Agility CMS Blog

11/16/2009 Publish to Facebook, Mobile and YouTube from Agility CMS
Posted by Michael Assad

The name Agility comes from the flexibility of the platform to do lots of things that other CMS systems can't.

11/11/2009 Agility Tip: A Refresher on Content Scheduling
Posted by Joel Varty

Content Scheduling is a powerful feature - let me explain how it works.

11/06/2009 How to test multiple copies of Internet Explorer on your PC without Virtual Machines
Posted by Ian Davis

Nearly 10 years after it's release Internet Explorer 6 is still used by enough people to warrant testing.

11/06/2009 Quick and dirty Cross Browser compliance...
Posted by Ian Davis

Even though all sites should be "standards compliant", the world of the web just doesn't work that way.

11/05/2009 Shrinking your SQL Server 2005 Transaction Log
Posted by Joel Varty

How to shrink your SQL Server 2005 Transaction Log.

11/02/2009 Edentity announces Sponsorship at nextMEDIA Toronto
Posted by Pam Westwater

Edentity is proud to be a sponsor of the 2009 nextMedia Toronto event, taking place from November 30th to December 1, 2009 at the Design Exchange Building.

10/30/2009 Facebook Open Graph API Makes Every Website a Facebook Page
Posted by Michael Assad

Facebook recently made some big product roadmap announcements at the latest Facebook Developer Garage including the Open Graph API.

10/27/2009 Edentity is proud to announce our Sponsorship at the Digital Marketing Awards
Posted by Pam Westwater

Edentity is proud to be a sponsor of the 2009 Digital Marketing Awards, taking place on November 11, 2009 at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre.

10/27/2009 Channel 9 - Windows Azure Storage Overview Video
Posted by Michael Iskiw

Great video on the basic concepts of Window Azure Storage

10/27/2009 Bing Maps Interactive SDK
Posted by Michael Assad

If you're working with Bing Maps, the Interactive SDK gives you a leg up on how to learn and code all of the features and functionality.

10/15/2009 Check out the Cineplex Mobile Site
Posted by Michael Assad

Here's a great way to check movie times at your favorite theater from your iPhone, BlackBerry or mobile phone with the new and improved Cineplex mobile site.

10/13/2009 Writing for the Web
Posted by Kyle Tinning

have written web standards several times for jobs in the past.  So many times that I wrote them for myself so I wouldn't have to keep writing them.

10/07/2009 Facebook Connect Wizard and Translations
Posted by Michael Assad

Facebook has announced a compelling new version of Facebook Connect that provides quicker setup and translations.

10/06/2009 Agility Release - October 2009
Posted by Joel Varty

We’ve just released a round of new features, fixes and enhancements for Agility!

It’s been a long summer of development - here’s a summary of what we’ve been up to:

• Features and enhancements: 31
• Bug fixes and tweaks: 189

09/24/2009 Canadian Opera Company Website Wins WebAward
Posted by Michael Assad

Delvinia Interactive and Edentity have won a WebAward for 'Outstanding Achievement in Web Development' in the 'Non-Profit Standard of Excellence' category for the Canadian Opera Company website.

09/15/2009 Crisp Brand Agency Launches First Agility-Managed Flash Site
Posted by Michael Assad

Agility has been used to manage content embedded in Flash objects for a while. However, the Five Axis site is the first example of an Agility-managed site that is 100% Flash - navigation, content and all.

07/22/2009 Great Article on Open Source Software from CMS Watch
Posted by Michael Assad

My favourite line: 'First of all, I have to keep repeating that open source isn't gratis ("think of free as in free speech, not as in free beer").'

07/10/2009 Agility Tip: Clear out all Formatting and Start Fresh
Posted by Michael Assad

When all else fails, sometimes the only way to get your formatting right in the Agility Editor is to strip out all HTML and start again.

07/07/2009 Agility CMS Reviews Posted on Capterra
Posted by Michael Assad

Read product reviews from Agility customers.

