KBPublisher Knowledgebase

KBPublisher web-based knowledgebase

The folks over at KBPublisher have released the new paid version of their excellent knowledgebase software. The primary improvement in this version is granular control over user security, thus enabling you to have protected content in the knowledgebase without having to set up a separate sysetem.

KBPublisher can run on Windows, Linux or Unix, requires IIS or Apache, MySQL v4.1 or higher and PHP v4.3.0 or higher. The client is browser-based, supporting Firefox, IE and Safari and just needs javascript enabled.

As many of you know I am a firm believer in building centralized repositories to capture information that some of you still maintain in spreadsheets and word documents. With KBPublisher you can centralize the data (no, not by keeping your spreadsheet on a file share) and make it searchable. In addition to posting information as an article, you can attach files (PDF manuals for example) to the articles as well. And, since articles can be assigned to multiple categories, you can post an article once and see it in different category areas as you drill down into the knowledgebase for information.

Built into KBPublisher is a visual text editor for posting articles and an image upload wizard for posting images to the knowledgebase. Also key is the ability to create secure categories and secure articles that are only accessible by authorized users. This is one way you can have a single repository with both a "public" view, like an FAQ section for end users, and an internal knowledgebase with technical data, server setup information, detailed descriptions of application setup and installation instruction and the like. In addition, you can create categories that can be user maintained so that areas like Sales, Marketing, Adminitration, Warehousing, Transportation, etc. can each have their own knowledgebase of data that are specific to their area of expertise.

Given the extensive feature set, the new paid version of KBPublisher is a bargain at $198 for the basic version with a 10 user limit, Small Biz version, limited to 30 users, is $398 and the Corporate edition is $998 with unlimited users. There is also a $98 Start single-user edition that is limited to 100 "articles".

FileZilla FTP Client

Free FTP client FileZilla

Ok, so I was at a customer site and we needed to download some patch updates for a program which required an FTP client. The customer didn't have one installed and I suggested downloading and installing FileZilla. File-what came the reply. Ok, so I realize now that not everyone has heard of it before, so I thought I'd pay homage to FileZilla in today's post.




FileZilla Client is a cross-platform FTP, FTPS and SFTP client with lots of useful features and a graphical user interface.

(From the FileZilla website) The features of FileZilla include (among others) the following:

* Supports FTP, FTP over SSL/TLS (FTPS) and SSH File Transfer Protocol (SFTP)
* Cross-platform. Runs on Windows, Linux, *BSD, Mac OS X and more
* IPv6 support
* Available in many languages
* Supports resume and transfer of large files >4GB
* Powerful Site Manager and transfer queue
* Drag & drop support
* Configurable Speed limits
* Filename filters
* Network configuration wizard
* Remote file editing
* Keep-alive
* HTTP/1.1, SOCKS5 and FTP-Proxy support


So, next time you need a full-featured FTP client, don't forget about FileZilla.

Super Mario Flash

Super Mario on Widgetbox

Ok, so I wasted probably 30 minutes tonight playing the Super Mario Game Flash Widget on Widgetbox.com. For those of you that remember playing that game when it originally came out it's a step back in time. But this is just one of thousands of available widgets on the Widgetbox site. There are scratch-off mystery buttons, embeddable weather widgets, clocks, news clippings, and a whole host of other available widgets, free for the taking and embeddable in your blog, web page, myspace, facebook, etc.

While many of the widgets on Widgetbox are frivolous and fun, there are some very useful additions that could even make it onto your corporate web page like the Forbes.com breaking news widget, Weather.com widget, Google calendar widget and many more that link to quality content.

But, for those of you reading who want to get busy re-mastering the old Mario - here's the link:

http://www.widgetbox.com/widget/supermariobros



See, I told you it was addictive...

Google Sites update

Google Sites for shared content

Ok, so a while back I wrote a post on Wetpaint and their rich media content "social website" and I continue to be amazed at the variety of options available there.

However, the other day I needed a quick site to use for tracking open items, to do lists, quote requests, quote responses, technical documents, etc. for a customer. As a creature of habit and given my constant use of Google docs I thought I'd dig a little deeper into Google Sites. After taking some time to familiarize myself with some of the page edit and sub-page options I found that Google Sites was a GREAT way to do what I needed. For one particular site (I have since set up at least a dozen) my menu hierarchy now has ten top layers and some pages are up to 3 and 4 layers deep. I set this particular site up to track all open activity items for a customer as well as creating an archive site for issue resolution, open issue tracking, technical document repository, service requests, quote requests (and responses) and the like. Since it's a web-based service (yeah, another one of my Software-as-a-Service rants) it's accessible from anywhere via web browser. Also, to share access to the site it's easiest that everyone have a gmail account (who the heck doesn't by now), that way you can link to shared Google docs, spreadsheets, presentations and the like.

As an example, when you click on "Create new page" the options are: Webpage, Dashboard, Announcements, File Cabinet and List. The list type is interesting in that you can pick from three pre-defined templates (editable) or chose custom and then define column headings and types (checkbox, date, dropdown, text or URL). Each column is then sortable as well. I chose to create "home" pages at the top level and then create cascading levels of repository pages under each heading. The site map link in the upper left hand corner of the site gives a complete hierarchical view of all of the pages, so it's easy to find everything once you create it. I even created a "quick contacts" list, sort of a mini contact list with phone, email, etc. so everyone could have a central place to update their respective information.

Of course the "site" is search-able as well, so don't fret if you can't find something quickly. While the templates for the sites give you some basic backgrounds, don't expect the "rich media" options you get from Wetpaint - at this point so far with my experience, Google Sites is more about functionality than beauty. Given what I'm using it for, that's fine but I could see where embedding podcasts, Youtube "how to" videos, and the like can't be too far off.

I have a few of you that have said you are now looking into Google Sites as an alternative to using Microsoft Sharepoint internally. I can see some limitations on that as a long term option, but if you're talking about an alternative to Sharepoint Services, then you might be satisfied. The primary issue at this point is the lack of detailed, extensible security. If you share the Site, then shared users have access to all content on the Site. You have a choice between collaborators and viewers, but that's it; so I could see using it for information that needs to be share with a whole team, but knowing that all information is visible to every member could cause problems. You could use document passwording and encryption to strengthen the security at the document level, but the document itself would still be available for download.

So, while not a panacea as a team website it only took me about 30 minutes to build the whole environment and upload all of the necessary documentation to get the information centralized and shared. So far, well worth the effort. As always, give it a try and let me know what you think!!