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Websites
Understanding the Types of Websites
The university’s website is a platform for communicating with external stakeholders, such as prospective students, researchers, and faculty, about university activities. OIT and the Office of Communications and Marketing work together to make decisions about sites and content within the university’s website domain. Remember: any site within the utk.edu domain structure reflects on the university, and internal communications should be built within the enterprise intranet platform.
OIT and OCM provide multiple options for website hosting, including a University-Supported WordPress environment and virtual server space for faculty, staff, and students—all at no additional charge.
Websites are available to those groups engaged in work to support the university’s mission and students completing academic coursework.
University-Supported WordPress vs OIT Public Linux Environment
| University-Supported WordPress | Public Linux | |
| What type of content will be on your site? | Colleges, schools, and major administrative divisions Academic Departments, Academic Support Units, Administrative Divisions, Administrative Support Units Major Research Initiatives Research labs, groups, and projects Special events and conferences | Student coursework and projects Non-WordPress sites for special events, conference, and research labs and projects |
| Who installs WordPress, Themes, and Plugins? | OIT | You |
| Which theme can I use? | UTK’s theme, The Hill | You can choose your own theme |
| What plugins can I use? | Any plugin currently installed on multisite; new suggestions will be considered. List of installed plugins |
Any plugin not included on the banned plugins list |
| Where is it hosted? | WP Engine | Public Linux |
| Who creates content? | You | You |
| What URL can I request? | name.utk.edu* name.sites.utk.edu name.labs.utk.edu *requests for top-level utk.edu URLs are subject to approval. |
volweb.utk.edu/~netid |
| Price | No additional cost | No additional cost |
| How to Get Started | Request a University-Supported WordPress site. | Sign up for a Public Linux account |
Additional Web Resources
If you are looking for web resources that don’t fit into the description above, OIT provides additional web resources for specific groups.
- Canvas: Academic Course Information
- Campus Intranet: Internal information for all UTK employees
- Collecting Online Payments: Use the University’s approved vendor, TouchNet, to collect online payments.
- Online training platform or training development resources: Use Canvas Catalog to host your online training
- Online Surveys: Use Qualtrics, the university’s preferred online survey solution. Qualtrics is HIPPA and FERPA compliant and an excellent resource when surveying the university community.
- Student Organizations: Use VolLink for Student Organization sites and information.