06/26/2009 Adding HttpModules to Agility Websites? Extend the ExtensibleAgilityHTTPModule
Posted by Joel Varty

If you want to do Friendly Urls or other things in an Agility website that requires you to add an Http Module, you should do it by extending Agility.Web.HttpModules.ExtensibleAgilityHTTPModule.

06/16/2009 Bring Your Site to Life with SitePal
Posted by Michael Assad

This nifty utility allows you to place a talking avatar on your site to guide your visitors through the functionality and navigation.

06/10/2009 Google Launches Innovative Translation Tool
Posted by Michael Assad

The Google Translator Toolkit combines automated translation with 'crowdsourcing' so actual people can review and edit machine generated translations.

06/09/2009 IIS7 Search Engine Optimization Toolkit
Posted by Michael Assad

Microsoft has released a toolkit that will simplify basic SEO tasks like making it easier to build a site index and robots.txt file.

05/21/2009 Amazon Web Services Import/Export – fill your S3 Buckets Without Killing Your Bandwidth
Posted by Joel Varty

One of the things about online file storage is getting the first massive data dump onto the server.  If you have a lot of data to store, it would be more prudent to simply take an external drive to the physical data center and do a transfer that way.

05/13/2009 Agility Release - May 2009
Posted by Joel Varty

We've just released the May 2009 Agility Update.  It includes 20 new features and productivity enhancements as well as over 100 tweaks and fixes.

05/06/2009 Agility Shared Content Preview Settings
Posted by Michael Assad

Just a reminder to the Agility developers and power users about how to set the Preview settings on a shared content list.  If the settings are not correct, the list and items in the list will not preview correctly.

05/04/2009 Can a website keep you fit?
Posted by Steve Pontisso

Well, not exactly, but it can give you tools to help you start a fitness habit!  That's the goal of our latest Agility managed website http://www.fitin15.ca/ (or http://www.faitesle15.ca/ in French).

04/27/2009 New Address Effective Today
Posted by Michael Assad

As of today, we are working out of our spacious new office space at Spadina and Wellington in Toronto. 

04/17/2009 Easy Access for your Amazon S3 Data
Posted by Michael Assad

Now that Agility CMS supports Amazon S3, we will start storing more and more data on this cloud storage environment.  Here are some useful tools to help access your S3 data.  You can use any of these tools alone or with your Agility account.

04/07/2009 Feature Tweak Released: Language Copy
Posted by Joel Varty

We recently rolled out a tweak to the "language copy" feature of Agility.  You may not even have known that this feature exists...

04/06/2009 Agility Site Launch: COC.ca
Posted by Michael Assad

The latest in a string of high profile sites running on the Agility Content Management System is the site for the largest opera producer in Canada and one of the biggest in North America.

03/27/2009 Agility CMS vs. OpenText WCM (Formally RedDot)
Posted by Michael Assad

How does Agility stack up against OpenText WCM (formally RedDot) - one of the most mature and best known content management systems?  According to Andre Gaulin, Director of Web Operations for Cineplex, very well.

03/17/2009 Latest Agility Release Highlighted on CMS Wire
Posted by Michael Assad

CMS Wire picks up on the new features from the March launch of Agility.

03/09/2009 Agility Release March 2009 – Features!
Posted by Joel Varty

Our March update for Agility has been released, and it packs in a bunch of new features.

03/05/2009 Agility Tip: Publishing Agility Modules
Posted by Michael Iskiw

There are a few scenarios that need to be followed when publishing Agility Modules and if you are unaware of how things work in Agility it can be a little confusing.

03/05/2009 Thinking about Mambo for your CMS? Might Want to Think Again.
Posted by Michael Assad

Chad Auld, former core developer of Mambo and founder of Mambo fork project MiaCMS explains why the new CMS is better than its parent - and how the Mambo Foundation has some soul searching to do.

03/02/2009 Agility Tip: Customize Your Agility Lists
Posted by Michael Assad

Display the fields that you want to see on your list and change the default sort column in under a minute.

02/27/2009 Agility Tip: Published Modules That Don't Show up on the Page
Posted by Jonathan Voigt

There is a case you can get into that shows the module as published but where it won't appear on the site.  This should be known to everyone for debugging reasons.  We're looking to change the modules state from Published to Published - Requires Page Publish.

