Lightware designs and manufactures precision video signal management products for high-end applications across various industries. With over 25 years of experience, Lightware has 18 offices worldwide, and their products are present in more than 30 countries. They support customers in multiple verticals such as Corporate, Education, Medical, Defense, E-sports, and Live Events.

During the discovery phase several key difficulties were pinpointed which caused daily issues both in content management and in the user experience:

• Technical and User-Experience Issues: The existing site was slow, negatively impacting SEO and customer experience.
• Global Growth: The on-premise server farm in the EU could not support Lightware's global presence, leading to performance issues.
• Complex Content Structure: The growing product portfolio made it difficult for users to find products and information.
• Outdated CMS: The existing CMS was outdated, hard to develop, and limited Lightware's ability to manage localized and multilingual content.
• Lack of Direct Customer Access: Users could not see important product data like regional prices, and Lightware had no direct access to active customers through the website.

Our main goal was to address these items through website modernization with a new design system and the CMS solution. The wide variety of content hosted on the website required custom

To provide an improved search experience, SnapSoft implemented a state of the art search engine which relies on the data managed in the CMS.

During the project an additional area for improvement has been identified, which led to the extension of the scope with the introduction of the new product information management system in parallel with the CMS.

This required architectural adjustments and extending the involved teams which led to a cross department process improvement exercise as well, providing additional value to the project. The goal was to achieve low operational costs paired with quality performance:

• Product data schemes had to be defined and implemented from ground up.
• Data between CMS and PIM system had to be kept synchronized as certain webpages were using data from both system
• Maintain low infrastructure costs, but not compromising performance by the utilization off the on demand Static Site Generation. Pages load extremely fast because they’re pre-built and served as static files via CDN, and hosting static files is cheap with minimal server resources needed.
• Allow content managers to review and publish the changes in content instantaneously Integrate Lightware’s existing attachment management processes and automatisms to the Pimcore system

SnapSoft Application Development services are capable to build and modernize existing applications to native AWS products and migrate the legacy data from existing data sources and applications. Additionally through design and discovery workshops, we are able to provide UX/UI consultancy and materials according to the latest standards. SnapSoft brought expertise in building complex ecosystems based on SDLC best practices on scalable cloud infrastructure, coupled with a strong background in custom application development and legacy system integration. SnapSoft provided an end-to-end (E2E) solution, which included:

• Conducting multiple discovery workshops following the design thinking methodology, to discover the product vision and set objectives which align with customer and market standards
• System and UX/UI design, offering multiple solution proposals.
• Low-fidelity and High-fidelity usability testing
• Iterative technical implementation, following QA and testing process.
• Integration with open source / 3rd party APIs
• System and feature documentation, including user guides.

AWS was selected for its scalable, secure, and reliable cloud infrastructure, essential for modern application development. AWS’s services ensured that Lightware’s CMS and PIM system could grow and adapt without compromising performance or security. With the AWS services we were able to provide multi region support in a pay as you go model with low operation cost.

SnapSoft initiated the project with a thorough technical review of multiple open source CMS and product information management systems. The goal was to fully understand the chosen system's limitations and to find the optimal candidate for the integration by validating its feasibility with a proof of concept. After validating the priority requirements related to the CMS our team shifted focus to validate the PIM system capabilities.

Goals of the PIM POC: Assess how well PIMCORE integrates with Lightware’s existing data structure. Test PIMCORE’s capabilities and usability in real-world scenarios. Provide insights and evidence to support the decision on adopting PIMCORE as Lightware’s primary product information database system. Assess which of Lightware’s product management processes should be adjusted

Solution Architecture

Once Lightware approved the proposed solution, SnapSoft developed the system defined and developed the architecture. The team also planned an environment strategy to support content migration and testing workflows. This included the development of several data importer solutions.

Our team focused on delivering the CMS and frontend part of the application first in order to enable Lightware to test the system and allow building content for the launch as soon as possible. Multiple design and functional iterations were conducted, incorporating feedback loops from technical teams. Throughout this phase, SnapSoft worked in close cooperation via agile ceremonies with Lightware’s marketing and content management teams to optimize testing and feedback channels.

Common priorities and milestones were defined taking into account dependencies between related work items and technical depth. A parallel integration / research pipeline was set aiming to highlight and clarify all PIM integration related tasks which might have an effect on the required feature set of the CMS

Technical Implementation SnapSoft developed a new website and integrated Pimcore for product data management, opting for a clean break from existing systems. This involved several key technical decisions and the heavy utilization of AWS services.

