SDL Tridion R5 Basics
Vendor Name: SDL TridionProduct Name: SDL Tridion R5Product Category: Enterprise Web CMSTypical Scenario: SDL Tridion R5 is typically a choice for multilingual and marcomm websitesCompany & Product History
SDL Tridion -- simply “Tridion” at the time-- was founded in 1999 and is headquartered in Amsterdam, Netherlands, with offices in the UK, France, Germany, Belgium, Spain and Sweden.In 2007, Tridion was acquired for €69 million by SDL, a leading provider of Global Information Management (GIM) solutions.The oldest version of the product is R3, as far as anyone can remember. It was followed by a number of new releases, including the latest R5.3 that was launched at the end of 2007. Its most commonly used predecessor is R5.2 SP1. However, some customers, who have to date been unwilling to brave the upgrade pains, are still running on R4.SDL Tridion’s strengths lie in multilingual/multi-site support using the product’s BluePrinting feature. Tridion R5 is recognized as leading Content Management Solution by Forrester, Butler and Gartner.R5 separates Content Management from Content Delivery. Content management products include: * Content Manager Explorer -- main interface* SiteEdit -- inline editing interface* WebDAV Connector -- access to content via Windows Explorer* Word Connector -- allows users to create content in MS WordContent Delivery products include:* Presentation Servers -- machines where published content resides* Dynamic Content Broker -- assembles dynamic pagesAdditionally, there’s a range of such tools as:* Archive Manager * Content Porter* Business Connector* Content DistributorMarket & Pricing
SDL Tridion R5’s target market is mostly concentrated around interactive marketing, marketing and communications sites and global enterprises with multiple language support requirements.Price Range
Given the fact that SDL Tridion’s pricing model can be very complex, it is hard to pinpoint a typical deal price. It may vary greatly depending on the package, which at the very least includes three environments (development, test and production), several Presentation Servers, Content Broker, Content Porter and named user licenses -- for content authors, developers, system administrators, etc.The license also specifies a limit on the number of CPUs on each machine where the product is installed and features like BluePrint depth, Complex Schema support, binary document search support and Workflow support.And this is without optional modules like multilingual interfaces, Communications Statistics, Word Connector, Translation Manager or WebForms. There are about a dozen of language packs you can add to your package, including Japanese, Spanish, Dutch, German, French and others -- all with native spell-checkers.Customer support, new releases and maintenance fees are usually around 20% of the entire package price and are charged annually.Depending on the time of a given fiscal year, you can expect to cash out anywhere from US$ 80,000 to … sky is the limit. Locating a sales representative should be easy, as there are several SDL Tridion sales offices in APAC, EMEA, North America, South Africa, etc.The highly recommended engagement of SDL Tridion Professional Services for technical training and implementation support will cost you another “penny,” depending on the level of your consultant’s expertise and the length of engagement. Braving your way through a typical tech training module will take about five full days.Partner Network
Numerous implementation partners worldwide include:* Accenture* Capgemini* HintTech* SiteworxFor a complete list, go here.Customers
There are around 500 SDL Tridion customers in the world, including big shots like Ricoh, Lexus, Toyota, KLM, Canon, Renault, Alitalia, Emirates Airlines and Scania. Their North American customer base includes AIG, MetLife and Hanley Wood, among others.Product Root / Original Business Problem
For a European vendor located on the crossroads of various countries speaking different languages, it was a logical choice for Tridion in its early days to concentrate on the localization and globalization sides of web content management.Since the emergence of Internet as a global communication tool, there evolved a need for technology that could facilitate localization and better cross-market, global communication. Corporate branding strategy often required the message and look-and-feel consistency for corporate websites spread out around the world (e.g., Toyota, KLM). This is where Tridion found its niche and developed a product with strong localization support through the CMS and the BluePrinting technology that facilitates sharing and re-use of common content and design elements across multiple sites. Soon after the acquisition by SDL, the company released Translation Manager v2.0 in 2008. This product integrates with SDL Translation Management System (SDL TMS) and the SDL Tridion R5 CMS, enabling users to send content stored in the R5’s Content Manager to SDL TMS for translation.Key Features and Ratings
Here, we will outline the key features of SDL Tridion R5. In each section, you will find product ratings between 1 and 5 -- 1 being poor and 5 being excellent. For a summary of features and ratings, refer to the Review Summary section at the end.Product Core Technology
Rating: 3/5 SDL Tridion R5 works in both Microsoft .NET and Java/J2EE environments via WebServices using the SOAP protocol. APIs:SDL Tridion R5 supports Java and COM APIs. The latter is actually TOM (Tridion Object Model), based on COM. In 1999, it was all Perl.Databases:Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server and IBM DB2Platforms:UNIX, J2EE or Microsoft .NET, IBM WebSphere, BEA WebLogic and Microsoft Internet Information Server (IIS)Supported browsers:Microsoft Internet Explorer 6.0+ and 7.0+Languages and protocols: * VBScript, XSLT, JavaScript, J2EE* Static and dynamic HTML, JSP, ASP and ASP .NET pages and/or XML/XSLT fragments* Several protocols are supported, including FTP, SFTP, HTTP and HTTPS.Content Entities
Rating: 3/5SDL Tridion’s famous Building Blocks represent the core of this WCM solution. Building Blocks are Component and Page Templates, Component Presentations, Components, Pages and Schemas.
