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User's Conference Recap

By Kirsten Eidsmoe

Monday, October 1st, 2007 at 1:00pm

A big thank you to everyone who came out to Atlanta for our second annual Cascade Server User's Conference!  We had over eighty attendees from forty-five different organizations. 

We did a few things different this year to encourage participation and interaction between attendees early on, including a new "Birds of a Feather" session where people could ask questions, answer questions, and brainstorm in a small group setting.  Breaking up into different groups early helped get people talking and sparked some conversations that are probably still going on right now.

Special thanks to David Wisniewski from Brandeis University for facilitating a CMS Show and Tell session, as well as Eric Palmer from University of Richmond, and Nathan Glass and Stephanie Kern, both from Texas A& M Health Science Center, for leading sessions and sharing their amazing Cascade Server implementations.

Of course we had excellent speakers from Hannon Hill too: Bradley Wagner demonstrated the new Cascade Server 5.0, and Collin VanDyck offered a tutorial in load balancing – something new for 5.0.  David Klanac showed how Cascade Server can be used quite effectively in Rapid Application Development, and Amy Liu explained how to manage a site redesign effectively.  Anyone who sat in on Syl Turner's presentation should have a much clearer understanding of workflows, and if you were lucky enough to catch Sean Sawyer's, you'll be able to do some really cool things with XSL.  Videos of the presentations will be available shortly, so watch this space.

Monday night was especially fun for us at Hannon Hill; our Open House gave us all a chance to relax, get to know our clients a bit better, and share a little of our "corporate culture."  We look forward to the conference every year because our clients are so much fun – especially when you get a few of them together! 

And thanks to everyone for sticking in there with us despite a few setbacks – a power outage at our host hotel  for starters.  The good news is, I think we may have found a slogan for next year's conference:  "2008 – bigger, better, and this time with Air Conditioning!"  

Hope to see you all again next year!

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Hannon Hill's Atlanta Travel Guide: Recommendations for User's Conference Attendees

By Elizabeth Starkey

Wednesday, September 5th, 2007 at 1:00pm

It’s always more fun to get the inside scoop from some locals before heading into a new city.  Since so many of you are headed into Atlanta for our User’s Conference this month, we all got together to recommend a few places that might not be in your guide book.  To make it easier for you, all suggestions that are are MARTA train accessible are marked with a single asterisk (*).  All suggestions that are within walking distance of Hannon Hill and our host hotel, Sheraton Buckhead, are marked with a double asterisk (**).  (Most other locations within the perimeter are accessible via MARTA busses.  Schedules are available on itsmarta.com)

If you're planning to arrive in the city early on Saturday or Sunday, Tim and Kevin W. recommend that you take advantage of the great opportunity to catch a Braves game at Turner Field.  Our home team will play against the Milwaukee Brewers in both of these action-packed games.  Six Flags Over Georgia is another great place to spend your weekend here.  Artur recommends this theme park, which packs in lots of thrill rides and entertainment.

Plenty of good eats await you in Atlanta.  For distinctive Bangladeshi cuisine, Emily suggests Panahar. Amy advocates Roy's Restaurant* for excellent Hawaiian fusion cuisine.  For an upscale dining experience, try the Sun Dial*, located atop the Westin Peachtree Plaza.  Joel D. recommends this revolving restaurant, which features a breathtaking panoramic view of the city.  For the best barbeque in the city, Brock suggests Fat Matt's Rib Shack, which features live blues performances daily.  Morgan advises a trip to Atlanta Fish Market in Buckhead, one of the best places to find fresh fish in this inland city.  Atlanta is home to a number of fantastic sushi restaurants, including Genki, which is close to our headquarters in Buckhead.  Blaine commends their outstanding Cheese Kari Kari.  Joel B. recommends Twist** for your sushi needs, which is also located in Buckhead at Phipps Plaza.  In addition to sushi, this restaurant offers creative satays, tapas, and wraps and half-price bottles of wine on Mondays.  Harry & Sons is Collin's top pick for sushi.  This restaurant also offers Thai food and is located in the charming Virginia Highland neighborhood.  Dekalb Farmers Market is quite popular among Atlantans, offering a huge selection of produce, baked goods, and other foods at great prices.  Sean suggests a visit here for an inexpensive but delicious meal at the hot bar and to pick up some unique snacks for the trip home.  Finally, Beth recommends Cafe Intermezzo, a European coffeehouse, for dozens of desserts and coffee drinks.

