Liferay Portal CMS Concepts for Non-Technical Users

I recently presented this to a group of non-technical users. The feedback was positive, and made me think this may be useful to others.

Why did I make this presentation?

I put this little presentation together because a lot of our users, who were being trained to contribute content, had trouble distinguishing a web content item from an instance of the Web Content Display portlet. The solid red line between a Web Content Display portlet and the journal article that it is configured to point at is more blurred to end users than you think. Furthermore, some folks could not appreciate the need for structures and templates, often viewing them as unnecessary overhead. 

In less than fifteen minutes, I address the above at a level high enough to make a techie gasp for oxygen.

Take note that:

  • This presentation is intended for non-technical business users. It is not for developers.
  • Developers interested in learning about Liferay Portal CMS concepts would do better to start with the Liferay Developer Network
    • That being said, if you are a developer and are looking for ideas on how to present some of these CMS concepts to a non-technical team of (say) content editors, then you may find the content of this presentation useful.

Warning! Cheesy analogies abound.

Part 1 (10:00)

Part 2 (3:34)

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Believe, your presentation is to developers too, because there is metaphors useful to start an explanation.