Multiple product lines on a single Docs Portal

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WriterAndrew
Propeller Head
Posts: 50
Joined: Tue Mar 05, 2019 2:43 am

Multiple product lines on a single Docs Portal

Post by WriterAndrew »

Quick overview of situation:
Company A use flare, but mainly to generate PDFs. They want a Docs Portal.
Company B has a Flare-based Docs Portal.
Company B is purchased by Company A.
What is the best way to create a single site that documents both products?

- Have separate Flare projects that output to /companyA or /companyB folders within the Docs Portal ?
- A single project (will make maintenance a nightmare and build times excessive...)
- Globally linked project? (I have no experience of these...)

There will be some limited integration between the two products, but they serve different users/needs, so will only need a "common landing page" and a few links between the docs for the different products.

Thoughts?
RStreets
Propeller Head
Posts: 63
Joined: Wed Apr 19, 2017 8:37 am
Location: Cambridge, UK

Re: Multiple product lines on a single Docs Portal

Post by RStreets »

I have a portal for several linked products: a project for the portal itself, plus several projects that are linked from the portal for different products and user groups. I make extensive use of global project linking across all the various projects too. This was as a result of inheriting one site for on product, building a new site with a different host (needed access control) for a second product,... and eventually getting the opportunity to bring them all together in one place. (It's over here should you wish to take a look: https://docs.ubisense.com/portal/Content/Home.htm)

Note I use Central for hosting so my approach is influenced by working inside the MadCap "biome".

I find the portal plus sub-sites approach is useful because:
- it enables some parts to be password protected and others not
- individual sections can be updated independently
- faster builds and uploads for smaller sub-sites
- if you're building from existing content a simple link from the portal to another site ties content together rapidly

But, from a user experience perspective, search (using MadCap's search) doesn't work across the complete documentation site just the individual sub-sites. This is making me reconsider the multi-site approach.
Rae Streets (Flare user since 2017, now on Flare 2023; Central user from 2020)
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