Recommend: CMS for multiple sites & easy admin area

I’m working on a project for a foundation that manages a number of microsites and a few regular websites. Right now the microsites are just WYSIWYG HTML pages and the main site is managed by one CMS tool, Convio. We want to bring all these together under one roof. I’m most familiar with Drupal however I think a CMS that has an easier admin area would be best (and maybe an easier theming method). If any have a great WYSIWYG tool, that would be preferable – I will likely do all the coding but most of the users here need an easier way to input content.

Any recommendations? Maybe ModX? I’m not sure.

Right on with MODx.

The new version 2.0 Revolution, supports multiple sites easily through something called “contexts.” Theming a MODx site is ridiculously simple, and your users can input content with TinyMCE and an easy admin interface.

Have you used the admin_menu module? It replaces the regular administration menu block and is a must for anything Drupal 6 or less. Drupal 7 has a built in Admin Menu that is very similar to the aforementioned module and it really makes navigating through the administrative areas a much nicer task.

Also for Drupal, I have been a fan of TinyTinyMCE however, I’m now a big fan of the WYSIWYG module. What I like about this module is that is is a wrapper for TinyMCE, FCKEditor and several others. You install the module and then put CKEditor, FCKeditor, jWysiwyg, markItUp, NicEdit, openWYSIWYG, TinyMCE, Whizzywig, WYMeditor, YUI editor, etc… in “sites/all/libraries” then you can configure your editor. Best of all, you don’t have to write or edit an init script to add or remove icons from your editor. Well worth a try IMO.

Other than that, I would recommend taking D7 out for a spin. It’s set to release any day now and since Drupal is built to manage multiple sites right from the get go, I can’t imagine why you would look anywhere else.

Let me know if you’d like to take a vanilla copy of D7 for a spin… I have a copy of RC2 running on a test server and I can set up an admin role for you to try it out with.

Cheers,
Andrew

EDIT: Some links regarding multiple sites and multisite:
http://drupal.org/node/43816
http://drupal.org/getting-started/6/install/multi-site
http://groups.drupal.org/multisite
http://gotdrupal.com/videos/multisites-vs-multiple-sites (comparison multisite vs. multiple sites)

If you’ve got the budget for it check out Sitecore. It’s an asp.net solution and has virtually unlimited capabilities and support for multiple sites in various ways one with a dedicated product but their overall cms platform supports them as well.