02/25/2009 Content Management Interoperability Services
Posted by Michael Assad

IBM, Microsoft, Open Text and others are pushing a web services specification that will provide a standard way for applications to read data from any content management repository.

02/25/2009 RedDot is now Fully Digested by Open Text
Posted by Michael Assad

Open Text has formally announced the termination of the RedDot brand.  What does this mean for RedDot customers?  Hopefully no more than a little upsell pressure from the ECM vendor.

 

02/19/2009 Agility Tip: Many Tabs Make Light Work
Posted by Steve Pontisso

One of the limitations of working in a web application like the Agility Content Manager is that often, moving to another section requires a "page refresh".  For example, if you're working in the Pages and Content view, and you want to switch over to the Documents folder, the page refreshes.

02/10/2009 Agility Tip: Upload Hundreds of Files to Agility, In Just Four Easy Clicks!
Posted by Steve Pontisso

It's pretty common for our clients to upload many files to the Documents folder in Agility.  This is typically where linked documents, images, and even Flash files are stored, and used on a variety of different pages throughout their website.  Uploading files to Agility is no different than uploading to any other web application.

02/10/2009 Software as a Service - "Transition to SaaS: An ISV Cookbook"
Posted by Jonathan Voigt

Software as a Service is definitely getting a lot of attention.  Only now are people starting to understand the benefits and what it really means.

02/03/2009 Agility Site Launch: CookWithCampbells.ca
Posted by Michael Assad

The latest Agility site was launched last week.  Users can search for recipes that match keywords or a selection of criteria.  Once logged in, users can print, email or rate recipes.

02/02/2009 IE7 AND IE8 Compatibility
Posted by Jonathan Voigt

IE8 is coming out soon and because of its change in CSS rules (more compatible) it may break some previously build sites that were built for IE7.

01/30/2009 Agility CMS Listed on Capterra
Posted by Michael Assad

Agility has been listed on the Capterra catalog of software products.  Capterra is a leading source for information about technology vendors across a broad spectrum of categories.

01/22/2009 IIS 7, Dynamic Compression and AJAX Web Services Means Massive Performance Increases
Posted by Joel Varty

I work on a product called Agility CMS.  Agility CMS is a hosted web content management system - including a web application dedicated to actually editing website content, pages, sitemaps and other good stuff. 

01/20/2009 Agility Featured in CMS Wire Article
Posted by Michael Assad

CMS Wire is one of my favourite sources for CMS news.  They cover a very broad spectrum of all things content and social networking.  This month, they have continued to provide commentary on our monthly update process.

01/15/2009 Agility Tip: Adding an Extra Line Feed in the Rich Text Editor
Posted by Michael Assad

You may find a glitch in the Agility Rich Text Module content editor where you can't seem to enter an extra line feed between two paragraphs of text.  Read on for the simple work-around.

01/14/2009 Agility Update for January 2009 - Back-end
Posted by Joel Varty

Our first update of 2009 is here! This month, our changes to the system are mostly "behind the scenes" backend changes, which will allow us to better service all Agility sites and apply future updates quicker.

01/06/2009 Great Article on Usability from ComputerWorld
Posted by Michael Assad

The premise of the article is that usability is about more than simplicity, consistency and stability - it's about control.  Users are happiest when they are in control of the software and not the other way around. 

01/05/2009 Agility Tip: Content Scheduling of List Items
Posted by Joel Varty

Content Scheduling allows you to configure dates and times for content to automatically be published or unpublished.  This is useful for time sensitive content like events or press releases, or for content that changes on a regular basis like the 'hot story' on your home page.

12/18/2008 Agility Tip: FireFox 3 is the Best Browser for Agility
Posted by Michael Assad

In our Agility browser speed tests, FireFox comes out on top.   FireFox 3 in particular is the best bet.

12/11/2008 A Great Article CMS Usability
Posted by Michael Assad

James Robertson from Step Two Designs in Australia posted a great article on CMS usability.

