
The parser object is available through the tools menu in SHADO and
piecemeal code can be entered in a form for conversion or the object can
parse an entire SHADO site and ensure all code in containers is XHMTL
compliant.
There is also the option to determine HMTL is converted whenever content
is edited or updated.
The above processes take care of content that is editable and stored in the
SHADO database. To ensure a site is 100% compatible then all templates in
the system must also be coded to the correct XHMTL standard.
The parser object will parse to XHMTL 1.0 Transitional XHTML.
As with the Dublin Core Meta Data Standards the XHTML parser has been
encapsulated into a ColdFusion Component and is accessible via a fully
exposed API to give developers freedom to use the parser in any way the
feel.
4.19.7 Is there an API for adding functionality to the system? Please provide
details.
Response
Shado has over 1000 available API functions. The API is written in
ColdFusion MX so an understanding of this technology is required to
extend the API. The API is fully documented.
4.20 Content presentation
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4.20.1 Describe the features for creating and maintaining page templates.
Response
Templates can deliver content in any format required from Plain text to HTML,
XHTML,WML, XML or any other mime type. The limits are only controlled by the
Web server not the content management system.
There is an in built style sheet editor in Shado MX. Styles can be enforced on users
editing content. Style sheets are standard .css files, not stored in a database or
other proprietary storage.
A key strength of SHADO is its built in editing tool, the SHADO Content Editor.
The web-based WYSIWYG editor, which generates HTML code is as easy to use as
MS Word. It offers the following features:
Spell checker
Bold, Italic and Underlined text
Font styles
Font size and colour options
Left, Centre and Right aligned paragraphs
Numbered and bulleted lists
Background colours and images
Linking within the site and to external sites
Image inclusion from the DMS
The Shado Editor is used “in-context” to enable the user to review the content in
the page before submitting.
The Shado Editor is entirely controlled by style sheets. This ensures user cannot
add any fonts or styles outside of the section-approved fonts or styles. An
administrator can add new styles or entirely new styles sheets that can be applied
at page or section level.
Content can be reused by link content containers across multiple pages. Templates
can be re-used by assigning to multiple pages
The reuse of content is made possible by linking content containers. Shado
manages a history of all containers versions and can enable versions to be
compared. The reuse of documents is managed by Shado’s Document Management
System (DMS), which enables any document to be reused across the whole site. The
DMS also manages version control of each document.
Shado incorporates a Style Sheet control function. This allows Style Sheets to be
viewed and edited from within Shado administration and outputs both the style
elements and the end viewable result of the style. Style sheets can be applied at the
Page or Section level and an existing style sheet can be copied and modified
accordingly.
Site appearance is controlled by the use of page templates. The templates can be
developed using such tools as Macromedia’s Dreamweaver. By separating content
from presentation, Shado MX enables dynamic presentation of rich content. All
content is stored in a database and output utilising containers placed into a page
template.
4.20.2 Can custom tags be defined in the templating language (if applicable)?
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Response
4.20.3 Describe how published pages are made to conform to the W3C‟s Web
Accessibility Guidelines (http://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG10/).
Response
Bobby – accessibility standards
By being XHTML compliant it is possible to use XSLT style sheets against
the XHTML to produce different views of a page for different audiences i.e.
you may render a page differently for a sight impaired user than you would
for fully sighted user. It is also then possible to apply XSLT style sheets for
different devices such as PDA’s, WAP and other devices.
Shado has native support for the Dublin Core Meta Data (DCMD)
standards.
Accessibility
The system will adhere closely to the guidelines laid down by the RNIB and
WAI’s Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. While the system is compliant
with all the necessary standards, compliance of the web site can be very
different. It is important that the University’s personnel are conversant with
the required standard so that templates will always generate Accessible
content. A key tool will be the use of reporting tools such as Bobby or
Dreamweaver, which can scan all templates and report on their compliance.
The Shado MX content management system can enforce standards by
limiting editing features to prevent users creating non accessible content.
Browsers
Output from the Shado MX content management system is completely
independent of browser version or capability.
