MacSites Weekly Maintenance - Every Wednesday from 8 p.m. – 11:45 p.m.
There may be disruptions and intermittent outages during this time. We highly recommend refraining from editing websites during the maintenance window.
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MacSites

By Media Production Services

Get Started with MacSites – Order Form

MacSites is a continuously improving website content management system for McMaster University that has a strong focus on accessibility, branding and ease-of-use. MacSites is built on WordPress: the world’s most popular website content management system.

Main Project Contact

Who will be our main contact for this project?
Note: If yes, this form will populate a secondary contact name and email field.
Faculty of Health Sciences websites feature the 'Health Sciences' menu on the left of the navbar. If your site is connected to FHS, please discuss your website requirements with CSU prior to continuing with this form. To contact CSU, please submit a MyCSU service ticket.

Subscription Fee

The MacSites subscription fee is $125/month which gets paid annually at the start of the fiscal year ($1500/yr). If your website goes live during the year, we will pro-rate the subscription fee to the end of the current fiscal. Your subscription supports maintenance, security updates, accessibility improvements and ongoing new features so your site never gets stale. It is a continuous improvement model that all MacSites content editors benefit from!

Project Options

When starting a MacSites project, you have two options:

MPS Coordinator: An MPS Coordinator will work with you and your team to plan/coordinate the build of your new site. This service includes sitemap planning, content population (up to 20 pages, with one round of revisions), export/import support for database driven content from previous websites, and some graphical support. The one-time cost for an MPS Coordinator is $6500.

Self-serve: If you have previous experience with WordPress, MacSites or you would like to watch the training videos to build out your site yourself, you can choose the “Self-serve” route for free!

Custom Development

If your web project requires custom development to add new features, functionality different branding, etc., additional costs may apply. Additional costs will be discussed after we meet with you to discuss scope and requirements.
If your website is not McMaster branded and requires custom branding, there will be an additional fee of $1850. Custom branding will consist of a logo placement in the center of the header (logo supplied by client) and two brand accent colours that will replace the primary and secondary colours in their default locations. Custom branding must be kept at a minimum so it does not conflict with future updates of the MacSites platform.

Website Details

List the ideal web address/URL you would like to have (we will check to see if it is available).
This will be confirmed before launch.
Required format for McMaster branded sites: https://sitename.mcmaster.ca

These include URLs you've purchased (or plan to purchase) for this project.
External URLs are outside the required format (https://sitename.mcmaster.ca).
Examples include:
https://macsites.ca
https://mac-sites.com
macsites.com

Please note: External domain implementation and/or management is not included in the scope for Coordinator or Self-Serve projects. They must be quoted separately.
Will be used for Search Engine Optimization (SEO)(approx. 110 – 130 characters)
This is only necessary if you would like the parent website or faculty to appear in your website header above your site name.
Example:
Editor Name (email1@mcmaster.ca)
Editor Name (email2@mcmaster.ca)
Example: GitLab, Unbounce Pages, Static HTML Sites, Email Services, etc.

There are two responsibility components to AODA compliance; content and technical.


As a website owner/manager you acknowledge your AODA compliance responsibility related to all content on your website. MPS is responsible for technical compliance on your website.


For more information regarding AODA website compliance please visit the McMaster Accessibility Hub.

Is there anything we have missed or you would like to include?
Please note that many factors determine a launch date. The request above is used for planning/scoping purposes only.
For MacSites Coordinator projects, the typical time from a Project Kick-off meeting to a formal site launch is 12 weeks.
This timeline is highly dependant on when content is received from clients and how quickly revisions are finalized.
Once the development site is finalized, a formal launch request is submitted by the client. The launch process from the time the launch form is submitted can take anywhere from 5-12 business days.

Billing Contact

The billing contact will be the one invoiced for the MacSites Subscription fee and another other associated fees.
Code Order: Unit (MAC01), Fund (00), Account (000000), Department (00000), Program/Project (00000), Employee ID (only if PDA)
Note: please remember to include the Unit number at the start of your account number (Typically MAC01).
More Information: Available in the "Project Options" section.

On submission you will be billed the subscription fee of $125/month, pro-rated to the end of the current fiscal year and any associated custom development fees.