In recent years, Joomla has grown increasingly popular among users of government websites. Although there are some minor drawbacks, Joomla is still considered perfect for government websites because it meets most of stable web standards, needs little product development and is totally friendly with average users. Most importantly, users can build a government website with no or extremely low budget. Today, we are going to show off a diverse list of free Joomla extensions for that purpose. The list is limited by 10 but you can add your own favorite tools in our comment area.
Developer: Cédric KEIFLIN
Compatibility: Joomla 1.5/2.5/3.x
Example: http://www.narromine.nsw.gov.au/
A handy menu is something that every website would really like to have and Maxi Menu CK is that handy one. The extension uses jQuery/Mootools effects, allows you to load modules in menus and supports e-commerce extensions like Virtuemart and Hikashop. Maxi Menu CK is also SEO-friendly and responsive.
Developer: DJ-Extensions
Compatibility: Joomla 2.5/3.x
Example: http://www.kalselprov.go.id/
DJ-Image Slider is by far one of the best free Joomla slider extensions. Besides displaying an image gallery with title and short description linked to urls, you can manage slides by categories. DJ Image Slider particularly fits government websites well since it is simple and fast-loading.
Developer: ExtStore
Compatibility: Joomla 3.x
Example: http://www.spb-pba.org.pl/wspolpraca/partnerzy-spb?view=projects
Free Advanced Portfolio can be used as a gallery that shows events such as political and environmental campaigns, award ceremonies, charity parties. Each project contains image slideshow, short and full description, URL button while all projects are managed by categories and filtered by tags.
Developer: JoomlaWorks
Compatibility: Joomla 1.5/2.5/3.x
Example: http://hospitalmalvinas.gov.co/
K2 is a content construction component which lets you customize content items for Joomla websites. With K2, you can build all sorts of page types: news, blogs, portfolio, knowledge base, download/document manager, directory listing, event listing, etc.
Developer: Guillermo Vargas
Compatibility: Joomla 2.5/3.x
Example: http://www.narromine.nsw.gov.au/site-map-xml
Xmap is the popular sitemap extensions for Joomla that creates a sitemap based on the menu structure of Joomla website, allowing your pages to be shared with Google crawler .Using Xmap not only benefits SEO but also offers an HTML sitemap for visitors so that they can find needed information quickly.
Developer: Stéphane Bouey
Compatibility: Joomla 2.5/3.x
Example: http://www.turkiyeburslari.gov.tr/
A language switcher is unsurprisingly essential to government websites, especially when they focus on education and international relations. Falang is therefore a solid solution to manage content translations, even the content of components/modules on the website.
Developer: Jonathan Cameron
Compatibility: Joomla 1.5/2.5/3.x
Example: http://www.icporcusatta.gov.it/j/
If you want to upload and attach downloadable documents to Joomla articles, Attachments by Jonathan Cameron is a great option. Attachments can be added and edited from the frontend, and managed in backend. Also, there are options to control who can see the attachments and who can upload them.
Developer: Nikola Biškup
Compatibility: Joomla 1.5/2.5/3.x
Example: http://www.oaphd.on.ca/
People are living in social media fever and so do government websites. Although Addthis seems famous, I recommend Nice Social Bookmark as a more diverse extension since it’s a great tool to share news by putting bookmark and social media buttons in posts. The free version of Nice Social Bookmark supports some popular icons only but it doesn’t matter at all!
Developer: TemplatePlazza
Compatibility: Joomla 2.5/3.x
Example: http://zamboangacity.gov.ph/
Mini Frontpage is a lightweight yet powerful module to display recent content items or articles in news headline style. Using this module, you can show any latest or most read articles from selected sections or categories.
Developer: Alfred Vink
Compatibility: Joomla 1.7/2.5/3.x
Example: http://www.idrperak.my/index.php/malaysian-anti-corruption-commission
ALFContact is the top choice for a neat, appealing and useful contact form. It might look simple but sophisticated in the functionality. Captcha security is included with a choice between reCaptcha and captchas.net. You can add extra fields, customize response page and show the contact form in around 33 languages.