Web Services and interoperability
A core capability of the Shado MX content management system is the
exposure of the components as web services. This is standard functionality
which will allow integration with any other application or web system.
Presentation is be separated from logic, allowing any content to be
repurposed to any device or any browser capabilities. This deals with future
needs as laid down in the interoperability framework. The system is
compliant with e-Gif standards, and allows exchange of information in XML
and other formats as required.
4.20.4 Describe which HTML standards are or can be used for published pages (i.e.
DOCTYPES), and how the system ensures that published pages are valid
HTML.
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Response
H
can be custom set for individual requirements
4.20.5 Is there a minimum specification for web browsers used to view the
published content?
Response
Minimum browser specification for editors is IE5.5 and Mozilla 1.4. These
minimum specifications apply to Windows, Mac and Linux operating
systems. Using a low level browser would impose limitations on the use of
the system but it is possible to write alternative interfaces into the system if
required.
4.20.6 List any other formats (other than HTML) in which content can be
published.
Response
HTML, FlashMX, Flex
4.20.7 Is there an option for creating print-friendly pages?
Response
Yes
4.20.8 Describe any localisation and internationalisation features.
Response
Shado is capable of multi-language content including Unicode format for
double byte languages. It is quite possible to create a replication of a section
of the site tree for each language required, without the use of the multi-
language option but this does not provide any linking between the master
and secondary languages.
The multi-language and personalisation module provides advanced multi-
language functionality that allows the following features
1. Creation of a master language
2. Creation of secondary languages
3. Linked workflow on update with changes/creation of master
language items emailing secondary language editors/publishers
4. Secondary language metadata creation
5. Secondary language page titles for navigation switching.
The interface can be offered in different languages.
4.20.9 Can content which uses extended character sets be stored, managed and
published?
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Response
Yes, this has been extensively with Asian languages in Shado.
4.21 Content types and content storage
4.21.1 Describe how the system stores content, whether in a database, file system
or some other method.
Response
Content is stored in the database and also cached to the file sytem.
Templates are stored in the file system.
4.21.2 If content is stored in a database, is the data model readily available?
Response
Yes
4.21.3 Describe how the storage and reuse of content elements (text, images, other)
is managed
Response
The SHADO Document Management System (DMS) allows you to store all
files and images used within the site in a central repository. File types
included all commonly used files. Once files have been stored in the DMS
you simply use the content editing tools to add files or images into the site. It
possible to add display behaviours to files pulled from the library giving
content editors a large design toolset, while enforcing design guidelines.
A file in the DMS consists of two parts. The first is a file object, which in
turn contains one or more file instances. In this way the DMS contain
different versions of a file, multiple resolutions of an image or a document in
different formats for example. Meta data can be added to uploaded files,
such as captions, usage guidelines, text descriptions and source information.
Files can then be assigned to one or many user-definable search categories.
In this way, digital assets can be tracked, syndicated, and reused in a
controlled manner.
4.21.4 What types of content can be stored and published? (see Background section
for a list of the content types in use in the University)
Response
File types included all commonly used files such as:
Images (gif, jpeg, tiff)
MS Office documents
PDF's
media files (Quicktime, AVI, Flash, Shockwave)
4.21.5 Can additional content types be defined and managed?
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Response
Yes
4.21.6 Can content elements be shared across different websites, and how is editing
and use of shared content elements managed?
Response
The reuse of content is made possible by linking content containers. Shado
manages a history of all containers versions and can enable versions to be
compared. The reuse of documents is managed by Shado’s Document
Management System (DMS), which enables any document to be reused
across the whole site. The DMS also manages version control of each
document.
4.22 Content retrieval
4.22.1 Describe the features for creating and managing metadata.
Response
Administrators can configure the Meta Data requirements as follows:
Set compulsory Meta Data fields at a Section level
Create additional custom Meta Data fields against a page or Section
Metadata can be added to uploaded files, such as captions, usage
guidelines, text descriptions and source information.
