In their work at UVM, many departments, groups, or individuals will need to publish content on the web. This could include:
- Official UVM sites like a department’s home page
- A personal blog or class information site
- Departmental file sharing and collaboration
- A custom-developed web application
- A website for a lab or research group
To meet these needs and others, UVM provides several options for web hosting services. This article is intended to briefly describe the available options, and to help in deciding which would be most appropriate for a user’s needs.
UVM Hosting Options
Drupal
Drupal is a content management system (CMS), and is intended as the primary hosting service for official UVM pages. UVM’s Drupal instance is maintained and controlled by the Digital Team, part of the UVM Division of Strategic Communications.
UVM Drupal is the most supported web hosting option at UVM, and many tools, learning resources, and pre-made components are available from the Digital Team. For sites that need to maintain UVM’s branding and standard ‘look and feel’, this will be the easiest option. Because of this, UVM Drupal is also more controlled and less flexible than some other hosting options. Depending on a page or applications needs, Drupal may not be suitable or may be too cumbersome to develop within.
See also:
- UVM Web Guide (access request)
WordPress
WordPress is a popular blogging platform, and an instance is hosted at UVM for general use. WordPress sites are simple to create and work with, and require minimal technical knowledge to get up and running. While the most common use-case for a WordPress site is to host a blog, other types of content can be hosted here too.
WordPress is a good option for more informal, less controlled web content. Sites are easy to create and each user can have as many as they’d like. Some UVM theming options and default plugins are available for WordPress sites, but UVM is not able to offer usage support for other customization.
URLs for sites hosted on UVM WordPress can start with “blog.uvm.edu/” or “site.uvm.edu/”.
See also:
SharePoint
SharePoint is a cloud-based platform for sharing and collaborating on files. It is hosted by Microsoft and access is provided as part of UVM’s Microsoft Office licensing. SharePoint is ideal for teams that need to share files between multiple users or groups at UVM. In-browser editing, version history, and integration with Teams and other Microsoft Office applications are a few of the more useful features.
While individual files can be shared with non-UVM users, SharePoint is not a suitable option for hosting public-facing websites. Additionally, SharePoint cannot be used in the development and hosting of custom applications, as other options on this page can.
See also:
Silk
Silk is a general-purpose web hosting platform hosted on UVM servers and maintained by UVM System Architecture and Administration (SAA). Silk can be used to develop and host custom applications, and several programming languages are supported. Silk is a “DIY” platform, meaning that while SAA maintains and supports the server itself, users are responsible for their own projects’ code and won’t be able to receive support on application development.
Silk is the most flexible hosting option provided by UVM, but it also asks the most of its users. Groups and individuals building sites for Silk should have plans in place for ongoing maintenance of their projects, as custom code will need to be updated periodically to keep working as intended.
See also:
Choosing a Hosting Service
The best hosting service for a given project will depend on the following:
- What kind of content will be hosted?
- Who is the intended audience?
- What is the level of technical knowledge and time commitment of person or group developing this project?
For example:
- A UVM department’s official contact page should be hosted on Drupal
- An instructor’s academic blog or publicly available course material would make sense to host on WordPress
- A UVM research or Lab’s website would be a good fit for WordPress
- A UVM department’s internal shared files directory would work well in SharePoint
- A custom application or other web content that doesn’t fit any of the above options could be hosted with Silk
More generally, a decision tree for deciding this could look like the following:
- I want to host…
a. One or more web pages -> Go to #2
b. A custom web application -> Silk
c. A listing of shared files and folders -> SharePoint - On behalf of…
a. A UVM department or other group -> Go to #3
b. Myself or another non-UVM group -> Go to #4 - I want my site to be…
a. UVM branded and well supported -> Drupal
b. Custom-built and flexible -> Silk - I want my site to be…
a. Custom-built and flexible -> Silk
b. Pre-built and easy to work with -> WordPress