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Welcome to July 2009 installment of our what's coming from the open source CMS projects in the next 30 days.

If you're looking through here and feel that your project was left out, we invite you to send us an email at pr@cmswire.com with a pointer to who we should contact at your project for updates.

A wave of excitement shot through the Internet as bloggers suddenly noticed that Amazon (news, site) had posted the source code for each version of the Kindle.

However, the code is really just the GPL'd Linux libraries and drivers (Debian Linux is the common speculation), and it's been available since 2007. The e-book reader part is in no way part of the source package.

While no license file is attached, the folder the code unpacks into is called "gplrelease," which might be a massive hint. Not to mention all that's in there is what would be required for them to release legally for the GPL portions.

Jeff Bezos of Amazon had hinted recently at a conference that Kindle books and Kindle readers were, to him, two separate businesses. Releasing a Kindle iPhone app was certainly one hint that he was serious. Another was his statement that he intended to give the Kindle device team competition by making the Kindle books available on even more mobile and computing devices.

But entirely releasing the Kindle source doesn't appear to be the way they're going to do it just now. Who knows, maybe later if Amazon decides it would rather offer their content on more devices and get out of the hardware business.

On January 1, 2006, Rick Falkvinge set up a web page for the Swedish Pirate Party. He mentioned the address in a single chat room, and within 24 hours he had over the 2,000 signatures he needed for the party to participate in the upcoming election.

What do these pirates want? With such a name it can be hard to take the party seriously, but politicians are taking notice now and so should you. The Swedish Pirate Party now has a seat in the EU Parliament, two if the Treaty of Lisbon goes into affect, changing various aspects of how the EU's government works. And the party has spread far beyond the EU. It might even be in your own back yard.

Obviously if you make the list of any analyst report — at least in a good light — you want the world to know. For FatWire (news, site), that analyst report comes in the form of the Forrester Wave for Web Content Management For External Sites, Q2 2009.

One of three leaders among ten web content management systems listed, FatWire received recognition for “business-user-oriented tools that enable not only the management of content, but targeted delivery, analysis, and optimization of content consumption as well.”

We won't go into the details of the report, we did that in our article SDL Tridion Named Leader in Web CMS for External Sites. Suffice it to say, this report is designed for enterprise level organizations who have money to spare (well, no one really has money to spare these days).

It's worth noting that FatWire is the smallest vendor to make the Forrester Wave list. Does that make it any less good? We doubt it, but sometimes the smaller vendors can give better support.

Get your copy of the Forrester Wave and get more detail on FatWire and the other leaders.

Microsoft made its first ever keynote at the JavaOne Conference last week reports eWeek, touting their desire for increased interoperability between .NET and Java.

In an interview with eWEEK, Steven Martin, senior director of development platform products at Microsoft said interoperability is important to him, "[Seventy-three] percent of professional developers rely on .NET or a combination of .NET and Java.  In that sense, both Java and .NET have won in the enterprise and it is incumbent on both Microsoft and Sun to ensure that interoperability for the platforms is real, available and as easy to implement as possible."

We've seen and heard many times that many organizations, particularly the larger ones, don't have a single technology stack in-house and there's often a mix of .NET and Java solutions to support. Microsoft knows that and have for the last five years been working closely with Sun on interoperability projects like Web Single Sign On, the Interop Vendor Alliance and virtualization.

Although they have been involved in the JavaOne conferences for a few years, this is the first time they have keynoted. It would have been interesting to see how the Java audience responded to their keynote.

The keynote, conducted by Martin and Dan'l Lewin, Corporate Vice President, Strategic and Emerging Business Development, discussed what is happening today in regards to interoperability between .NET and Java and where it is headed in the future.

Interested in hearing exactly what they said? Watch the keynote.

The Forrester Wave for Web Content Management For External Sites, Q2 2009 is out and there are 10 web content management vendors on the list that we all know and love well. SDL Tridion (news, site) took the top honors this time with Interwoven and FatWire close behind.

Why are these three vendors at the top and who else is on the list? Let's take a look.

