I am trying to get my head around how to implement versioning and content
approval for my DNN websites.
I need to update a couple of websites, and I am hiring some
freelancers to make content updates and look into SEO issues. For this, I need
some kind of content approval workflow in place, so I am not worried that they unintentionally
mess up my live website. Another reason is, I do want to see the changes they
make.
One option is to use Live HTML module from mandeep which has
approval workflow and versioning where you can compare the content and see all changes
pretty highlighted. However, this means I need to replace every single HTL
module with a new one, and, since mandeep doesn’t have any tools that can do
this automatically, it’s going to be a long and boring manual job. Another
problem is I still won’t be able to see and approve changes to the page title
or description.
I am currently playing with the idea to make a copy of a
website and give it to the editorial team. Once they finish I would compare
changes to the live website and copy if I approve them. I can probably use a
combination of SQL Compare and Winmerge and write some script to copy changes
between two databases. Alternatively I can write an application that can access
DNN portals via WebApi and copy the changes. However it would take time and I
would rather use something that is already available.
None of the options is ideal, so I am thinking if I am
missing something. It seems like a quite common task, and I am just wondering if
someone else has looked into it.