This case study will tell the story of a 'three-stage rocket' based on Agile project management, which was the key to a successful project in terms of both time and budget.

The Netherlands Institute of Ecology (NIOO-KNAW) had an in-house Drupal 6 corporate website and an outdated intranet built with Dreamweaver and ColdFusion. It was time to upgrade the system, and YouWe was asked to be a partner in this adventure. Based on previous experience, YouWe proposed to make use of the Agile/Scrum project management methodology.

During the project we encountered several challenges, starting with a pregnant product owner who alone knew all about the old database. The design had to be approved by an internal communications committee, which lead to a longer time-frame to reach an agreement therefore tightening the unaltered deadline.

In order to build a corporate website, an intranet, the option of sub-sites and a separate stream for display on TV screens - all in one solution - we had to be creative. To make matters even more complicated, the entire user database had to be migrated from the Drupal 6 environment to the new intranet and LDAP was included in the equation to unify the use of authentication data within the organization.

To stay within budget, we decided to keep things simple and make use of Drupal community modules as much as possible. In addition, the order in which the various elements were built was unusual. The first stage was the actual intranet. In the second stage came the design and its implementation into the theme, followed by LDAP-integration. And finally, in the third stage, the corporate website was built within the same installation using Drupal’s multi-domain solution.

We aimed at all times to keep it simple, both in terms of the technical solutions and the management of the project. This was our formula for success.