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Core Components

• AWS Landing zone: A well-architected, multi-account AWS environment that serves as a starting point for deploying workloads and applications. It provides a baseline for multi-account architecture, identity and access management (IAM), governance, data security, network design, and logging
• Strapi CMS: The Strapi Content Management System was used for managing the content of the website. It was deployed on AWS Elastic Container Service (ECS), providing a scalable and containerized environment. This means Strapi runs in Docker containers managed by ECS, allowing for easy scaling and reliability.
• Pimcore PIM: Pimcore, the Product Information Management system, was also deployed on AWS ECS. This ensures that the PIM system can handle varying loads and remain reliable, crucial for managing product data effectively.
• Next.js Frontend: The website's frontend was built with Next.js and deployed on AWS ECS. Next.js's on-demand Server-Side Generation (SSG) was utilized for fast content refresh and performance. The Next.js frontend communicates with the dedicated CMS server via GraphQL calls with proper authentication. Where custom backend logic was required, Next.js API routes were used.
• Storybook: An open-source tool that helps developers create and manage UI components independently from the main application. It acts as a sandbox where components can be developed, tested, and documented in isolation, improving collaboration and streamlining UI development.
• Solr: A key aspect of the implementation was the integration of Solr to provide a fast and efficient search experience for users. The main goal was to provide search results in multiple information categories, enabling users to find the critical path to their destination. This included extended article main search, and product search functionalities with advanced filtering capabilities to further reduce redundant data shown to the user.
• ETL Pipeline: To facilitate seamless data flow, a custom ETL (Extract, Transform, Load) pipeline using Lambda and SQS (Simple Queue Service) was created to fetch, transform, and ingest data between Pimcore, Strapi, and Solr.

AWS Services for Assets and Delivery

• CloudFront and S3: Both Strapi and Pimcore assets are served through Amazon CloudFront. The actual files are stored in Amazon S3. This combination provides efficient and fast delivery of assets, as CloudFront caches content at edge locations, reducing latency. S3 offers durable and scalable storage for the assets.
• Traffic Management: For the Next.js frontend, both Application Load Balancer (ALB) and CloudFront are used. ALB helps distribute traffic across multiple ECS containers running the Next.js application, while CloudFront further optimizes content delivery.

Security and Monitoring

• Web Application Firewall (WAF): A Web Application Firewall is in place to protect the deployed applications and resources from potential security threats. WAF helps filter and monitor HTTP traffic to prevent malicious attacks.
• CloudWatch and SNS Alerts: Comprehensive monitoring is implemented using AWS CloudWatch. CloudWatch collects and tracks metrics, logs, and events. Alerts are delivered via Amazon Simple Notification Service (SNS), ensuring that any issues are quickly identified and addressed.

Key Elements of the Implementation:

• New website development from scratch
• Introduction and implementation of the Pimcore system.
• Strapi backend for content management.
• Next.js frontend running on ECS with on-demand SSG.
• CI/CD pipeline to ensure code integrity and smooth deployments
• Solr integration for advanced search and filtering functionalities.

Feature Implementation

• To support Lightware's content and product management needs, SnapSoft developed a suite of features:
• Custom built components: Content creators are able to use a wide range of components from functional and design perspective, covering specific use cases defined by their team members.
• Custom search engine: Enables content managers to effectively transfer specific information to the target audience by highlighting specific search terms and adjusting the ranking and priority of keywords and website content
• Content localization: Content managers can easily create, copy, publish and unpublish content from one locale to another. They are able to create locale specific exclusive content
• Asset management: Users are able to download the latest attachment (User guides, firmware,marketing literature and technical documents) from the website. These are automatically synchronized with the PIM system maintained byLightware.
• Access and role management: Allows Lightware to manage access control for different content manager groups, enabling internal testing, releases for specific locales only, and live updates.
• The primary challenge was ensuring that these new features didn’t disrupt existing content management processes. The SnapSoft team organized process review workshops to prevent ways of working disruptions.
• External Integrations
• SnapSoft integrated key tools to enhance user experience and system efficiency:
• Strapi: Integrated as the headless CMS to manage marketing content globally.
• Pimcore: Integrated as the custom PIM system to handle and organize customer product data.
• ReCaptcha: Security service by Google that protects websites from spam and abuse by verifying that a user is human, not a bot
• Google Analytics: Tracking and reporting website tracking in order to understand user interaction on the website
• GoDaddy: Website hosting and website management system
• DeepL: A leading neural machine translation service known for its high-quality, natural-sounding translations
• Salesforce: Cloud based customer relationship management system. On the website we utilized the Account Engagement Form Handlers features.
• Mapbox: A mapping and location data platform that empowers developers to create custom, interactive maps for various applications.

Documentation and User Guides

SnapSoft produced comprehensive documentation covering the technical, feature-specific, and functional aspects of the CMS. This included:

• System architecture
• Technical and API documentation
• Feature specifications
• Content management guidelines
• Video-based user guides
• This documentation empowers Lightware’s team to manage both the technical and business aspects of the system with ease.

Lightware’s newly developed CMS elevates their way of working, enabling them to manage, build, and update their website content on multiple locales with ease.

Benefits to the End-Users

• A smooth user experience with fast loading times.
• Information is easier to be found, thanks to the updated search engine and website design.
• Globally accessible, SEO-optimized site
• Enhanced product management with product recommendations, connections, and a room builder.

Benefits to Lightware

• Lightware now has full control over its content management system, allowing it to create, update, and iterate content based on real user and office feedback.
• Improved content management efficiency including each Lightware office worldwide
• The PIM system allows the maintenance of an up to date and secure database supplying the latest product information to the users driving engagements
• Modernized, engaging website design meeting which adequately reflects the company's status in the market

Technologies Used: React, Next.js, AWS S3, AWS ECS, Figma, Apache Solr, Pimcore, Strapi, Cloudfront, Terraform, AWS Lambda, AWS SQS, AWS Route 53, AWS CloudWatch, AWS SNS, AWS Secrets Manager, AWS RDS, AWS Aurora, AWS ALB, AWS ECR, AWS WAF

Learn how SnapSoft can streamline your AWS integrations and drive strategic success for your business. For more information, visit SnapSoft.