I have posted a several time before in this, the SitePoint Forum, and for the most part I received pretty good help.
Well, here I am with another question.
I am wanting to create a Blog, I was thinking either WordPress, Joomla or some other CMS. But then a Question comes to mind, that being; how much control do I have with a CMS?
I ask this because, I want to have not just a Blog Page, but too, a Gallery Page, Forum Page and a Directory List Page. And I am wondering if I can achieve this with an CMS?
I have also thought about just creating a Dynamic Website then integrating a Blog within the Site. After all, I do have Adobe CS6 and why not put it to use, right?
Most CMSes are dynamic driven content management systems.
WordPress can be good, depending on how you design/code it or what off-the-shelf template you use. All the requirements you have listed can be accomplished with most of the more popular CMSes like ExpressionEngine, MODx, WordPress, Drupal, and plenty more, but those are the ones that I consider good choices (some very good).
To be able to work properly with any of the above, you need to have a solid understanding of HTML and CSS and a basic understanding of JavaScript and PHP (if you chose a CMS that is based on that language, obviously). If you don’t know any of these, then it might be better to hire someone instead or, better, learn these languages because some of the specs you listed will require that you know what you do, and not knowing could leave you with potential security issues, suboptimal performance, etc.
As kohoutek said, a CMS is a dynamic website. As also said, you can do all of the things you listed with a CMS. Some CMSes will do those things “out of the box”, while some will require a few add-ons, of which there are usually many. With some CMSes—such as ExpressionEngine—you can get away with not knowing a line of PHP. (You will just need to know HTML and CSS.)
Where can I read what a CMS does? I know what the words mean, but I do not understand what the purpose is. I learned once I signed up for hosting that I can upload my files directly to the server (so as far as I understand, I don’t need an ftp client which I had thought was mandatory. . .) I can edit and delete the files I put up through the hosting dashboard. What is it that a CMS would give me that I cannot do now?
I hope this is not off-topic. I see in the questions and answers references to “simple” CMS and more advanced and things that write code for you or maybe the ones that write for you are the more simple ones. (I have only been learning HTML and CSS3 so far. I dread trying to learn php and js.) What can a CMS do to help me more than the hosting site’s dashboard? Thank you.
As an example of what a CMS can do, image you have a static site and want to post a new “blog” entry. You’d probably want to manually create a new page on your site with the text in it and upload it. Then you’d go to the blog home page, open up that file, and maybe create a link to that new page with a snippet of text. You might also have to bump older snippets off the home page—all manually. That’s a lot of work, and can get quite tiresome.
If, instead, your blog is run on a CMS, the process would be much simpler. You’d log in to your site’s backend, landing on an admin page. You would click a button to publish new content, type in / paste your new article text, and click Save. Done. A snippet of the article can appear on your blog home page automatically, with a link to the full article. No more work required by you. The article is saved in a database, and when a user clicks on the link to the article, the backend of the site (often in PHP) will pull the article from the database and present it to the user on an auto-generated new page.
There are many other things a CMS does, of course. It’s particularly useful if you are creating a site for someone who wants to manage the content themselves. At the click of a button, they can add new pages, add in text and images etc., without ever seeing a line of code.
If you have a simple, static site, then no, you don’t need a CMS. The only thing to consider is how the site might grow in future. If it’s likely to get a lot bigger, it would be easier to set up a CMS from the beginning than try to incorporate it later. (Although some small CMSes can be added in to a static site to suport it, rather than completely envelop it. Examples include Perch CMS and Pulse CMS.)
I am sure it has been echoed many times in this forum, but…
I have used them all. Joomla, Blogger,Drupal, now Wordpress. Here is my opinion.
Wordpress 100%!
WP is by far the best. Especially if your like me. A small operation like me (2 people) and you don’t have a programmer. Go Wordpress and you will save yourself a TON of trouble trying to convert later.
CMS is a good option but always remember to research a CMS before investing time in it. Never forget that the main purpose of a CMS is to make creating and editing content simple and easy. Never sacrifice the user experience for functionality.
have heard that PHP would be more beneficial in web development is it so ?
There are well paying jobs available using any of the dominant web technologies technologies. To say PHP is *most beneficial would be short-sighted and ill-informed. However, to say PHP *might be a better technology for achieving some specific goal with certain requirements is not. It all depends. For example, if you have a small budget and would like to create a blog than Wordpress might be a good solution. However, is Wordpress or even PHP the *best solution for creating an enterprise level ecommerce platform. Wordpress fanatics will probably say “yes” but the answer is a hard no and an argument can even made there for avoiding PHP entirely using something like ASP or Rails instead. It all depends. If you just want to chug out Wordpress sites all day than PHP is the obvious answer. If you want to build/manage new innovative medium to high budget web applications/sites than the answer is much more abstract and open to interpretation.
It’s possible to write good code and bad code in PHP and .NET, but given the strength of the language and the framework I would always choose ASP.NET and C#.
It hasn’t been echoed many times because numerous developers would disagree strongly with your opinion.
The fact that you mention Blogger as a Content Management System shows a lack of understanding in what is required from a CMS for the average website. WordPress is a blogging platform that is desperately trying to be a CMS, and the only reason why this continues to happen is because entry-level developers continue to use it where it is not required.
WordPress is vastly inferior to the likes of Drupal and Concrete5, and those offerings are again inferior to those offered for other frameworks like .NET.
