Joomla!
What was that?
The name is somewhat of an unknown entity to those not in the know. Some may have known it's predecessor, Mambo - sounds like a dance or a jive. So what is Joomla?
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In fact, Joomla! is an award-winning Content Management System (CMS) that will help you build websites and other powerful online applications. Best of all, Joomla! is an open source solution that is freely available to everybody. In other words, anyone wanting to build a website can build one by downloading the software and customizing the system to suite their needs, with absolutely no website design experience needed. This system allows anyone with only a basic understanding of computers to generate a website which can typically costs website owners anything from R2500 to R100 000. And all of this for free!
Joomla! is used all over the world to power everything from simple, personal homepages to complex corporate website applications. Here are just some of the ways people are using Joomla;
Corporate websites
Online shopping /commerce
Small business websites
Non-profit organization websites
Government applications
Intranets and extranets for Corporates
School and church websites
Personal or family homepages
Community-based portals
Joomla! can be used to easily manage every aspect of your website, from adding content and images to updating a product catalog or taking online reservations.
The basic Joomla! package is designed to be easy to install, even for non-programmers. Most people have no trouble getting the software up and running, and there is plenty of support available for newbies on a very healthy forum, numbering tens of thousands of users. Once Joomla! is installed and running, it is simple for even non-technical users to add or edit content, update images, and to manage the critical data that makes your company or organization go. Anybody with basic word processing skills can easily learn to manage a Joomla! site.
An average of 172 new users sign-up every day world wide on the official Joomla website. On top of all that Joomla! won the Best Linux / Open Source Project at UK Linux and Open Source Awards 2006, in London last year for the second year running. You will also find an amazing array of websites powered by Joomla including the likes of East Coast Radio, Yeigo, Felixton College and the Richards Hotel.
However, the most astounding fact of all is that the Joomla South African Portal, is managed, owned and continuously developed by our very own local yocals in little Empangeni; Slingshot Content Management Systems.
Not only have they made their mark on the Internet - the Joomla.org.za website is currently in first, second and sixth places on Google.co.za out of a possible 231,000 for joomla and even more impressively, ranks 17th out of a possible 44,700,000 for joomla internationally - and this position is improving on a daily basis. this is due to the Search Engine Friendliness of the Joomla powered websites, although the same principles may be applied to non-Joomla sites that want to command the rankings, and by implication the business that flows from such dominance in the competitive online market.
Another exciting recent development was an invitation to present conference papers and a Joomla workshop at the 9th Annual Conference on World Wide Web Applications, hosted by the University of Johannesburg in September.
Sean Grant, the founder of the Joomla Southern African Portal, who is based at the University of Zulualnd in the Department of Communication Science, will present research papers on the Use of ICT in Education, particularly Joomla and Moodle, and will be offering a Joomla workshop to conference delegates.
Sean hopes to have a Joomla Users and Managers course accredited by the end of the year, which could be offered at schools, colleges and universities as an official learning programme. This work is due to be published in scholarly journals once documented and presented.
The team at Joomla South Africa are clearly breaking new ground in their pioneering efforts to catalyse the use of the Joomla Content management System nationally, by offering training courses in Richards Bay, Durban, Cape Town and Johannesburg and ongoing support of ordinary people who are making use of the free Joomla software.
The team consists of Terri on email marketing and website development, Elinor on marketing and website development, Melanie on training and website development and Sean on training and website development.
If you want to build your own website, give yourself some real skills that you can use to make you more employable, or add value to your current occupation – go to Joomla.org.za. There you will find online tutorials on "how to". There is also online support as well as telephonic support if you need a bit of assistance.
Slingshot are currently offering a Search Engine Marketing course in Richards Bay this Saturday for anyone who is interested in increasing the visibility and effectiveness of their website - ideal for Public Relations practitioners, Marketing Managers, Establishment Owners and other SMME's - basically anyone whose business can benefit from more enquiries, leads and sales, most of which can be done online.
Contact Slingshot on 035-772-4555 or training@Joomla.org.za
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