TYPO3 Empowers GAYA to Deliver a Modern, Accessible, and Secure Website for the French Senate

The French Senate, serving as the upper chamber of the French Parliament, fulfills an important function and crucially, was running its official website on a very old version of TYPO3 (version 4). The website was long overdue for an upgrade. Not only did the French Senate need to bring thousands of pages to the latest version of the CMS, they also needed to integrate the website with existing business applications, and apply the current branding design and graphics. 

The website boasts about 1.2M unique visitors and 2.8M page views per month, emphasizing its critical role in communicating the Senate’s activities to journalists, politicians, and the public, across the globe. Through a public call for tenders, the French Senate selected digital agency GAYA to redesign, upgrade, host, and maintain the website. GAYA’s expertise in TYPO3 development and focus on delivering exceptional user experiences made them the ideal partner for this high-profile project.

GAYA developed a custom solution that allows the Senate’s website to seamlessly interface with several business applications managed by the Senate’s IT Department. TYPO3 provides a package that includes HTML templates, compiled CSS, and web components, all dynamically generated and configurable in the backend. This setup allows for the smooth integration of data from both TYPO3 and external business applications.

Both the website’s header and footer are dynamically updated across TYPO3 pages and automatically sync with pages from business applications. When a change is made to the header or footer in TYPO3, such as adding a new menu item or updating the contact information, these changes are automatically applied to all pages within the TYPO3 system.

The site also features a JSON API with six routes to support Senate business applications, and GAYA developed a custom video integration module that works with the Senate’s proprietary platform.

Since the upgrade, the technical hosting solution has successfully withstood several attacks, underscoring the robustness and security of the site’s infrastructure.

GAYA configured the TYPO3 backend to make it user-friendly for over 150 non-technical staff, implementing a detailed access rights system with over 50 groups and roughly 60 different mount points. This ensures that each contributor can access only the tools and content they need.

Furthermore, GAYA introduced a custom news management module, which allows each department to maintain its own news directory and categories, adding a layer of customization to how news feeds are configured. Editors can now easily configure the homepage using this module, empowering them to tailor content according to the latest relevant news.

The redesigned website features a contemporary, responsive design that supports smooth navigation and allows for clear  presentation of information, particularly concerning the progress of legislative projects. The website includes over 50 unique graphic templates and offers multilingual support, including an Arabic version that accommodates right-to-left reading. 

GAYA also introduced a module for importing senator diary data via ICS feeds and developed a comprehensive senator directory with sophisticated multi-criteria search capabilities. Furthermore, GAYA ensured compliance with web accessibility standards, making the website accessible and user-friendly for all visitors. The site is GDPR compliant and achieves a 79% compliance rate with the RGAA (French equivalent of WCAG).

The enhancement in user experience has significantly attracted more visitors, with a record 14.8 million visitors in 2023, representing a 28% increase from 2022 and surpassing the previous high of 14.3 million in 2021, a year notably impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic.

GAYA’s successful redesign of the French Senate’s website demonstrates the agency’s expertise in leveraging TYPO3’s capabilities to deliver modern, accessible, and user-friendly digital solutions. The Senate, having used TYPO3 since 2010 and with approximately 1200 employees (2000 including parliamentary aides), plans to continue its partnership with GAYA for future enhancements and ongoing maintenance of their platform.

Experience the flexibility, scalability, and rich features of TYPO3, the open-source CMS trusted by organizations worldwide. Visit typo3.org to explore the possibilities and join the vibrant TYPO3 community.