Contents

University Web Services

Best Practices

Maintenance

Introduction

Creating a good website is easy. It probably didn't seem easy at the time, but it was far easier than keeping it good. Just as the hard work of writing lies in re-writing, so the hard work of web sites lies in maintaining them. Here are listed the aspects of maintenance that need to be done on a regular basis. You may notice that they correspond closely to what is listed in the Workflow section. These tasks should be part of the job description of any site administrator. The tasks are listed in no particular order.

Backups

Copy all files at the site to a local drive on a regular basis (semesterly or monthly). You might also make an additional copy once a semester or once a year to a CD or DVD or other permanent storage device. If the site is really important (and whose isn't?), you should consider keeping a copy off-site, in case of fire or other disaster.

In addition, you should never work directly on the production copy of a file. Instead, copy the file to a local drive. Then duplicate the file locally and edit the copy. When done editing, upload the changed file and test.

If the uploaded copy is fine, you can delete both local copies (the original and the changed version). If there's a problem, you can re-edit. If you are unable to fix the problem, you still have your copy of the original, which you can re-upload until you can resolve the difficulty.

Link Check

Check your links on a regular (monthly or weekly) basis. There are a number of programs around that will do this, and both FrontPage and Dreamweaver can do it as well, though both have limitations.

If there is only one maintainer of the site, that person can fix all links. Most of the time, though, there will be more than one person responsible for content at a site. In such cases, the site administrator will find there are two kinds of broken links: ones that the site administrator can fix, and ones that s/he cannot. In the latter case, the site administrator should send the broken link information to the content provider and ask that the correct link information be sent. If such information isn't forthcoming in a timely manner, the broken link should be removed.

Unlinked Files

No file should be on a public university website that is not linked. Plan to check for these annually or semesterly. Unlinked files (also known as orphans) should be removed.

Orphans include old versions of PDF files, images that were uploaded "in case" they are needed, and information on employees that have since left the university. Removing the link to the file isn't enough; the file itself must be removed. If you want to keep a library of images, keep them on a local drive. Upload only the ones that are actually linked.

The ART of Web Sites

ART = Accuracy, Relevance, Timeliness. These are the essential elements of any successful web site. The content of a site should be reviewed regularly for all three.

Accuracy means that the information is still correct and has an appropriate level of precision. Relevance means that the information is still needed and is placed in an appropriate context. Timeliness means the information is not out of date and appears at the appropriate time.

Review requires a person to read the content and make a judgment. This doesn't need to be the site administrator and in many cases should not be. The content should be reviewed by the content originator, at the least. It's also a good idea to have it reviewed by an editor, someone who is not closely involved with the content and can read the material objectively.

Business Process

Review your workflow on a regular basis. Annually should be sufficient, but if there have been significant changes in personnel and/or job descriptions, a review might also be in order.

The review should include answering the following questions:

Remember that "content" means text but also includes images, forms, sound, video, etc.

Planning

Once a year (at least) you should plan for site improvement. You can make this part of your review of business processes.

You can do things during the year to aid in this. For example, collect user feedback and questions. Organize and summarize this and bring it to the planning session. During the year you or others in your department will likely visit the websites of your peers. When you see something you like, make a note of it and bring that information to the table as well. In short, while planning may happen formally only once a year, your organization should be thinking about it all through the year.

Central Resources

Review annually whether your site makes use of central information resources. These may be central at the university level, or at the level of a vice-president or college.

The best practice is that no central information resources be duplicated. There are methods for inserting resources into your website dynamically. If this were done rigorously across campus, information would be changed once by the information's owner, and updates would appear instantly across the university. It is not practical to reach this goal all at once, but you can identify which central resources you are using, and make the move incrementally.

Marketing

Review your site marketing annually. This means a review of keywords, titles and other html markup to make sure it is accurate and descriptive; review of links into your site, via reverse-link checkup; review of print literature; and review of how your site appears in multiple search engines.

Reading Reports

Departments can request web log analysis reports from their server administrator. The site administrator (at least) should be charged with reading these reports as they arrive. These reports will form another important source of information when planning time comes around.