A few months ago, CMS Australian enthusiast Said Salameh posted this excellent breakdown comparing the number of steps required to complete simple tasks between eight leading open source content management systems. He illustrates how simple things like editing a page or adding an article can take ten steps or more – far more than necessary. His post spawned a discussion on the Web Content Management group on LinkedIn drawing out frustrations from many in the industry about the complexity of content management systems – particularly open source systems.

Acquia, a Drupal solutions provider, announced today that it has received a second Federal Information Security Management Act (FISMA) Authorization to Operate (ATO) for federal customers using Acquia Cloud. FISMA compliance provides a path for government agencies to develop next-generation digital experiences with Drupal that incorporate the web, mobile and social communities. 

Early this morning, I was one of two guests on the eZ Publish Show. The purpose of the episode was to discuss the future of content management system. I was joined by host Ivo Lukač of Netgen, and fellow guest Apoorv Durga from Real Story Group.

But ‘keyword domains’ are less important according to a comprehensive analysis of factors that correlate with ranking highly in Google US searches in 2013

Web pages that rank higher in Google searches tend to have more Google+ plus ones and Facebook shares. While having a relevant keyword in the web site domain name or web address now seems less closely linked with high rankings according to new research. And while pages with higher quality content rank better, top brand web pages apparently continue to automatically rank in top positions without obeying the same rules as other sites.

What I want from tech vendors: "I need them to listen, learn and be honest and realistic about their capabilities. Many technology vendors are still more interested in selling than in listening to what our real challenges are."

- Steve Mills, CIO, Rackspace, CIO Profiles: Steve Mills Of Rackspace, InformationWeek, March 13, 2013

Magnolia International announced today the release of Magnolia CMS 5.0, the new generation of its open Java content management system (CMS). Magnolia 5 features a mobile-inspired, HTML5 user interface that is intended to be as easy to use on the desktop as it is on a smartphone. With Magnolia 5, full CMS functionality if provided for both desktop and tablet computers.

Alfresco and Acquia announced today a strategic partnership to deliver business critical content applications to their customers.With this relationship, Acquia builds on Alfresco’s open platform to extend the web experience applications that enable customers to quickly build content applications that span traditional documents, structured editorial workflows and dynamic multi-channel delivery. The combination is expected to give customers the freedom to combine content, community and commerce capabilities into unified digital experiences in order to drive business results.

On my "to-do list" is a mention of the availability of my In the Spotlight segment online as well as the rest of the May 2013 CMS-Connected show. One of the nice things about participating on this show with hosts Tyler Pyburn and Scott Liewehr is the chance to get to spread my wings to new CMS territory. Specific to this show, I had the opportunity to review Bridgeline Digital's iAPPS Product Suite for the very first time. Once I had a chance to get a demo and do some homework, I found I was quite impressed with this content management platform.