Looking for CMS solutions / templates. Want to try them all out and see which is better and what each one is for or best for. Also need to find out how many people use each solution, would want to use the one with the most support and the most new modules and biggest forums.
CMS Made Simple
Need to have a go at trying this out properly. It dosnt look like theres that many modules available compared to what I imagine drupal would have. Theres photogallery though, forums etc etc.
From the site...
"The idea behind creating opensourceCMS revolved around the need to have a place where one could completely test content management systems in one place, before taking the time to install one."
So it seems that its not one solution but it is a source for many solutions, and by searching through different ones maybe theres already one out there that is just what you need, this is interesting.
From what I can tell unlike drupal which you can edit the content on the actual page your looking at, this requires you to login to an admin section and edit lists of pages. OK for a small site, but I think for a client its easier for them to get their head around the CMS if they just navigate to the actual page they want to edit and edit it. (Although guess to add content they still need to go to a different area.
Plone
Plone is meant to be more powerful than Drupal and Joomla and better for massive organisations, but needs a specific setup (a specific server / hosting setup which will probably be more expensive) and has a steeper learning curve for the web designer implementing it. Also it is written in Python, so getting a programmer to make extentions and customisations will be more expensive or harder to find than a PHP programmer to work on Drupal / Joomla.
Joomla!
From a quick browse of reviews, Joomla (like Drupal), is good for non-profit organisation websites. It is considered very easy to set up and get going and to learn to use. However, it isnt considered as powerful as Drupal in some respects. And advantage of it is that it is built with PHP, so if you need a customisation done, this shouldnt be too expensive to get programmed.
Joomla has a large commercial development community. A shopping cart built in, better calendars and is easier to learn.
Drupal
Good for organisations that need a straightforward setup but a fair ammount of power. It sits in the middle of Plone and Joomla in regards to power and ease of use. Soa good compromise. Its written in PHP so again cheap for getting customisations made.
Heres an excellent table of comparison features between Drupal and Joomla. http://www.alledia.com/blog/general-cms-issues/joomla-and-drupal-%11-which-one-is-right-for-you?/
Drupal dosnt have a shopping cart built in, it is getting one soon (Ubercart). Drupal is more standards compliant. Drupal dosnt have great event calendars or Templates / Themes (which isnt an issue Id want to design it anyway). Also Drupal has unlimited subcategory levels and cross categorisation. Overall looks like Drupal is the right choice at the moment.
Pligg
Open Source: Looks like especially for large community sites, with rating systems. Utilises smarty templating system. Allows multiple authors, private user messaging, user profile pages etc.
The Secretary
http://secretary.nivr.net/index.php
"The Secretary is a different kind of content management system. It is simple, lightweight, easy-to-use and meant for designers and artists. It aims to be transparent by removing itself entirely from the front-end - forget the restrictive themed layouts of other systems and create truly unique websites again."
Looks really neato for artists portfolios - nice plugins with support for lightbox and cycle galleries. Good for little portfolio sites it seems, and made by a designer so looks really nice.It is a content management system not a page management system. ie you just design your static site how you want it, then where you want the dynamic pieces you put in the database calls, just like a custom CMS would have. Anyway going to try it out ASAP.
Need still to find or see if its got
- ability to have video objects in portfolio / database
- ditto music player
- newer lightbox modules like smoothbox etc
- text formatting features - like blogger has
- its just been released - so community and modules are lacking...
Though - Drupal is still looking good for extendability down the track to adding say a blog, recent news, shopping cart - shit like that with no fuss....
Drawback with Drupal being templates not designed for primarily portfolios...
Gallery
http://gallery.menalto.com/
Looks like just a gallery feature that integrates into your cms. looks a bit complex...
eZ Publish
http://ez.no/ezpublish/
Used by EMI to manage their artists websites - so handles video and music well. Looks likeits good for large organisations.
features video, photo galleries, blogs etc. imports from office documents (yuk) has translations. Multiple upload files at once (good for large galleries). And ---- has a permissions workflow thing and you can cross publish content. They also have some sort of paid premium service which gives you extra goodies...
Plone4Artists
http://plone4artists.org/products
hmmmm.....
does video, audio, photos etc. plus a e-commerce module for selling cds/ artwork etc. theyve really thought about it. good if youve already got a plone site, but not out of the box if you dont...
Im still sold on secretary at the mo...
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