Open Text manages new static content for The National Archives—one of the world’s largest information banks

1. 1 | Customer Success
The National Archives
Open Text manages new static content for The National Archives—one of the world’s largest information banks
It holds records of the central courts of law, documents government Web portal. Today, www.nationalarchives.gov.
useful for family historians (census data, wills, and divorce uk provides access to databases, news and information from
“Open Text came out on top. records), service records of the British armed forces, press releases, event details, and podcasts to a catalogue
Its Web solution is highly records of central government departments, and Foreign of over 10 million official documents. Clearly to manage
featured and easy to set up and Colonial Office correspondence showing Britain’s such an exponential growth of online information, the small
and use. Open Text has given relations with the rest of the world. in-house Web team required expert support.
us excellent support and
Maintaining this huge and extremely important collection
willingly transferred knowledge to our Web
and managing the content so that information is readily Removing the bottleneck
team. In a complex environment such as available to the general public, the professions, businesses, It was equally important to find a way to remove the
The National Archives, we particularly valued and government departments is one of the most challenging bottleneck in uploading data, making changes, and keeping
the version history feature, which lets us see of all information management tasks. Web information up to date. Previously, all content was
an audit trail of when and why changes to prepared and managed by a small Web team using basic
“It was essential we found a structured, methodical,
the site were made, long after individuals Internet development tools. The manual preparation of
effective, and efficient way to manage such a mass of
may have forgotten.” documents, passing to the Web team for conversion to
information,” says Vera Mehta, The National Archives’
Web Designer/Developer. “After a thorough review of HTML, validating, and amending on a test site was a lengthy
the market, we selected Open Text for our Web Content and resource-consuming process. It took at least five days
Management System (CMS). It has proved a perfect to implement a change and much longer to upload
match for our requirements.” a complete suite of new pages.
“We have over 500 employees, and each department has
The National Archives, based at Kew, is the Online information explosion its own presence on The National Archives’ Web site.
UK government’s official archive containing The National Archives acts as the nation’s collective They were all channelling uploads and Web requests
almost 1,000 years of history. It houses one memory by storing the records of government. It is tasked through our Webmaster and the small Web team,” Mehta
of the largest collections in the world with with assembling and making available regular influxes of explains. “Because the Open Text solution is simple and
over ten million records and documents information from such nationally important activities as UK intuitive to use, we have now empowered content owners to
from The Domesday Book to census surveys and the release of government archives construct and upload their own pages. The content owners
government papers. under the 30-year rule. are happy to have more control, the content is loaded
faster, and the Web team is able to progress
Ten years ago, in its former guise as the Public Records Office, Web improvements in other areas.”
The National Archives had a single-page presence on the

2. 2 | Customer Success
Open government tender computer servers and storage systems that house them,
would both increase rapidly were the servers allowed to
Selection of a CMS vendor was subject to the thorough Customer become cluttered with old and irrelevant material.
scrutiny required of a government open tender. Great care
was taken to achieve best value for money from the public Although over 500 potential content owners create,
purse. The National Archive sifted about 10 potential Industry upload, and manage their own Web pages, the overall
suppliers to present a proof-of-concept demonstration appearance, structure, and accessibility of the site are
of their products and undergo intensive interrogation to maintained to a consistent style and standard. This
evaluate product reliability and performance and assess Business Solution is achieved automatically by the Open Text system
the capabilities and support levels of each vendor. that allows the Web team to formalise the “look and
feel” and the structure of the site through a portfolio
According to Mehta, “Open Text came out on top. Its Business Challenges of tailored templates. These ensure site standards are
Web solution is highly featured and easy to set up and
maintained while the templates guide content owners
use. Open Text has given us excellent support and willingly
through the stages of building pages, presenting content,
transferred knowledge to our Web team. In a complex
and uploading without the need to possess a detailed
environment such as The National Archives, we particularly
knowledge of Web technology.
valued the version history feature, which lets us see an
audit trail of when and why changes to the site were made, “The content owners are very happy using the Open Text
long after individuals may have forgotten.” templates. They have a secure and efficient framework
Business Benefits within which to construct their pages and really value the
Consistent and accurate speed with which they can handle uploads and changes
and the control they have over their own information
The Open Text solution provides important features to help
areas,” Mehta comments.
The National Archives automate Web file management. If a
page is not updated or accessed for a while, the software
triggers an automatic alert so that the content owner can
Proactive site management
take the appropriate action to ensure information on the Freeing-up the Webmaster and the Web team is the key
Web site is kept accurate and relevant. benefit of distributing responsibility for the content and
using Open Text to automate routine site administration.
The National Archives had a big problem with its Web
Instead of being under constant pressure to deal with
server becoming overcrowded with obsolete information.
content changes and formatting new material for the
It now uses Open Text to purge out-of-date or rarely used
Web, the small Web team is now more productively
material automatically—an operational and economic
employed in upgrading, extending, and improving the
imperative for such a large online information service.
entire Web site.
Difficulties in accessing documents and the cost of

3. 3 | Customer Success
“The implementation of the Open Text system has given out what was working and what could be improved.
our Web team the time to work with content owners to The review confirmed high satisfaction levels with the
improve the appearance and structure of the material they new CMS and the improvements to The National Archives’
disseminate via the Internet,” Mehta comments, alluding Web presence.
to the need to provide more concise, tree-structured “Because of Open Text, we are now actively pursuing
content for easy access via the Web. more advanced ways of adding video, maps, and
Working closely with The National Archives, Open Text historical databases to the site without adding pressure
consultants undertook a comprehensive business review to the team. Such activities were previously outside
of the requirements and attitudes towards publishing our capabilities due to a lack of available time,”
material online. Extensive interviews were conducted with Mehta comments.
department heads, content owners, and other staff to find
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