Welcome to another installment of our what's coming from the open source CMS projects in the next 30 days.

If you're looking through here and feel that your project was left out, we invite you to send us an email at pr@cmswire.com with a pointer to who we should contact for your project for updates.

The world of Enterprise Content Management saw the beginning of a possible new direction last week when Mark Lewis, president of EMC’s (news, site) Content Management and Archiving division took the stage at EMC World 2009.

Lewis’ main argument was that the majority of present day information is a total mess (that's nothing new). He specifically focused on the dangers of unstructured data floating around without hide nor hair of an application or database. After all, vagrant infomation is like kryptonite for both business efficiency and security.

In order to nip this super-sized problem in the bud, Lewis suggested moving away from application-centric management in favor of information-centric management:

“…creating a flexible, adaptive information environment requires moving beyond the typical content management platform to focus on a composition platform that accelerates application development," he said.

Lewis specifically cited composition, business process automation, integrated archiving and cloud computing as key areas through which the value of information management technologies can be maximized.

Interested in the vision? Check out Lewis' full keynote here. 

Bada boom, bada bing!

That’s how quickly things seem to happen in the webverse anyway, the search engine avenue being no exception. Accordingly, recently there have been rumors backed by heavy advertising dollars that Microsoft (news, site) plans to release a search engine called "Bing."

As is inevitable whenever big names put out new solutions, "Bing" is already being compared to offerings from other big names. In fact, much like the ongoing Mac vs. PC battle, we’re seeing Microsoft's new offering propositioned as competition for the biggest name.

Softlayer (news, site), a Texas-based provider of on-demand virtual data center services, has been approved as a partner in the Microsoft Hosting BizSpark Program.

Hosting Partners are partners who can provide hosting services for SaaS solutions developed by BizSpark Startups. Startups that intend to deploy a product on the Internet within 12 months of enrollment are encouraged to engage a Hosting Partner to assist them in hosting their application on the internet.

Hosting Partners obtain Microsoft server products to provide hosting services to startups directly from Microsoft under their Service Provider License Agreement with Microsoft.

Working out of facilities in Dallas, Seattle and Washington DC, Softlayer was created in 2005 and integrates all aspects of IT development to create automated solutions for clients that gives them security, scalability and easy manageable IT infrastructures.

Chief Strategy Officer for Softlayer said participation in the programme would enhance their ability to offer clients dynamic platforms at critical stages in their business development.

Interesting news in the pipeline for Telligent (news, site). Founder and CEO Rob Howard has released the reigns of the company he founded almost 5 years ago to Patrick Brandt.

Well, released the reigns — sort of. Howard has been appointed the new CTO of Telligent. A position that he feels right at home in.

FatWire Software (news, site), a very familiar Web Content Management provider in these parts and one of the few companies that managed to actually benefit from the failing economy, has been acknowledged for its success yet again. Yphise, one of Europe’s independent research firms, recently named the company the best Web Experience Optimization (WEO) solution, placing it on a higher pedestal than competitors such as Interwoven, SDL Tridion and Vignette.

The Yphise Award ranks software solutions in over 170 different technical or functional assessment categories. FatWire Content Server scored high marks in:

• The assessment for increasing the agility of businesses in setting up and managing websites,
• Optimizing Web content to support corporate objectives, increasing business activity on the web,
• Facilitating website deployment

“Web Experience Management and optimization are critical drivers for marketing success and business efficiency,” said Loren Weinberg, FatWire vice president of marketing and product management. “This award is an important testament to the high quality of FatWire’s products, as well as the completeness of our vision and our commitment to helping customers achieve their goals online.”

Yphise conducts ongoing research in order to help business and IT execs make sound IT investments for boosting performance. Curious to see who else they deem worthy? Check out their list of approved software products and projects here. 

The results of the 2009 CODiE Awards are in and Clickability (news, site) is rising to the top for a second year in a row. They have won the award for Best Content Management System.

What were the judges looking for?

