Because Manifesto was designed to be modular, you can add entire new capabilities to your website just by installing another module.

At the heart of any module is the notion of a content object. The most basic installation of Manifesto includes the following features and modules:

User Accounts and Roles: For managing site visitors, editors, and administrators. User accounts can be simple, like a username and password, or detailed, with an individual's complete profile, site preferences and multiple addresses. Roles are larger grouping units, and are used to control editing and viewing access permissions. Users may belong to one or more roles.

Media Gallery: This module handles all media uploads, including images, mp3s, Flash animations, QuickTime movies, Microsoft Word documents, etc. It manages and coordinates all of your media assets for use throughout the site, so media can be reused and repurposed in multiple locations. You can also enable direct user uploads and gallery display, in which case the module functions as a public gallery or repository.

The Dated Posts module: This is a simple module that allows you to display brief news blurbs, announcements, or press releases. Use it to quickly post updated information to your site, to announce upcoming events, or issue important statements. 

The Home Page module: A generic free-form HTML page for displaying content on your site's home page. The home page generally acts as a kind of portal, aggregating brief references to content from other modules, but for the main body of your home page, use this module to add content that will appear only on your home page.

The Pages module: This is the most flexible of all content modules. With the Pages module, you can create any number of freeform HTML pages with limitless hierarchy and dynamically-generated navigation menus. You could build your entire site with nothing but this module, but for specific kinds of data, it is convenient to have a custom module. See the Links module below for an example.

The Links module: Because the world wide web is designed to be interconnected, it's always a good idea to have links to related content on your site. The Links module allows you to organize your links into categories, and, since it contains specific fields for the URL and last access status, it is capable of automatically maintaining itself. It periodically contacts the URL, and when a link becomes unavailable, the module automatically disables it and removes it from display on your site until you can verify its availability again. Hassle-free maintenance!

The Page Hits module: It's always nice to know how much traffic your site is getting, and where visitors are coming from. While there are more comprehensive hit statistic software packages available, the Page Hits module gives you a quick overview of your most popular content, frequent referrers, and even what search terms people are using to find your site!

Combine this with flexible design options and a built-in search mechanism, and you have yourself a website. But what if you have more specific needs? See the next page for a list of modules already developed for Manifesto…