Best All Round CMS

Just as a follow-up ...

I have decided to use Textpattern as my general CMS because it offers the best basic architecture and a very high degree of build-in flexibility and performance on a shared hosting platform. If you search for Textpattern on this site then you get some articles and comments already published.

My actual Textpattern project will consolidate six domains in one TXP installation and every single domain will point via server side redirection to a special section inside TXP and will get its own design through different style sheets.

I started using Drupal 6 months ago. I have tried Mambo, Typo3, Wordpress and some commercial counterparts as well.

What I like about Drupal is the clean design, its easilly extendable and the PHPtemplate engine makes theming very easy.

Just pick out your favourite theme on www.openwebdesign.org and add a few php variables to it, its very very easy.

So...

The good:
- Fast
- Flexible
- Easilly themable
- Solid community
- Clean code

The bad:
- Learning curve
- The forum system isn't great

So I guess drupal seems to be the winner in this thread.

One feature that is REALLY attracting me to try Drupal is that you can get your community to make their own blogs.

Is there a wordpress plugin that can do something like that?

Rob, for Wordpress communities, there's Wordpress Multiuser. It's the stuff that drives wordpress.com and edublogs.org - very cool stuff.

The big difference between Drupal and Wordpress is that Wordpress (even WPMU) is essentially a standalone blog manager, whereas Drupal is a community facilitator. One one level, they're basically the same thing, but the "feel" of each is quite different.

That being said, I use Wordpress for my own blog, and do all of my projects in Drupal. The latest version of Drupal (up to 4.7RC2) is awesome and way flexible for deploying community websites. Performancing.com is a great example. I've got almost a dozen Drupal sites running through my Day Job, including the upcoming revision to our department's website. Also, our campus weblog system is running on Drupal.

Another really cool thing about Drupal, when you get multiple websites going on it, is that it can be configured to serve an infinite number of sites from a single set of files. Update one set, and all sites get done at the same time. Each site can have their own database, so they behave as if they are separate installations (enable different sets of the common installed modules, enable different sets of themes, etc...) Sure makes my life easier.

I do websites that aren't blog oriented. They are club or business sites where the owner wants to manage the content. I've tried various methods, some of which I wrote myself. I've cobbled together all sorts of various different solutions over the years. After never getting it right, I have now settled on using wordpress.

I can customize wordpress where I need, but the basic editing engine is what I appreciate the most. I have a lot of people who just don't 'get' computers much. I've found they can all handle logging in to wordpress and writing/editing their 'articles'. I remove most of the blogging type features from the theme, leaving what looks like a standard website. Most visitors would never guess it was a blogging tool under the hood.

Wordpress is simple, clean, and easy to grasp for users. Where that's your main concern, wordpress is an excellent choice.

I agree with you on the Wordpress ease of use. It is very easy to customize WP. The templates are so much easier to create than the drupal ones. I run a website that gets a lot of hits everyday and WP is doing a fine job. The best part is the community for WP, there are so many plugins created that you could add any feature you think of to WP.

I would have to say that e107 is the best CMS I've ever used.
Back in the day when I was looking to create communities/sites I started off on the ol' php-nuke route, then off to Mambo a few days later.. then drupal and all over again until I finally came across e107.

I've been using (and supporting) them for over 3 years now and can't remember ever having to try another CMS since then. I've randomly installed a wordpress or mambo/joomla system here and there but nothing beats e107.

As my job is in tech. support (for web hosting) I have to know just about every CMS very thoroughly as we get all sorts of questions regarding the configuration of each system.

But I just keep on recommending e107 :) www.e107.org
Give it a shot -- it's amazing.

Do any of these work on windows servers? We too have been searching for a CMS that generates SEO friendly urls but those are far and few in between.

And oh, BTW what a great community!

chuck

Best windows suite is communityserver (complete with friendly urls and more general purpose in version 2) but while the others work on windows unfortunately not with friendly urls unless you are running apache.

Thanks Chris!

chuck

i used e107 and it was pretty helpful to me. But, the problem I found was that it limited my freedom a whole lot. I had to use bb code and things like that.

One of the big reasons I like drupal is, like others have said, it is an all-rounder. As an all-rounder I can use one install / one code base and run numerous sites. I have some family members that wanted sites so I just add and dir into 'sites' and they are live! I do like the 'look' of Joomla but have become very comfortable with Drupal.

ladydelaluna (nice name!) could you be so nice and explain how you manged 'to integrate WP as a full CMS'. I don't see how WP can be turned into a full CMS. I am not a WP insider because exactly the broader CMS approach is missing in my eyes!

As we are talking 'best all round CMS' here and not 'best all round blog system' I would like to have that point explained in detail.

WP has so many plugins that could be added to make a full CMS.

Word Press is not a CMS it is a blogging system so in reallity you can't compare both -WP and Drupal- since both are made for different reasons.

From Google:

Word Press:
A semantic personal publishing platform with a focus on aesthetics, web standards, and usability.

Drupal:
Full-featured content management/discussion engine suitable to setup a news-driven community or portal site.

Can you make WordPress behave like a CMS? of course you do but its not what it was intended for.

I do think , textpattern , is the one stop all round CMS . But it is a little hard to use and get on with it .

This is where MAMBo , rocks . ITs interface sure goes great with NOOBS .

"Mambo or Joomla and many of their plugins do have security issues in the code base." ... said a friend of mine who is just doing a Joomla project. He says that he had to hack a lot of the original code provided by the developers. He is a professional software developer (which I am not) and project manager.

No bashing intended ... just a quote.

I'm not a programmer, so until I get a better handle on Drupal I'm using e107 on 3 different sites. It customizes enough for me to give a unique look to each with plenty of options for member input. Two of the sites may eventually need more of a CRM solution, so I'll be looking at those soon as well.
I have heard a lot of good about Drupal and have it installed locally on my desktop (PCLos running Apache with mySQL) to play with until I know it better. If I can feel comfortable with it, then it might replace one of the e107 sites, but not both. For one site, e107 is perfect.

What about genuine Perl CMS?

I recommend using genuine Perl CMS, a good choice would be the multilingual, open source CMS from WebAPP.

Reasons:
1.) Fastest
2.) Written in genuine Perl and NOT in PHP.
3.) Safe
4.) Stable
5.) Great support
6.) Universal compatible DB system
7.) Cache
8.) System restore
9.) Open source and free
10.) Infinite addon and resources from cpan.org as a small example.

Olav