SDL Tridion R5 Building Blocks
Content authors usually create Components based on certain Schemas (which define permissible content fields), followed by combining those Components with appropriate Component Templates, thus, creating Component Presentations.
Creating a new Component in R5
A Page may contain several Component Presentations. Every Page requires an appropriate Page Template in order to be rendered properly. There are two types of Components: Components storing text and links and Multimedia Components handling binaries (.jpg, .gif, .swf, .doc, etc.)Pages are created in Structure Groups (i.e., a website sections) in a corresponding Publication (i.e., website).As you can see, all this terminology alone may have the “deer in the headlights” effect on content authors and developers alike. As a result, it takes time for users to get used to the complex hierarchy of Tridion terms.R5 comes with a set of default Page and Component Templates, which, most likely, won’t be useful, as customized Page and Component Templates will need to be developed to fit the layout and code of your particular website. While tagging is not the strongest suit of SDL Tridion R5, certain metadata -- so crucial to SEO and internal searchability and findability of items -- can usually be handled either on the Structure Group/Page level, or through embeddable metadata Schemas.While the Building Blocks technology can be great for managing content, there are some pitfalls. Some users find it daunting while working with a big number of Building Blocks, when assembling a Page that can contain anywhere from one to thousands of Components. Try to keep it simple. The “Where Used” feature shows content dependencies in one or several Publications. From the development standpoint, all Schemas and Templates are created in a development environment and then transferred to test and production environments, using the tool called Content Porter, where they become available to end-users. Oh, Content Porter… This one deserves separate attention. We’ll get back to you later in this review.
Content Versioning
Rating: 3/5R5’s Versioning is quite simplistic and can be used for two things: to view History and to Compare. The History feature provides data on all modifications on an item (user names and timestamps are included). Using the Compare tool, you can see the exact changes -- highlighted in various colors -- made to an item by comparing any two versions.
Versioning control in R5
Workflow
Rating: 3/5R5’s Workflow engine is pretty standard. The basic flow is Ready for Editing – Ready for Publishing, with the ability to modify and add other levels of approval. You can create and customize your Workflow in MS Visio armed with a Tridion plug-in and define your specific approval requirements.
R5 Workflow in VisioIf you want to go further, there are additional modules (at an extra price, of course) that allow for inline and e-mail notifications. The standard, out-of-the-box version includes commentary capabilities. Tridion’s Event System can also be used to introduce a number of automatic (vs. manual) activities in the content management process.According to SDL Tridion, the newest product version -- R5.3 -- offers the new and improved Workflow capabilities described as giving you a “greater control over your workflow processes with more tools for website contributors to monitor and ensure the quality of their corporate communication, branding and marketing messaging.”R5’s Workflow is natively integrated into the GUI, which makes it easy to track where the content items are, providing a good bit of transparency to users. R5’s Workflow can also be integrated with Microsoft Outlook allowing a user to perform various activities from his/her inbox.
Multilingual Support
Rating: 4/5This area is probably the strongest suit of SDL Tridion R5. Following the acquisition by SDL, Tridion can now offer new localization tools. With Translation Manager (TM), customers can set up that a TM for a certain Publication and specify target languages, as well as use Workflow to specify the translation process, as illustrated below.
R5 Translation ProcessFor each translation process customers can set up a number of criteria, such as which translation agency to use. When properly configured, clients can initiate a translation in one or all Child Publications using Translation Manager, which will prompt a translation job creation at a chosen agency.Translation jobs can be seen in the GUI right below the Publishing Queue. From the translation jobs list you can send the job to the TMS (Translation Management System) and check the status of your translation. Translation Manager is supported by Tridion R5.2, R5.2 SP1, R5.3 and TMCS 1.3 SP1.A note on localization: It may be painful, but if you want to localize a Publication you have to localize every Component/folder in it.
Editorial Features
Rating: 3/5If you set aside the hurdles outlined above (and below), SDL Tridion R5 can be very popular with content editors. Depending on the implementation, it can be quite easy to manage online content. There’s version comparison and roll-back, which doesn’t seem to be used often by content authors. The system is so complex, that in, most cases, content authors end up using the most basic features of SDL Tridion R5 to author content.
R5 GUIR5’s inline editing tool -- SiteEdit -- is magical, when configured properly. In addition to that, you can enhance your out-of-the-box R5’s Workflow to the point where it can actually be helpful and send e-mail notifications. Tridion COM API is available to customers and is used often, with varying degrees of success, to allow for better usability and implementation flexibility. Integrations with third-party software packages such as Google Enterprise Search and online metrics suites like WebTrends and Omniture can be almost painless. R5’s digital asset repository is managed through Multimedia Components that can store major binary extensions, which can be configured per your requirements.