12/11/2008 Agility Tip: Publish Content Faster
Posted by Michael Assad

The staging and published modes in Agility are a great way to preview changes to the site before they go live.  However, as any Agility user knows, publishing content can sometimes take a few extra precious seconds that could be used for something more productive.

12/10/2008 Upcoming Agility Update for December
Posted by Joel Varty

We are quickly approaching another update for Agility!

12/01/2008 Huge Upside for Agility in SaaS Web Content Management Market
Posted by Michael Assad

CMS Watch has posted their trend analysis of Software as a Service Web Content Management (SaaS WCM) Vendors for 2009.  The report focuses on the top three SaaS WCM tools out there: Clickability, CrownPeak and OmniUpdate.  Of the three, the first two compete more directly with Agility.

12/01/2008 More Press for Agility
Posted by Michael Assad

CMS Critic has posted a good summary article about Agility.

 

11/19/2008 People posting about Agility...
Posted by Joel Varty

There's nothing more gratifying than seeing someone else say something about a product you build...

11/14/2008 Agility Tip: Share Your Agility Content with Popular Social Sites in Minutes
Posted by Michael Assad

The web is all about sharing.  Find out how you can instantly share any Agility content with all of the major social networks, bookmark sites and portals.

11/14/2008 Agility Tip: Global Scripts
Posted by Steve Pontisso

If you’ve been working in Agility for a period of time, you’ve probably noticed the Scripts tab when working on a page in your site. Many of our clients make use of this tab for putting a tracking script (like Google Analytics) at the top or bottom of the page. Did you know that if you wanted the same script on every page, there is an easier way?

11/05/2008 Agility Update for November 2008 - Productivity!
Posted by Joel Varty

For the November update, we have focused on productivity: how can we make Agility users more efficient?  We took a bunch of requests and put them into the product.  This will be a recurring theme in our iterations as we strive to integrate new features, productivity enhancements and other backend or performance enhancements into the system.

So what is there to look forward to in this release?

10/24/2008 Agility is in the Cloud
Posted by Joel Varty

One of the latest buzz-words that I hear flitting across the office these days is “Cloud Computing.”  I won’t even bother to look up an actual definition (I stopped doing that after Web 2.0).  What cloud computing means to me is that a hosted application and all of its constituent data are stored on a server and taken responsibility for on behalf of customers.

10/10/2008 The Numbers Don't Lie
Posted by Justin Lafontaine

Recently, I set out to put together a return on investment document for our Agility Content Management System.  My goal was to compare implementing a web site using our Agility CMS product to implementing a web site from scratch with no CMS, to using a standard , non-web based CMS and to using an Open Source CMS.  The results surprised me.

10/03/2008 It's Good to be Agile
Posted by Michael Assad

The name Agility comes from the flexible nature of the CMS, allowing easy implementation of graphic intensive sites with complex back-end integration requirements.  But there is another reason why Agility is 'Agile' that has an enormous benefit for our users.

10/02/2008 How does Agility synchronise data to my website?
Posted by Joel Varty

When you login to the Agility Content Manager application, what happens when you click Publish on a page, module or content item? How does this content get moved from the central content server to the various web application servers that host your site?

09/25/2008 Agility Release – September 25, 2008
Posted by Joel Varty

This was a pretty major release for Agility, as it introduced new features and consolidated our WCF (Web Services) platform to give us more flexibility down the road.

09/24/2008 Agility Tip: Google Webmaster Tools
Posted by Michael Assad

If you have a website and you haven't linked it with Google Webmaster Tools, you should.

09/22/2008 Secrets to Successful CMS Implementations
Posted by Jon Voigt

Content Management Software is complex.  It's not like Microsoft Office where you can buy the software off the shelf, install it, and you're done.  Every website is different which means every CMS implementation is unique.  

09/19/2008 An Architect's Perspective on Agility
Posted by Joel Varty

Agility is a CMS product written primary by developers for developers.  That, in my mind, was always the first priority – but not in the way you might think.

09/19/2008 Language / Region Localization in Agility
Posted by Michael Iskiw

Working with multiple languages on a website is rarely pleasant. However, Agility proves that multi-language website implementations can be streamlined.