Content Management Systems

[N2CHX]

I've always "rolled my own" when doing any kind of web design. My last two major projects were a trouble ticket database and a very unique school closings listing database for the radio station. The latter was pretty complex with a nice smooth, easy to use GUI so that the newsroom people can bring up and enter the data quickly as a the calls came in during a blizzard (hundreds of calls per hour, literally!). There was a lot more to it but I won't get into that.

Anyway, I've always prided myself on doing everything from scratch, HTML/DHTML, Javascript, CSS, SQL queries, graphics, everything. Recently I've started working on another project and wonder if a Content Management System (like Joomla) would make things easier for the front end. It's always the GUI that takes me a long time to get right. Silly browsers and their quirks and not conforming to standards *cough* IE *cough*. The backend stuff is easy.

So anyway, I checked out Joomla yesterday and it's OK. A lot of people rave about it but I think it's kinda slow and it's also not very friendly toward doing a purely custom SQL integration of forms and data display. There's plugins for it, which I tried a couple. Fabrik is cumbersome yet powerful. It also requires a lot of coding to do what I want to do. I also don't want my projects' GUI to look cookie cutter, which requires more HTML/CSS coding along with the SQL queries I'm going to have to build. So I'm kinda thinking I'd rather just build my own from scratch like I always do, which will ultimately be more efficient and I KNOW what's under the hood and can fix it easily.

Any thoughts? Anyone else do this sort of thing? What do you recommend?

[KC2UGV]

Whenever I do a web design project, I always use PmWiki as the CMS. It's lean, fast, flexible, and no need for a SQL DB. Lot's of plugins, and skinning is easy as pie.

[N2CHX]

Whenever I do a web design project, I always use PmWiki as the CMS. It's lean, fast, flexible, and no need for a SQL DB. Lot's of plugins, and skinning is easy as pie.

I'll check that out. If it doesn't use SQL, then how does it store data? Flat files? Ugh. I like SQL. I know how to build queries and use it all the time. This particular project, like most of mine, will be data-intense so SQL is a must.

[KC2UGV]

I'll check that out. If it doesn't use SQL, then how does it store data? Flat files? Ugh. I like SQL. I know how to build queries and use it all the time. This particular project, like most of mine, will be data-intense so SQL is a must.

So, do you need a CMS or something different? Writing a Web application that is data intensive would be outside the realm of a CMS, which is to store and retrieve content, and format it for display in a web browser. More or less, they are an easier way to separate content from style.

Yes, it uses flat files for storing content.

The nice thing about PmWiki, is that you can build any sort of markup you need, to include calling a php script to do the data collection/display; or using any sort of mashups you could think of.

This site is an example of PmWiki, with links to some other sites using it:

http://coreyreichle.tk

[N2CHX]

So, do you need a CMS or something different? Writing a Web application that is data intensive would be outside the realm of a CMS, which is to store and retrieve content, and format it for display in a web browser. More or less, they are an easier way to separate content from style.

Yes, it uses flat files for storing content.

The nice thing about PmWiki, is that you can build any sort of markup you need, to include calling a php script to do the data collection/display; or using any sort of mashups you could think of.

This site is an example of PmWiki, with links to some other sites using it:

http://coreyreichle.tk

It's not exactly an application. It's a site designed for a lot of people to share similar information. Kind of a directory, but I need unique fields and that's not all it will have.

[KC2UGV]

It's not exactly an application. It's a site designed for a lot of people to share similar information. Kind of a directory, but I need unique fields and that's not all it will have.

That's a web app :) Sort of like this:
http://www.opensourcescripts.com/dir/PHP/Groupware_Tools/zoneideas_4432.html

[W2NAP]

joomla is horrible.

but there are other CMS. like php-fusion php-nuke (google ravennuke). and the list goes on

[W4GPL]

I'm a Drupal fan, for what it's worth.

The mere mention of php-nuke/fusion make me want to :vomit: though.

