Drupal for User Services?

Last week at work, my boss came to me and said that he was interested in setting up a uniform website for all the User Services documentation that we've ever generated. The idea of the project is to use DreamWeaver MX or some OpenSource equivalent to make the site architecture slick and easy to update. He's also interested in putting in some sort of Wiki or blog in the index page to serve as a running newsletter from User Services or a collaborative community that authorized users in the school can edit.

My first thought was to build a quick blog through Blogger, put my template over it, host it on our servers and make it the main page. Then one of my colleagues suggested that I look into Drupal. So that's just what I did. This is an open source platform that allows for content management, blogging, polling, discussion, news ag, etc. What's really nice is that it makes building FAQ pages from posted content. Also, their book module builds a heirarchical structure of nodes that can be edited. Older versions are retained in case reversion is required. All in all, it looks like an ideal tool for building a users' guide for our department.

I am interested in exploring more about how this might be of use to us right now, and how it might be a useful tool for readers advisory in libraries.

Now All We Need Is Chicago Style...

I know, I'll never be satisfied.

From Educational Technology:

Copyright: Giving Credit - techLearning
David Warlick's Landmarks for Schools Web site offers a free online tool, called Citation Machine.... Students can open the tool, select the type of resource they want to cite, enter the "raw" information requested (author, publisher, etc.), and then click on Make Citations. The result is a proper citation in both MLA and APA formats. Students can then copy and paste the format into their bibliography (they will have to do the proper indenting on their own, but there's an explanation about how to do that). The beauty of Citation Machine is that it handles online and electronic sources as well as print, so students who use the Web or a CD-Rom encyclopedia as a reference can still follow proper citation protocols.
http://www.landmark-project.com/citation_machine/index.php

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