SDL Tridion: An Impressive Web Content Management (WCM) System - Part 1

I did a quiet in-depth analysis of the SDL Tridion platform a while back. I'll be sharing my assessment over a number of blog posts. I'll cover the architecture, content management, content publishing and delivery, content migration methodologies, search, analytics, documentation, and extendability aspects of the platform, so stay tuned!

Architecture

The underlying architecture for SDL Tridion is modular, de-coupled, and based on industry standards (underlying technologies and protocols) and best practices.

Tridion supports both .NET and a Java-based deployment.

Content is stored in XML for better reusability and separation between content and presentation. The use of XML Schemas allow for more flexibility in structuring content. XLink manages relationships between schemas and documents. XSLT can be used to render content in native formats (HTML, PDF etc.). This XML foundation is the underpinning for Tridion’s content reusability and modularity.

Tridion also supports Web services for reuse, extension, and integration with other platforms.

Content delivery is decoupled from content management. This decoupling allows for easier content distribution, better demarcation of logical and physical architectural components, and more flexibility in how the platform is deployed and scaled.

Tridion supports standard application servers such as IIS and WebLogic. The Presentation server provides storage management (published content and related assets and their metadata), link management (across all assets to prevent broken links), and cache management (for better performance).

As for publishing models, SDL Tridion provides 5 models with the ability to combine them (for example, pages with high hit rate can be static, while areas behind the login can be dynamic and personalized). These models give us extreme flexibility in how we design our physical architecture.

One of the unique features of SDL Tridion is BluePrinting. It’s a modeling mechanism for content and processes. It provides the ability to separate the management of content, layout, applications, and profiles. This allows for better alignment to functional roles and the ability to reuse or localize content without compromising the corporate branding standards.

SDL Tridion has a developer community and a framework for developers to submit components for other SDL Tridion customers to use.

In summary, the product’s architecture is truly impressive and manifests a great technical aptitude on the Tridion engineers’ part. It lends itself well to potentially any physical architecture requirements and will likely meet most of your functional and technical requirements. But remember, there is no silverbullet with WCMs; you can never find a platform that meets ALL your requirements. Custom development should be expected.

Note: I relied on published documentation from SDL Tridion as well as meetings with their architects.