After dinner, it's time for drinks, and Atlanta offers plenty of options.  Zach urges you to check out Brick Store Pub* in historic Decatur.  MJQ Concourse, suggested by Bradley, is a distinctive late-night hangout located in an old Midtown parking garage.  Enjoy your drinks while taking in the Atlanta music scene with live bands at Brett's favorite bar, Lenny's*, or at Michael's recommendation, Blind Willie's, a blues and Cajun bar.  If you prefer DJs, Sadiq suggests Opera*.  Finally, Midtown Bowl, recommended by Kevin G., offers a full bar along with 24-hour bowling.  Don't forget to try Atlanta's favorite microbrew, Sweetwater, while you're out.

For some culture, try the High Museum of Art* in Midtown.  Nedko recommends this fantastic museum, which was recently remodled and features an expansive permanent collection of art from all periods.  The Atlanta History Center, recommended by David C., showcases Atlanta's Southern roots.  Currently, the center hosts several historic houses and an exhibit on Benjamin Franklin.  Kirsten suggests taking a stroll through historic Piedmont Park*, which offers park tours, Green Market, and great place to exercise or relax in the heart of the city.  While you're in the neighborhood, discover Atlanta Botanical Garden, only a few steps away from the park.  The facility, advocated by Martin, is currently hosting David Rogers' Big Bugs & Killer Plants, featuring sculptures and "the world's largest public collection of carnivorous plants."  Stone Mountain Park is another great spot to walk and explore.  The park, recommended by Mike, includes a skyride, train ride, paddlewheel riverboat cruise, and laser light show.  Dean urges you to check out the new Georgia Aquarium* during your visit to observe and experience amazing underwater life.  The Fox Theatre* is a great place to catch a show, suggests Andrew.  "STOMP" and "The Rat Pack - Live at the Sands" will be playing during the conference and the weekend preceeding.  Syl advises a visit to the CNN Center*, which offers popular behind-the-scenes tours of your favorite CNN shows. Jeff proposes a trip to the brand new World of Coca-Cola*, which is now open and showcases the history of America's favorite soft drink in its hometown.  One of my personal favorite places to go in Atlanta is the Center for Puppetry Arts*.  This soon-to-be host of Jim Henson's definitive collection features a museum with famous puppets.  Their current performances include "La Cucarachita Martina" and "Winnie-the-Pooh."

We hope this list provides you with a few ideas on how to spend your free time while visiting Atlanta.  For information on attractions that are not listed here such as Fernbank Museum of Natural History, Underground Atlanta*, and Zoo Atlanta, check out Atlanta.net.  A CityPass can also be purchased to explore six attractions at a discount.  Recommendations on additional local restaurants and bars can be found on Citysearch.

We hope you enjoy your stay during our User's Conference, and we look forward to having you as a guest in our great city.

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User's Conference Registration Deadline Extended

By Morgan Griffith

Friday, August 24th, 2007 at 10:00am

The deadline for registration for this year's User's Conference has been extended by two weeks from today, August 24^th, to September 7th,  so don’t miss out!  This will be a great opportunity to interact with other Cascade Server users and the Hannon Hill team, and to learn new ways to get the most out of your CMS.

Please make sure to sign-up by September 7th, we’re looking forward to seeing you September 24th-25th!

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Hannon Hill Places In Top 50% of Inc.500 Rankings

By David Cummings

Thursday, August 23rd, 2007 at 1:00pm

When founding Hannon Hill in 2001, I had a vision of providing a powerful web content management system that would provide users with a simple yet robust means to manage and publish content. Over the last 6 years, that vision has become a reality and Hannon Hill is thriving as one of the leading developers of web content management software. Accordingly, I am so pleased to announce that Hannon Hill has placed 247^th in the Inc. 500’s annual ranking of America’s fastest growing private companies. It is an immense honor to be recognized by a publication as prestigious as Inc. Magazine and we at Hannon Hill look forward to carrying out our vision of providing powerful web content management software in the coming year and well into the future.