[W2NAP]

ive used php-nuke for years. (granted if you go to phpnuke.org and download it there virgin your asking for lots of problems lol)

been toying with fusion awhile i like it.

[N2CHX]

I appreciate the input, however I've decided I'm going to continue to do what I've always done and simply roll my own. I have years worth of code modules to work with for pretty much anything I want to do. The only thing I really hadn't done is come up with a way of organizing my pages better and into some type of management system. After looking everything over, I've decided that trying to incorporate what I have already accomplished into any existing CMS is more headache than it's worth.

Anyway, thanks for all the ideas and info. Some of them may be of value for future projects.

[KC2UGV]

Kelli, that's what I thought you would do. Your app requirements seem pretty "out there" (as in, not something everyone and their mother is doing, hence not likely to have a pre-rolled package).

[N2CHX]

Kelli, that's what I thought you would do. Your app requirements seem pretty "out there" (as in, not something everyone and their mother is doing, hence not likely to have a pre-rolled package).

Pretty much, yes. My biggest headache is keeping up with whatever new BS changes are made to browsers (usually IE) that don't conform to any standards. It gets ridiculous having to write different code for three or more browser standards. I like doing something ONCE, not two, three, four, five times. I stopped coding for Windows for that very reason. Software that ran on Windows 95 should run on Windows 7. I can understand it not working the other way around, but for Chrissakes... /rant

[kf0rt]

But, but... Microsoft's gonna make the Web more beautiful! :vomit:

http://www.beautyoftheweb.com/

[KC2UGV]

Pretty much, yes. My biggest headache is keeping up with whatever new BS changes are made to browsers (usually IE) that don't conform to any standards. It gets ridiculous having to write different code for three or more browser standards. I like doing something ONCE, not two, three, four, five times. I stopped coding for Windows for that very reason. Software that ran on Windows 95 should run on Windows 7. I can understand it not working the other way around, but for Chrissakes... /rant

Code for standard CSS and HTML. Use exclusion style sheets for the IE workarounds :)
<!--[if IE]><link href="/ie.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" /><![endif]-->

[N2CHX]

Code for standard CSS and HTML. Use exclusion style sheets for the IE workarounds :)
<!--[if IE]><link href="/ie.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" /><![endif]-->

Yeah I hear ya. That's exactly what I'm talking about. There's actually three different builds. One for Firefox, Opera and company, one for IE 5 and 6, and another for IE 7+.

I also use a LOT of Javascript and AJAX, so that makes things even more interesting.

[n2ize]

Good luck. Last time I did Website Programming was using Perl along with whatever Perl module it is that provides an easy OOP interface between the browser screen and MySQL. Never got into Ajax or javascript so I'm out of touch with how it's all being done these days. However, I've noticed some of my Perl driven apps are still up and running. They're not pretty but they've stood the test of time I suppose.

[W2NAP]

i hated perl. tryed that long long long ago.

rather deal with php lol

[N2CHX]

i hated perl. tryed that long long long ago.

rather deal with php lol

I wrote a database for a sales company back in the late 90's using Perl and VB6. It used flat files to store data and they had like 50,000 items of office supplies, with pictures. The website was automatically updated by the warehouse database which was the VB app. It was pretty cool. I should be a friggin' millionaire. I have no clue why I'm not. Oh well.

[N2CHX]

I wrote a database for a sales company back in the late 90's using Perl and VB6. It used flat files to store data and they had like 50,000 items of office supplies, with pictures. The website was automatically updated by the warehouse database which was the VB app. It was pretty cool. I should be a friggin' millionaire. I have no clue why I'm not. Oh well.

Heh, just found that code project (the Perl side) on my Netbook in the web development section of my Apache directory. I forgot how many modules I wrote for that. Dozens. There's probably 100,000 lines of Perl code. I made $10,000 on that job. Took me about two months.

[N2CHX]

....

[W2NAP]

you should be rich!