R5 digital asset management
One of the weakest editorial points of the SDL Tridion WCM solution is the lack of Web 2.0 preparedness. It is not the best tool if you are into such “fancy” Web 2.0 trends as video feeds, RSS, blogs, comments and tagging. The product is not very well-suited for almost any kind of user-generated content. And even the closest possible solution, SDL Tridion WebForms, is a module that is far from being usable. Communication StatisticsChronically problematic on the back-end side, Tridion Communication Statistics module provides in-site views of how your content is doing. Business folks can track how their content is performing by viewing web pages with stats graphs on it in a staging environment. Communication Statistics is the most fascinating part of any SDL Tridion sales demo. Graphs and color overlays show comparisons of content in its popularity contest.
R5 Communications Statistics
SiteEditOne of the most user-friendly inline editing interfaces on the WCM market, R5’s SiteEdit is a popular CM interface for non-technical users used to perform simple actions like re-arranging content blocks, adding new content, editing existing content and spell-check.
R5 SiteEdit
Personalization and ProfilingR5’s Personalization and Profiling module (which used to be called WAI) is aimed to create personalized web sites and web pages catering to specific audiences. It works with both explicit and implicit profiles, ensuring that content is personalized based on information that visitors have provided.
Content Delivery Architecture
Rating: 4/5R5’s Content Delivery is mainly based on two products: Presentation Servers and Dynamic Content Broker. In addition, there are other modules that are part of Content Delivery, including Dynamic Linking, Personalization and Profiling, Content Distributor and Content Deployer.The separation of Content Delivery from Content Management ensures that only approved content goes outside the firewall. Delivery of both dynamic and static content is possible, using either the Dynamic Content Broker or the Presentation Server approach. Dynamic Content Broker assembles pages containing dynamic content based on configurable queries. Content Broker’s API is public and can be used to retrieve published content using custom built applications. On the static side, Content Delivery System (CDS) distributes published content from the Content Manager to Presentation Servers, where it is stored in either a file system or a relational database.
Basic R5 Content Delivery architecture
Presentation Servers also manage R5’s Dynamic Linking feature responsible for resolving and rendering of links between published content items. Architecturally, SDL Tridion usually recommends a four-tier setup, which they call DTAP (development > test > acceptance > production), as illustrated in the graphic below.
R5 DTAP setup
All environments, with a possible exception of test/acceptance, require a dedicated machine. Content Porter is a Windows client used to import and export code, content and other items from one environment to another (up and down the chain). Content Porter can connect to any OLEDB or ODBC data sources. A note on Content Porter: many sysadmins think of it as the worst nightmare, with cryptic errors, lack of flexibility, inability to cope with complex dependencies and endless e-mail chains with customer support. It is also a known fact that this tool, which can be very wise and sophisticated, needs to be run at least a couple of times before you approach something resembling success.It may be useful to know that when you publish content, you are likely to publish to several different targets. For one, it’s preprod and prod (think licensing costs here!). Most organizations have IT infrastructures with web farms of several web servers, i.e., several Presentation Servers (think licensing $$$ again). The unlimited Content Delivery license may be your way to go in this scenario.
R5.3 Features
As we’ve noted previously, the latest version of the product was released at the end of 2007 and boasts several innovative enhancements with an eye to marketing/communication and developer needs:* Enhanced workflow -- A more transparent way of tracking activities is introduced, as approval statuses are displayed in the list views of items. Multiple workflow activities are better supported, allowing users to work simultaneously on multiple content items.* Modular templating -- The new templating framework separates various Template Building Blocks, making it easier to assemble various pieces of code, design and functionality into new modular templates. Developers can work in either Dreamweaver or Visual Studio and debug Template Building Blocks right in the Template Builder diminishing the number of errors. * Additional platform support -- R5.3 provides UNIX support and Content Delivery on UNIX and Java platforms, along with new public .NET and TOM.NET API’s. Additionally, Windows Vista and Windows Internet Explorer 7 are supported.* Visual BluePrinting -- Visual BluePrinting provides content authors with a more transparent grasp of relationships between content items that are shared between different Publications. More on R5.3 can be found here.Our Take, In Summary
Here’s a summary table of the review:| Feature | Description | Rating |
| Core Technology | .NET, Java/J2EE, Oracle, Microsoft SQL Server, Unix, VBScript, XSLT, JavaScript, SOAP, ASP .NET | 3/5 |
| Content Entities | Building Blocks, multimedia support, SEO support, can be intricate when going into dependency levels. | 3/5 |
| Content Versioning | Fairly basic, meets average requirements for content managers. | 3/5 |
| Workflow | Configurable, optional e-mail notifications, comments | 3/5 |
| Multilingual Support | A strong point for the product. Native integration with a Workflow and Translation System is optionally supported. | 4/5 |
| Editorial Features | Good usability, poor Web 2.0 support, content previewing, good metadata support, spell-check, digital asset repository | 3/5 |
| Content Delivery Architecture | Very complex, configurable, scalable | 4/5 |