• Ease of posting and manipulation
• Fulfillment of key attributes
• Functionality of key attributes
• Management tools
• Translations between different formats
• User interface

Clickability has won the award over Nstein — also their second year to make the finalist list — Ingeniux CMS 6.2, RSuite CMS from Really Strategies and Salesforce Content from Salesforce.com.

"We are extremely proud to have won such a prestigious award two years in a row," said John Girard, Clickability co-founder and CEO. [] This award represents our continued dedication to providing the most innovative WCM solution on the market today. The CODiE Awards honor only the best and brightest in the software industry, and we are thrilled to be among the 2009 winners."

There were 850 products submitted by 600 companies up for a number of different awards. You can view all the winners here.

Everyone said that the Interwoven/Autonomy deal would only be the first in a series of big announcements within the enterprise content management world. And that it is.

Today, Canadian-based enterprise content management vendor Open Text (news, site) has reached a deal to buy Vignette Corporation (news, site) for US$ 310 million.

Vignette is expected to become a wholly owned subsidiary of Open Text. The deal will see Vignette stockholders get US$ 8 per share plus 0.1447 of Open Text stock.

The deal is expected to close the second half of this year. The news saw Open Text shares fall by 85 cents. Vignette's shares however soared US$ 3.32 — a sign that shareholders see this as good news for the struggling enterprise content management firm.

"Vignette's customers represent some of the world's most powerful online brands and we are excited about the opportunity to expand the relationship with these customers and partners," Open Text Chief Executive John Shackleton said in a statement.

We are waiting on more details. When we get them, we'll be sure to pass them on.

Who’s hiring these days? e-Spirit is! Well, that is, they’re recruiting partners.

The Enterprise Content Management System providers recently announced the launch of their UK Alliance Partner Program. Currently on the lookout for partners in all industry verticals, e-Spirit hopes that the program will ensure their future success through formally built networks and partnerships. Additionally, linking their electronic arms with those of Content Management System vendors is expected to help place e-Spirit among reputable CMS suppliers in the UK market.

Already on board is ecomplexx, a UK based Web services provider with rich internet and Content Management offerings.

“Alliances play a critical part in e-Spirit’s overall business strategy for delivering and implementing e-Spirit systems,” said Jeremy Pitt, Head of UK Sales, e-Spirit UK. “We are delighted to welcome our new partners.”

Members of the Elite Partner Program can look forward to both training and education to ensure that they have a deep understanding of customer challenges, the CMS market and the benefits of the technology.

Additionally, further enhancements to the Partner Program are reportedly to include the launch of a certification program later this year.

For more information about e-Spirit, check out their websitee here, or, for the skinny on ecomplexx, here.

When an open source advocate, open standards advocate, or, well, pretty much anyone that competes with Microsoft (news, site) sees an extended hand from the software giant toward better interoperability, they tend to look and see if the other hand's holding a spiked club.

Even so, the Redmond, WA company continues to push the message that it has seen the light regarding open standards and interoperability.

AIIM has released its annual State of the ECM Industry research report. And although the term Enterprise Content Management was coined about eight years ago, the research findings are still not very optimistic in some areas.

Not surprisingly, the bottom line is that electronic content in many of its shapes and forms in the organizational landscape is still (mainly) a mess.

Without the web, there would be no web content management systems. Some might say that without the Apache web server, the web as it is today either might not exist, or may have taken a very different direction.

A shining example of the innovation and value provided by open source projects, ten years ago the Apache Software Foundation was formed by the same people that brought us the Apache web server.

While you were Googling, AOL named a new CEO and chairman. Tim Armstrong, who headed up ad sales in the Americas for Google, will replace Randy Falco as chairman and CEO. As well, AOL President and COO Ron Grant is leaving the company. Perhaps Armstrong was in need of a challenge, as AOL does not have the strength of either Google or even Yahoo in terms of advertising assets or traffic. Now things will get interesting. Everything you knew about AOL is about to change.

The government of the United Kingdom stated in 2004 that its policy was to "seek to use open source where it gave the best value for money to the taxpayer in delivering public services."

In 2009, the UK government has decided to increase the pace of open source adoption. To achieve this goal, they have outlined a ten-step action plan.