Meta data can be added to uploaded files, such as captions, usage
guidelines, text descriptions and source information. Files can then be
assigned to one or many user-definable search categories. In this way,
digital assets can be tracked, syndicated, and reused in a controlled manner.
4.22.2 How much metadata can be automatically captured? (e.g. from user login
details)
Response
As much as required via scripting to the API
4.22.3 Can controlled keyword lists be set up or imported? Can this be done per
website and/or on a server-wide basis?
Response
Yes
4.22.4 Can standard metadata schemas such as Dublin Core (http://dublincore.org/)
be implemented?
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Response
Shado has native support for the Dublin Core Meta Data (DCMD)
standards.
Shado is a page centric application and DCMD can be applied to a
page.
The actual meta data is stored as an XML structure in the Shado
Database
The meta data is automatically inserted into all rendered pages on
the site
It is possible to control the meta data through the Shado API which
has an open Meta data object.
4.22.5 Can metadata be queried from outside the system?
Response
Yes
422.6 What facilities are there for creating and managing metadata for non-HTML
documents? (PDF/Microsoft Word/RTF)
Response
DMS system provides this functionality
4.22.7 Can published content be indexed and searched by search engines external
to the system? Are there any restrictions on which search engines can be
used?
Response
Search is provided via the integrated Verity search engine that ships with
Shado/ColdFusion. Search collections are created based on the content and
meta data associated against a page. Verity is a very powerful full text
search engine.
SHADO uses the Verity K2 capabilities of Cold Fusion Server to deliver a
fully integrated site search. This is a full featured, full text index search
engine giving SHADO a powerful and search that is pre-built and can be
integrated into any SHADO site in minutes.
Verity allows for searching both content stored in the SHADO database and
also searching of meta data associated to sections and pages and metadata
against files in the Database. SHADO will create verity search collections
for the entire SHADO application and also collections for the individual
sections within the SHADO site tree enabling both a site wide search and in
context searches. The result can be sorted and configure for the format they
are returned in.
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5—RACE RELATIONS QUESTIONNAIRE
5.1 Introduction
In accordance with its responsibilities under the Race Relations Act 1976 (as amended by the Race
Relations (Amendment) Act 2000, the Race Relations 1976 (Amendment) Regulations 2003 and
any other relevant statutory amendments) to eliminate unlawful racial discrimination, promote equal
opportunities and promote good relations between people of different racial groups, the University
requires its contractors and sub-contractors to comply with the terms of this section.
5.2 Questionnaire
This information will be shared only with people involved in purchasing who have a relevant need
to review the data in our organisation. In order that vendors are not required to complete this data
for several entities, the Education sector would like to share the results within the sector with
entities who would otherwise have to individually re-request it from you. Please select the box
below if you do not accept that we share this EHEP data with other relevant entities in the
Education Sector
I refuse permission for this info to be shared
EHEP 1 - EHEP Background Info Section ALL VENDORS
Essential Background Information – Your answer to these questions will not affect your
chances of being approved; we are asking for this information solely to assist us develop our
equal opportunities policy and for routine monitoring. We will use the information in your
replies for statistical purposes only.
1) Your Organisation
a) Are you a Sole Trader or a Single Employee Company Yes
b) If not Sole Trader / Single Employee Company, please state;
i) Number of Partners:
ii) Number of Employees (including all full-time and part-time
employees, apprentices and other trainees):
iii) Of the total number of employees above, how many are managers?
2) Is your firm part of a commercial group, a consortium, a subsidiary company Yes
or parent company or any other multi-legal-entity organisation
If yes; b) Please give summary level details below of your organisation structure
66% of the shares are held by our parent company Read Holdings Ltd
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c) Which of your employment policies are determined by you and which policies apply to
all firms within the wider organisation structure ?
All of our policies are determined by ourselves
3) The Commission for Racial Equality defines an Ethnic Minority Business YES
as “a business 51% or more of which is owned by members of one or more NO No
ethnic minority groups, or, if there are few owners, where at least 50% of the Not Known
owners are members of one or more ethnic minority groups”. For this as Publicly
purpose, ethnic minority means ethnic groups other than “white British”. quoted
a) Is your enterprise an ethnic minority business according to the above company
definition? (tick appropriate box)
b) What is the ethnic origin of the owners of your organisation in percentage terms?