For more detailed information about the Inc. 500 and our standing, take a look at our Press Release.

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My CMS Is Totally RAD

By David Klanac

Wednesday, July 25th, 2007 at 1:00pm

As Director of Services for Hannon Hill, I am always looking for ways to improve our processes internally to ensure a high quality of service.  Sometimes, that involves a little Rapid Application Development (RAD). 

Recently, the Services team took on the task of analyzing the entire process of a project moving from the first product demonstrations on the sales side to their transition and ultimate project execution on the Services team.  We wanted to identify ways to make the handover from sales to services run more smoothly, and we also wanted to manage projects more efficiently.

After a few requirements meetings, we realized:

• Project scheduling needed a more scientific approach that would allow us to know what was coming down the pipeline from the sales team long before any invoices go out. 
• We needed to be able to see an actively updated list of clients and prospects so that we could be more proactive with scheduling clients. 
• We wanted to be able to see a daily status update of the currently active projects which would permit us to move resources around more efficiently to projects that needed our immediate attention.

It all sounded like a great challenge!  It was clear we were going to need to develop a system that would help people accurately communicate critical information. We got to toss around a few business 2.0 buzzwords and phrases like “establishing a new ‘paradigm’ to generate beneficial ‘synergy’ throughout the office.”  I am sure that some would say that we went for the hat trick by touting that it would have some “web 2.0” features to make interaction with the system more intuitive.

Since there was no existing code for us to reuse, we had the freedom of starting with a blank slate.  We identified several technologies and frameworks that would give us the most flexibility while lowering the total time spent with maintenance of bugs and feature improvements in the future.  Although we have skilled Java and PHP developers on the Services team who could have whipped up something really nice, the complexity of maintaining such an application would be best handled by the same developers who coded it.  I wanted to make sure that whatever framework we used would be easy for anyone (including me) to go in and modify.

After mulling over the benefits and drawbacks with taking a pure coding approach to our new web 2.0/paradigm-driven/synergy-generating system, we realized the best option was right under our noses.  Using Cascade Server we could create a framework for a fully functional prototype of our system within a couple of weeks (once we had a full understanding of our business requirements, of course).  By using XML-based data definitions and XSLT, we could provide the application with a means for data collection that would require minutes of developer time rather than hours to create.  The whole mix equaled quick time to production with a RAD cycle.  It will also ensure easy future modifications as our needs grow and change.

We completed the project in just enough time for us to take on quite a bit of project load. Now, with our new application making so much timely information available, we can focus our efforts towards measured planning and smart allocation of resources, and away from ad-hoc management. 

In short, we saw a business need and were able to realize tangible benefits from its implementation in weeks rather than months – one of the virtues of rapid application development.  One of the advantages we’ve seen using Cascade Server in-house is that it’s a tool that we can continue to extend to meet our internal application needs.  Moving beyond just using our CMS for our internet and intranet sites, we’re able to quickly develop solutions to problems that will keep everyone on the same page.

I’ll be speaking more on the topic of Rapid Application Development and Cascade Server at our upcoming Cascade Server User’s Conference.  Hope to see you all there! 

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Conference Registration and Call for Speakers Now Open

By Kirsten Eidsmoe

Tuesday, June 19th, 2007 at 1:00pm

If you look in our community section, you’ll find a new area dedicated to the 2007 Cascade Server User’s Conference.  We’re deep in the planning process, so check back often for updates on session topics and conference events.

Deadline for registration is August 24^th, so don’t miss out.  This will be a great opportunity to interact with other Cascade Server users and the Hannon Hill team, and to learn new ways to get the most out of your CMS.

Also, if you’ve done something interesting with your Cascade Server implementation, please consider being a speaker.  We’re looking for people to share their experiences solving specific business problems, integrating Cascade Server with other types of applications, and any sorts of tips and tricks you have.  Deadline for speaker submissions is July 20^th.

We’re looking forward to seeing you!

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