Establishing a new website

While each department on campus will generally have their own Drupal host (ie, its.unca.edu and housing.unca.edu), we sometimes need to create new sites for special programs, projects, and topics.  Below are some guidelines we use to determine whether a site needs its own host, or should live as a page on an existing site.

Is the content distinct from all the sites we currently have?

New sites need to have unique content that should logically stand separate from all other sites.  If it's related to a project or program already in place, consider adding your content to an existing site.

Will your website have permanent staff or faculty dedicated maintaining it?

Each website must have someone responsible for keeping it up to date.  That person must be a permanent staff or faculty member.  If not, you'll need to identify someone who will be responsible for maintaining the site once it's live.

Will the website need to be maintained indefinitely?

New hosts generally should not be created for temporary or transient content.  Guest speakers, conventions, and other short-term or one-time events can be advertised through news services.  Informational pages can be added to the department sponsoring the event.

Do you have enough content?

Perhaps the most important criteria:  New sites must have a minimum of 5-10 webpages worth of content.  Note that PDFs don't count towards this minimum.

If you have a permanant need for a distinct site, and have a series of content-rich set of pages, contact webmaster@unca.edu to have your new site created.  If your content doesn't meet these criteria, we can usually find an existing website to host your pages.