(pls complete this below based on the stated recommended CRE definitions.
NOTE: that owners must (ref Data Protection Act) complete this information I / we refuse
themselves or give the person completing the document the permission to do so on to provide
their behalf. this
OR information
If you refuse to provide this information (which you have the right to do), please
mark this box>>
White Black or Black British
British Caribbean
Irish African
Other White background (pls state) Other Black background (pls state)
Mixed Asian or Asian British
White and Black Caribbean Indian
White and Black African Pakistani
White and Asian Bangladeshi
Other Mixed Race background (pls state) Other Asian background (pls state)
Chinese or Any Other Background
Chinese
Other (pls state)
EHEP 2 Basic Equality Data ALL VENDORS
Equality in Your Organisation – these questions are relevant to all vendors and will be used to
measure your organisation‘s application of matters of Equality in your organisation and may
have an impact on the approval of your organisation as a vendor.
4) a) Is it your policy as an employer to comply with your statutory obligations Yes
under the Race Relations Act 1976 (which applies in Great Britain) or equivalent
legislation which applies in the countries in which your firm employs staff ?
b) Accordingly, is it your practice not to discriminate directly or indirectly on yes
grounds of colour, race, nationality, or ethnic or national origin in relation to
decisions to recruit, select, remunerate, train and promote employees?
5) In the last three years, has any finding of unlawful racial discrimination in the No
employment field been made against your organisation by the Employment
Tribunal, the Employment Appeal Tribunal or any court or in comparable
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proceedings in any other jurisdiction ?
If the answer to either or both of the above is yes, please provide details below of each occasion
(complete on separate piece of paper if required) and state what corrective organisation change
action you have taken as a consequence of each finding:
Date Unlawful Finding Corrective Action Taken
6) In the last three years, has your organisation been the subject of formal No
investigation by the Commission for Racial Equality or comparable body on the
grounds of alleged unlawful discrimination in the employment field?
If yes, please provide details below of dates, the area(s) covered by the investigation and the
outcomes / findings.
Date Areas Covered & Findings Corrective Action Taken if Applicable
7) a) In the last three years, has any finding of unlawful racial discrimination in NO
relation to non-employment matters been made against your organisation by any
UK court or in comparable proceedings in any other jurisdiction ?
b) In the last three years, has any contract with your organisation been
terminated on grounds of your failure to comply with:
i) Legislation prohibiting discrimination?; or No
ii) Contract conditions relating to equal opportunities in the provision of goods,
facilities or services?
If yes to either or both of above, please provide details below of each occasion (complete on
separate piece of paper if required) and state what corrective organisation change action you have
taken as a consequence of each occasion:
Date Unlawful Finding / Contract Termination Corrective Action Taken
8) Do you comply with the following legislation that applies in Great Britain (or equivalent
legislation in the countries in which you employ staff, whichever is applicable);
a) The Sex Discrimination Act 1975, as amended ? yes
b) The Equal Pay Act 1970 ? Yes
c) The Disability Discrimination Act 1995 ? Yes
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9) In the last three years, has any finding of unlawful disability, equal pay or sex No
discrimination in the employment field been made against your organisation by
the Employment Tribunal, the Employment Appeal Tribunal or any court or in
comparable proceedings in any other jurisdiction?
If yes, please provide details below of each occasion (complete on separate piece of paper if
required) and state what corrective organisation change action you have taken as a consequence of
each finding :
Date Unlawful Finding Corrective Action Taken
10) a) Are you currently subject to UK Legislation ? Yes
b) If No, please supply details of your experience in working under equivalent legislation which in
the relevant country is designed to eliminate discrimination (especially racial discrimination) and to
promote equality of opportunity.
EHEP 3-Section ―H Vendors‖ – ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS FOR HIGHLY RELEVANT
VENDORS
You will be advised if you are required to complete this section – otherwise you need not
complete it (these questions are relevant to all vendors deemed to be highly relevant in
relation to equality requirements and will be used to measure your organisation‘s application
of key matters of Equality in your organisation and may have an impact on the approval of
your organisation as a vendor).
