Accessibility is a word you will hear us say very frequently. It is very (very, very, VERY) important that your website and all of the content of your website be very web-friendly and accessible to all people of the world. This means that someone with any disability should be able to understand, navigate and interact with your site.
OU's CMS is called the Adobe Experience Manager (AEM). You will notice an AEM logo on your site admin screen (at the top-left) and on your pages in author.
Alternative text (or alt text) is a short description added to an image that conveys its content and purpose. It ensures people who use screen readers or have images disabled can still understand the visual information on a webpage. Alt text is essential for creating an accessible and inclusive digital experience.
Best Practices for Writing Alt Text:
Consider the image’s purpose.
By adding clear, descriptive alt text, you’re helping all users access and engage with your website’s content.
Web assets are the files and resources used to build your website and enhance its content. These include items like:
Web assets are stored in a shared folder within the CMS so you can easily upload, manage, and reuse them across multiple pages.
These are the ‘building blocks’ we use to populate. Components are used to add text, photos, embed videos, link documents, create tables, etc. Components are found in the left side panel while editing a page. They can also be added by clicking inside of the content area.
View Topic: Adding Components
A Content Management System (CMS) is a software platform that allows users to create, edit, manage, and publish content on a website without needing to know how to code.
With a CMS, you can:
A CMS makes it easier for anyone to keep a website up to date, regarless of their level of technical expertise.
This is the main area of the page. All of your standard content like text, images, components, and layout sections should be added here.
Cascading Style Sheets, or CSS, are a set of rules that control the appearance of your website. While HTML handles the structure and content (like text, images, and links), CSS manages how those elements look.
CSS controls things like:
Fonts and text size
Think of CSS as the design layer that helps your website look clean, professional, and consistent with OU Brand standards
A Digital Asset Manager is a tool used to store, organize, and manage digital files like images, documents in one central location.
It helps users:
Upload and store files used on their website
Keep track of where and how assets are being used
Make updates in one place so changes apply everywhere
Maintain file naming and organization standards
Think of it like a library for all your web content, making it easier to find and reuse your digital materials quickly and consistently.
A section for large visual or media element at the top of the page designed to capture attention or promote key information.
Information architecture (IA) is the way content is organized, structured, and labeled on a website to help users find what they need. It includes how menus are arranged, how pages are grouped together, and how links guide visitors through a site.
Good IA makes websites easier to use by creating a clear path to the right information, improving both user experience and overall site effectiveness.
The Material Template is the foundation for all new OU websites. It defines how content is placed on a page and offers flexible styling options, including a full-width layout and a horizontal navigation bar.
If your site currently uses Templates A, B, or C, it will eventually need to transition to the new template. The OU Web Team is available to support you throughout this migration process.
The Page Information menu provides quick access to key page details and actions.
From this menu, you can:
In a website’s structure, parent and child pages help organize content in a hierarchy.
For example, if “Academics” is a parent page, then “Undergraduate Programs” and “Graduate Programs” might be child pages.
This structure helps users navigate your site and understand how the content is grouped.
Before publishing, you can preview how your page will appear. There are two ways to do this:
We recommend using View as Published for the most accurate preview before publishing.
After editing your website, you must publish your page to make the changes visible on the live site.
You can publish in two ways:
From the Site Admin view
From the Page Information menu on the page you’re editing
If you do not publish, your updates will not appear on the live website.
Quick Publish works the same as the regular Publish option but is available in the Site Admin view. You can use Quick Publish to publish both pages and assets directly from the Site Admin screen.
The side panel is the menu on the left side of your screen. Use it to:
The side pael is a helpful tool for managing and organizing your page content.
This is the first screen you see when you select Sites after logging into the CMS. From here, you can:
Use the site admin screen to manage your site's structure and content.
If you want to remove a page from your live site without deleting it, you can unpublish it. This keeps the content saved in the CMS (author environment), but it will no longer be visible to the public.
Unpublishing is helpful for:
View as Published lets you see how your page will look on the live site before you publish it. It opens a new tab and shows a clean preview, removing items like the page summary and extra spacing that are only visible in the editing view. This helps you catch any layout issues before going live.
A VPN creates a secure connection to a private network over the internet. If you are working off-campus and need to access the CMS, you must connect through the VPN. OU IT manages the VPN service and provides setup instructions and support
View Topic: Using VPN Software
