 |  | | | | | |  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |  | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
MySQL, PHP, Content Management System
Challenge:
The National Center for Adoption Law & Policy at Capital University Law School, in partnership with the Ohio Department of Job & Family Services, was seeking to update a website that was aging and quickly becoming obsolete. As single online source of child welfare and adoption law information for parents, child and family lawyers, judges, agency personnel and child advocates of all kinds, the LawSite provides statutes, regulations, key cases, and explanatory materials, and many other resources for child welfare and adoption information.
The primary goal for the redesigned website was to increase usability for the entire target audience, making it easy for users to search for and find information relevant to their individual needs. A secondary goal of the redesign was to make the ongoing site maintenance performed by staffers a simple and intuitive process.
Solution
To address both the primary and secondary usability goals, the site was redesigned from the ground up. The original website stored the majority of site information in Word documents that users had to download to view. We took that information and instead placed it in a MySQL database. This created several advantages over the previous system:- Users are able to access the information as a standard web page, making it simple and intuitive for even the most technically challenged visitor to access.
- Storing the text in a database allows for increased search functionality and relevance sorting, as the entire text of the document, not just selected manually entered keywords, is now searchable.
- Adding and maintaining documents is a very quick and easy process. By utilizing a Content Management System (CMS), it’s possible for any staff member to add and update information appearing on the website by filling out simple web forms. No knowledge of html or other advanced web programming language, or complicated document naming conventions, is required.
Via the custom CMS, NCALP staff has complete control over all documents, text and images appearing on the site.
Officially launched on 4.29.2008, the Adoption & Child Welfare LawSite will continue to grow and evolve as information is continually added. Additional components and interactive elements are scheduled to be added in the coming months.
| |
| | |  | | | | | |  | |
|
|