11) Is your approach on race relations and racial equality set out in;
a) Instructions to those concerned with recruitment, selection, remuneration, Yes / No
training and promotion?
b) Documents available to employees, recognised trade unions or other Yes / No
representative groups of employees?
c) Recruitment advertisements or other literature? Yes / No
12) Are your staff with managerial responsibilities required to receive Yes / No
mandatory training on equal opportunities?
13) Do you observe as far as possible the Commission for Racial Equality‟s Yes / No
Code of Practice for Employment, as approved by Parliament in 1983, or an
equivalent code or statutory guidance issued under equivalent legislation in
another Member State, which gives practical guidance to employers and others
on the elimination of racial discrimination and the promotion of equality of
opportunity in employment, including monitoring of workforce matters and steps
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that can be taken to encourage members of the ethnic minorities to apply for jobs
or take up training opportunities?
If Yes, please supply evidence to support your answers to this question. Such evidence may be
examples or copies of documents such as your race equality or equal opportunities in employment
policy, documents containing instructions to staff, or outlining arrangements for advertisements,
recruitment, selection, access to training, opportunities for promotion, copies of recruitment
advertisements, extracts from staff handbooks, or other materials that demonstrates your
organisation‟s commitment to race equality.
14) a) Is it your policy to comply with your statutory obligations under part III of Yes / No
the Race Relations Act 1976 (which applies in Great Britain), or equivalent
legislation that applies an any other jurisdiction in which your organisation
operates ?
b) Accordingly, is it your practice not to discriminate directly or indirectly on Yes / No
grounds of colour, race, nationality, or ethnic or national origin in the provision
of goods, facilities or services to the public ?
15) a) Do you have a written policy on equal opportunities or race relations in Yes / No
relation to the provision of goods, facilities or services ?
If Yes, is the policy set out in:
b) Instructions to managers ? Yes / No
c) Instructions to staff? Yes / No
d) The staff conduct or disciplinary code ? Yes / No
e) Leaflets or other literature available to the public ? Yes / No
f) Please provide copies / examples of the above documentation with your returned questionnaire
g) If your answer to 15a is No, how else can you demonstrate that you can meet your obligations to
promote equality though the medias listed in 15b to 15e– please state below and attach examples.
16) In any previous or current contracts for supply of goods, facilities or Yes / No
services, did you apply or are you applying a race equality or equal opportunity
policy for access to, and enjoyment of, these goods, facilities or services by
different racial or other groups ?
If Yes, please provide examples below:
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APPENDIX A: COLLUSIVE TENDERING CERTIFICATE
To be completed and signed by the Tendering Company
1. In this certificate the word „person‟ includes any persons and any body or association corporate or
otherwise and the words „any agreement or arrangement‟ includes any such transaction formal or
informal and whether legally binding or not.
2. We certify that this is a bona fide tender and that we have not fixed or adjusted the amount of the
tender by or under or in accordance with any agreement or arrangement with any other person. We
also certify that we have not done and we undertake that we will not do at any time before the hour and
date specified for the return of this tender any of the following acts:-
a) communicating to a person other than the person calling for those tenders the amount or
approximate amount of the proposed tender except where the disclosure in confidence of the
approximate amount of the tender was necessary to obtain insurance premium quotations required
for the preparation of the tender;
b) entering into any agreement or arrangement with any other person that he shall refrain from
tendering or as to the amount of any tender to be submitted;
c) offering or paying or giving or agreeing to pay or give any sum of money or valuable consideration
directly or indirectly to any person for doing or having done or causing or having caused to be
done in relation to any other tender or proposed tender for the said work any act or thing of the sort
described above.
3. We further certify that the principles described in paragraph 1 above have been or will be brought to
the attention of all sub-contractors suppliers and associate companies providing services or materials
connected with the tender and any contract entered into with the sub-contractors suppliers or associated
companies will be made by all parties on the basis of compliance with the above principles.
