48 replies to this topic

[Mr Spoon]

Hello!
I was just wondering how many people use a CMS to run their site?

I would like to start to use one but I tried many in the past and getting my template to impliment into the CMS was always a dead end, so I just stuck with writing out all my stuff normally, which is why my site hardly gets updated.

If you have written your own - is it available to download?

Cheers,
Peter

[cypher543]

I use TextPattern. It's not really a CMS, but it can work as one. It has a fairly easy template system, which is what won me over.

[IBBoard]

I use my own and it's not available for download. There was a plan at one point to make it available (under the dotprograms.co.uk domain that I had a while ago) but I always got side-tracked on the things that I liked to do and may not have had the time to support it. That along with the fact that it only has an admin interface where I need it and that I'm no longer a student with lots of free time means that it isn't going to see the light of day outside mine and my fiancee's sites.

What site design were you trying to make that couldn't be done in a CMS? I can't imagine anything that couldn't be done in some way.

[Ghoul]

My personal site is just some HTML files glued together with a small bit of PHP. I don't need to update it often so I'm not running a full out CMS.

But, I voted yes, because for some recent clients, I've been using Drupal 5. It was easy to setup templates with, has a ton of community modules, is a robust and powerful CMS, and comes with the JQuery library. I couldn't ask for more.

[Mr Spoon]

What site design were you trying to make that couldn't be done in a CMS? I can't imagine anything that couldn't be done in some way.

My own really.
But it is probably one of the worst sites in regards to coding there is. The layout is alright (i thought) but to get the colours and tables (yes, i still use them) where I wanted then I had to put tables inside of other tables. I think the worst it gets is about 4 tables deep, but even using them is bad enough. I just can't get the bits to line up properly if I use CSS. But my other reason to take a look at CMS systems again is the adding news and downloads and things. I have to do it all by hand and make sure it's the same as the others - would be a lot easier if I just added the info.

[IBBoard]

"Wizzy World" (the one in your sig as "Website") seems like a fairly standard one that should be easy to convert to a CMS, even if you do still want to use tables. Any particular parts that were causing major problems?

[thrive]

We use a CMS for anything that is more than about 10 pages. Below that it is generally not worth the effort but past that it is great.

Wordpress can be adapted for most plain information type sites and blogs with the huge range of plugins, or a custom solution is sometimes what we come up with.

[carloslcc]

I also like TextPattern, it has a learning curve to it that usually discourage people to try it, but is a nice and light script.

[Rogue]

Joomla
great themes
great customisabillity
open source

[Mr Spoon]

I just had trouble getting the title's of the boxes to be correct.
BUT, I had moved onto a CMS - e107. It seems really good. Although I haven't looked at implimenting my own template, I am having a go at making a site using it. had to re-install it twice as it had errors and I couldnt fix them/didnt want to wait for forum answers, but I am happy to keep trying for now

Peter

[San Diego]

WordPress here for pretty much everything. So easy to adapt to.

[Will.]

I use wordpress

[Ben Johnson]

Expression Engine is king.

[mega]

I use JOOMLA. As someone posted already, it's open sources with a lot of plugins, components and modules (extentions) to make creating about most any kind of site I can think of a snap. Their extentions currently stands at 1496 although not all of these are open source most of them are.

I looked at Drupal and mambo but chose to go with JOOMLA and so far am very happy with the choice.

[home_theater]

I've used Joomla and Pligg - Joomla is pretty nice - like the functionality and relative ease of updating.

[EdBoy]

My CMS is specifically for my site because it's a special site.

I keep updating it to work with my XML Databases, but some day I may turn to MySQL.

[kjaonline]

joomla is the best and I am using it on my site!
and also using MyBB if that counts

[jednorozec]

I just started using Drupal a few days ago and so far like it very much.  I've been meaning to do a community site for years now and I'm finally getting a round tuit.  All of my other sites use a simple CMS that I wrote myself.

[iansycharth]

Joomla and its so good ...  

[portakal]

If you are just starting to use a CMS. And if you dont know what a CMS really is. And if you want to get something small and easy to use.

the answer is wordpress. if you install it, it is a blog in standard. But you can convert it to a small cms by just learning it's easy template system, and with the help of some plug-ins. And there are lots of templates available for free. I think there is no other open source software that has that much free templates.

wordpress also a good tool for small websites(namely websites which have a couple of pages and a news part or a blog part). I have a small web marketing company, and I use wordpress for my clients' company websites.

If you need a website with community, wordpress may not satisfy your needs. Because it is a blog, not a CMS. But I also used it for a small community portal, with a forum. For a small community forum, you also need a small software. Which could be done with a plug-in for wordpress for easiest solution. But I prefered bbpress which is also created by the guys who create wordpress, and it is so easy to implement with wordpress.

But if you need a bigger community website, or you are creating a website for a large community in your mind. Solution is drupal. When drupal 5 is released, there were not so much templates available. But for today it is increasing and there is some templates available to buy.

Especially I got templates and modify it for my needs. So spending some time for drupal 5's themplate system could be also nice.  

I dont have any 'just forum' websites. I may use Vanilla if I want something light.


For all of the above software you dont need to know php, or sql. But you need to know CSS and HTML for creating template systems.

Edited by portakal, 10 May 2007 - 12:31 AM.