Quick Start
Available to: Departments, Schools, Colleges, Academic Departments, Business and Administrative Units, Centers and Institutes (reporting to the Provost), and Major Initiatives, Events, or Ceremonies
Cost: See cost details, below.
- See Getting Started, below.
We provide centrally-managed website hosting services on www.bu.edu. The majority of websites are hosted with the WordPress content management system. While we strongly recommend WordPress, we also provide non-WordPress web space for those who want to build their sites from scratch.
Benefits
Websites are hosted in IS&T’s data centers, relieving you of the costs and responsibilities of maintaining your own web servers or paying for external hosting. We provide a high-performance, scalable, and secure solution for publishing your site, allowing you to focus on creating great content and getting your message out to the world. A collection of professionally-designed themes is offered in conjunction with the WordPress content management system. These themes simplify compliance with University branding guidelines and provide your visitors with an intuitive interface and experience consistent with other BU websites. WordPress makes it quick and easy for you to create and maintain your site.
Key Features
- WordPress – WordPress sites offer a modern, full-featured content management system with advanced permissions control, workflow tools, flexible layout and design options, and integration with other BU services and applications. It’s all web based, so there’s no software to buy or install.
- Non-WordPress – As an alternative, non-WordPress sites offer secure access to a top-level folder on the www.bu.edu domain where you can publish static content (XHTML, HTML5, CSS) with tools such as Dreamweaver or Contribute.
- Advanced editing permissions – Granularly define who on your website editing team can edit what content with the BU Section Editing plugin for WordPress.
- Workflow – Create a review and approval workflow within your editing team to stage edits to already-published content with the BU Versions plugin for WordPress.
- Drag-and-drop navigation – Easily and intuitively manage the hierarchical page structure of large numbers of pages with the BU Navigation plugin for WordPress.
- Mobile-friendly – All standard Flexi themes offer a mobile-optimized view to your visitors who are using small-screen devices (request required to enable this functionality).
- Restrict public access – A web-based interface lets you restrict access to a single page on your site, your entire site, or anything in between – without writing any code.
- Staging network – Clone your existing WordPress site to a staging server for redesigns and major content reorganizations, and work on your revisions privately without the risk of publishing disruptive or un-reviewed changes on your public site.
- More –WordPress includes many other key features including news feeds, integration with the BU Calendar, an easy-to-use online forms builder, local user management for adding/removing editors, a media library for managing photos and documents, and much more.
- Security – All sites are hosted in on-campus data centers and feature 24×7 monitoring, data redundancy, and backup services.
What to Expect
This service normally will be available 24 by 7 except for standard change windows, as described in IS&T’s standard policies, procedures, and schedules for making changes.
Requirements
- Domain eligibility is based upon how the website will be used. Please see the Website Services Matrix for more information.
- For WordPress sites, WordPress training or equivalent experience with WordPress is required.
- BU WordPress runs in a managed environment with many themes and plugins developed to enhance functionality for the BU community. We do not accept themes or plugins from outside developers or agencies. Please see these FAQs for further details.
Cost
- There is no charge for web hosting services.
- Custom website development and migration services are available, with charges based on cost recovery.
- Custom website development, migration, and content maintenance services are available, with charges based on cost recovery. Content maintenance is available only for official BU sites; it is not available for individual or student group sites.
Getting Started
- To start using WordPress to manage your website, you can:
- Do it yourself – get a WordPress site either to develop new content or manually migrate an existing site. See the Website Services Matrix for eligibility, and to request an empty WordPress site.
- Have us do it for you. You can request that we migrate your existing site into WordPress for you (cost-recovery charges apply). Request a consultation on redesigning your site, moving an existing WordPress site into a new design, or migrating a non-WordPress site into WordPress.
- For non-WordPress, contact us to create your directory or request a consultation.
- Attend a WordPress training session to learn more about WordPress in a hands-on classroom environment.
- Educational Technology Consulting is also available.