4. I confirm that any breach of the conditions of this collusive tendering certificate will inevitably lead to
the rescission of the contract by The University of Edinburgh.
Dated this:_____________________________ day of____________________________2004
Signature:______________________________ Name (capitals)__________________________
In the capacity of_____________________________________________________________
(State official position e.g. Director, Manager etc.)
being a person duly authorised to sign tenders on behalf of:
Name of tenderer:_____________________________________________________________
Telephone:_____________________________Fax:_________________________________
Postal address:_______________________________________________________________
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___________________________________________________________________________
APPENDIX B: CASE STUDIES
Several case studies are provided here. They are intended as illustrations of the range of websites in
use, the facilities required, and the kinds of problems faced. Detailed responses to the questions
raised in the case studies do not need to be provided at this stage, but we may ask shortlisted
suppliers to provide illustrations of how these situations could be dealt with.
1. Migrating a Department website - 1
The School has had a number of websites over the years, the current one being maintained
by the School‟s computing officer and a secretary in the School‟s administration team. It is
hosted on an Apache server run within the School. The School wish to migrate their existing
site to the Web Content Management System. Their questions include:
a. Can they retain their existing URL?
b. Can editing access be restricted to a few named individuals?
c. Can they continue to use both DreamWeaver and FrontPage web editors?
d. Can they use existing CGI scripts, such as for forms processing?
e. Can they make the site searchable?
2. Migrating a Department website – 2
The School website has evolved over the last 8 or 9 years without any dedicated staff. Much
of its dynamic content was developed by former Computing Officers and undergraduate
students undertaking summer vacation work and is not actively maintained. Our current
Computing Officers are too stretched to take an active role in web development so web
content is highly devolved and scattered over various machines, mounted via NFS and a
tangle of symbolic links. Network problems on one machine often lead to "server blockage"
and can compromise the availability of the entire site. The web server itself is underpowered
and due to be decommissioned at some point this year. Their questions include:
a. How can they manage the fact that some resources will be local and some will be in
the CMS?
b. Most content editors in the department know very little HTML. Can a CMS make it
easy to create content which is ultimately delivered in clean, accessible mark-up?
c. The content for a School website is contributed by many authors, and there may be
several editors each taking responsibility for different parts of the site. There may
need to be a hierarchy of editors, each of whom need in turn to be able to devolve
responsibility within their section of the site to a range of authors. What flexibility is
available in devolving responsibility for different sections of the site? How many
levels of delegation are possible?
d. How easy would it be to migrate content from their existing web into the CMS?
(And, conversely, could they easily export content at a later date if they needed to
return to hosting some content themselves for some reason?)
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3. Committees area of a Faculty Website
The College of S&H wishes to use the Web Content Management System to support part of
their existing site that stores agendas and minutes from a number of committees.
a. Can suitable structures to support the committees be set up as needed?
b. Can the new area appear as if it were still part of the College‟s site?
c. Can individual documents or whole areas be restricted to specific users or groups of
users, while others remain publicly viewable?
d. Can support for getting Word-to-html conversions to work be provided?
e. Can suitable search and metadata structures be supported?
4. Research Group Intranet
A research group in the Directorate of Thingummy wants to use the Web Content
Management System to support the Intranet activities of the group:
a. Can all the members of the group (12 academics and 27 postdocs and PhDs) have
access to their own personal areas of the site and 2 of the senior academics have
rights to the whole?
b. Can the group have a URL in the „.org‟ domain?
c. Can the group give access to the commercial design group that has been
commissioned to put the site together for them?
d. Can they use some server-side scripting such as php?
5. Information site for a public project
A site needs to be put together to support a public information exercise which has
collaborative members from a number of different universities. Multimedia such as
animations in Flash and movies/audio in Real format are to be used:
a. Can the use of multimedia content be supported and metadata for it managed?
b. Can a „.com‟ domain be used?
c. Can collaborating staff from the partners in the project (such as other universities)
also have access to the site from their institutions?
END of DOCUMENT
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