SIS launches new website, new functionality

The School of Information Sciences has launched a website with significant enhancements for users. Students can log on using their university Net IDs and then organize discussion forums, conduct groups, update select web pages such as the student organizational pages, launch blogs, and experiment with Web 2.0 features. Technology Coordinator Cindy Lancaster led in redesigning the SIS website, which follows the new university web template as well as the newly transformed College of Communication and Information website.

“Our new site will be more functional to users, is much better organized, and is more stable than our previous site,” says Lancaster.

The new site uses the open source content management system, Drupal, a popular web development platform that encourages the collaborative production of online information content. At the same time, SIS and CCI’s Web servers moved to the Stokely Management Center, along with other key university servers, where they are maintained, mirrored, and backed up daily.

“Heavy users of our website will soon find themselves empowered to make changes to content relevant to them,” said Lancaster. “For example, faculty members will be able to update their personal user profiles directly, making the site more responsive to their needs.”

A soon-to-be released feature is Biblio. When launched, this citation database will allow users, especially prospective graduate students, to search faculty research records, such as publications and presentations, to identify specific interests and research agendas. Lancaster helped Associate Dean of Academic Programs Sally McMillan create a taxonomy of descriptions in Biblio that will help users navigate the rich database of almost 2,500 college bibliographic records.

“The new website is also a more effective recruiting device,” said Lancaster. “The exciting thing about using Drupal is that many talented programmers and developers are working hard to expand Drupal’s abilities to serve users’ needs. Jeff Robbins, who runs Lullabot.com and conducts Drupal training, calls Drupal ‘a giant bin of free Lego-style building blocks for creating any type of website.’ Our college web team has worked hard over the past months to build a web presence that is highly intuitive, functional and uncluttered, aesthetically pleasing, and secure. A big thanks are in order for John McNair, Bo Link, April Moore, and Joel Southern.”

Stay tuned at www.sis.utk.edu.