ARMY presence on the web is being given a slick new look that presents a uniform, organised and good-looking face to internal audiences.

In line with forthcoming policy on Internet and intranet sites, the Army is employing a tool that ensures a commonality of approach in the design, layout and content of individual sites.

Army Web Manager Maj David Hanzl said the Defence Site Engine (DSE) was a customised Defence version of an existing product from a company called Compucraft.

"The DSE meets the Government mandate for the common look and feel across its web presence and meets requirements for privacy, copyright, archiving and other considerations," he said.

"It also allows any authorised person to create and maintain their site within those guidelines - it's really that easy to use."

This means units need not appoint technically-focused people to manage their web sites or send personnel on courses to learn web-site design or related applications.

In order to build a web site using the DSE, units need to nominate an authorising officer to review material posted to the site for clearance before it goes live and can be accessed.

Actually building the site and updating information is the role of the content manager, of which a unit can have as many as the commander deems necessary.

This generates a security measure whereby all information posted by all content managers has to be cleared by the authorising officer before it is available online.

Another advantage of the DSE is the standard presentation of information from site to site across the organisation.

"When the DSE creates sites it guides you into putting standard information into standard locations - so you will always know where to find the commander's biography, or the orderly room contact details from unit to unit.

"Until now there has been no consistency in the structure, naming, addressing or look of Army sites - trying to find something in that mess is, frankly, bloody confusing."

DSE is little more than a database with some Graphic User Interface tools incorporated into the top layer of programming.

Every web site entered into it is simply another record on the database, with standard pages in a standard structure.

The DSE is accessed through a standard web browser, making the tools used in building a web site ones that anybody familiar with the Internet will recognise.

Feedback from those who have started to make use of the program is positive, with some expressing surprise at how easy it is.

"We've had some people approach it with a fair amount of scepticism - but after half an hour of instruction, they're ready to go solo."

Units wishing to make use of the DSE should contact Maj Hanzl at army.webmanager@cbr.defence.gov.au to nominate their authorising officer and contents manager.

By Cpl Jonathan Garland