What a MODx Blog would consist of

MODx isn’t the preferred CMF for blogging, something like Wordpress simply beats the hell out of it, simply put.


This tweet from Ryan Thrash got me to think.... how can that be reversed?


MODx is the most awesome CMF out there, yet it just doesn’t cut it for eCommerce (VisionCart looks like that’ll be changed soon) as well as blogging.... so what could be done to change that around? (Besides hacking together a "blog" which consists of getResources, Quip, tagLister, Archivist et al)

I’m not much of a blogger myself so perhaps there are things you guys can come up with so perhaps something can be developed to fill this gap.

I think a lot of people don’t realise that there is a fully working blog in the MODx sample site package that they can use as a starting point for their blog. Instead they try to wade through the blog tutorial which when coming to it fresh, can seem a little intimidating - although downloading the six or seven packages required is not much different to downloading N number of plugins to customise Wordpress to what you want.

I understand why they did it, but I do think putting the sample site back in as an optional install in the download package might be useful. After all, the biggest difference between WP and MODx is that on first install you can’t actually do anything (by which I mean publish something and see it rendered nicely). I can’t remember what the splash screen says on install, but I’d much rather see an RSS feed of new packages, or a nag to install some sample content.

As more sample content and themes/templates are provided I’m sure that more casual adopters will follow, but the initial experience is pretty much ’here’s a workbench and some wood, build me a boat. There are some blueprints over there....’ It’s not the friendliest software I’ve used (and it’s really annoying to read the same security message (and have my clients read it) because I can’t dismiss it - I don’t want to change the RSS feed, as I need to know when these notices happen).

My personal opinion on this ( and it is only mine ) your now comparing a 10 course banquet to a chippy tea

Modx has never claimed to be a blogging platform from the off, in fact it’s never claimed to be anything from the off other than totally customizable which is why it has such a great following. I used to use wordpress for all my sites before I discovered Modx, once I discovered it I’ve never looked back.

In work if a client wants a blog on their site they get a modx site and a wordpress blog, one for the speed of setting up wordpress as a blog and one for the speed of setting up modx as a site.

That said I have just upgraded one of my sites to revo and setting up the comments was a breeze ( as were other things ) and I’ll be starting my new personal site tomorrow as a blog using modx.

At the end of the day Modx gives you the oven to cook, it’s up to personal taste what ingredient’s you want to add to complete your dish and how long you want to stay in the kitchen

This is the page being displayed upon install: http://misc.modx.com/revolution/welcome.20.html

I must admit I’ve never tried the Revolution sample site and didn’t even know there was a functional blog in there.


But I have the feeling that even if you know how to do it, it’s still quite tedious to do. Perhaps a Blog package, which includes the packages needed for a full blog and perhaps even creates a bunch of resources (if something is ticked on setup options) would be nice to allow a quick blog start.


Let’s just assume that you got your blog running, and all blog articles are resources in a certain folder/container (category), that’s still not ideal in my believe. You can’t just change the sortorder for them in the backend (when having 100s of blog posts) to display or filter them based on category/date/tags... and I would imagine that can be a big deal when you got an active blog.

One of my clients’ site runs a new section, where all items are entered as child resources under the News parent. They put about 1-3 articles up per week, and it’s already getting though finding what you’re looking for in the back-end.

My take on this:

I really don’t think MODx should try to emulate all the blog features that Wordpress has. Wordpress is a great blogging tool. But who was it that said "its easier to make MODx blog than it is to make Wordpress function like a CMS"? Most blog sites usually reveal the system they run on.

I like it that you get most of what you need from a blog system using MODx without needing tons of supporting scaffolding structure. Have you ever looked at all the under the hood work required to develop a custom them/template in Wordpress?

I would go so far as to suggest that different "flavors" of MODx could be released, installers preconfigured with certain sets of addons to accomplish a particular purpose, such as setting up a blog or a store. This would be analogous to the highly successful motif of Linux - a robust central core (the kernel) is released in thousands of customized versions such as Ubuntu, and even customizations on those customized versions, such as Mint and the many Puppies. This doesn’t keep purists from downloading Slackware or Arch and building exactly the system they want, but it lowers the entry barrier to people who otherwise might never try the software at all.

That said, I see a much more formidable obstacle to widespread adoption of MODx vs. Wordpress as a blogging platform: Themes. Wordpress has thousands of them, hundreds of which are truly pro-grade and free. Despite my affection for MODx, I am currently setting up a new blog with WP, largely because the presence of a great free theme will save me weeks on development. Unless and and until MODx acquires a similar culture of themes (which I don’t think it ever will or even should) Wordpress will always be more attractive for ordinary blogs - at least to me.

Weeks to develop a theme If that’s the case, you definitely aren’t doing it right!

Quote from: sottwell at Jan 04, 2011, 12:19 PM

If that’s the case, you definitely aren’t doing it right!

Do you really think that one designer, working alone (and taking time to eat and sleep) should be able work through intial design, mockup, complete coding, exhaustive browser testing, and release of a high-quality template (such as, for example, this one) in days rather than weeks?

You may be familiar with the Full Code Press benefit contest that takes place in New Zealand, where teams of seven tip-top expert web developers are given 24 consecutive hours to build a site - an achievement that I think we can take as a theoretical near-speed-limit for this kind of work. That’s 168 person-hours. To be fair, some of that time goes to content rather than presentation. Even assuming that only half of the work goes into template-related stuff, that’s 84 hours, or just over two standard work weeks.

Plus, I’m admittedly nowhere near the caliber of the FCP teams

Naturally, if we’re talking about a "basic" theme, any competent designer can scramble something functional together in a day or two - but I wouldn’t expect it to look anywhere near as a good as the free WP theme to which I linked above.

MODX has no such concept of a theme. That is the big difference between most other blogging/CMS systems and MODX. MODX is positioned to allow designers to bring their design to the CMS and all of it’s components without having to design a theme that will only work on the CMS. This separation of presentation and content is why you can take any free HTML/CSS template off the web and use it in MODX within minutes. IOW, you do not need a MODX theme to create a site with MODX; it’s just markup. This is why we have sample site packages for download that provide an example of how to use your own designs with the MODX framework and it’s add-ons, rather than hundreds of predesigned themes. In fact, all of my personal sites are using free or Open Source HTML/CSS templates that I turned into MODX Templates, Template Variables and Chunks in a matter of minutes. This is the source of the freedom designers rave about in MODX and why you can build HTML5 sites in the framework now. MODX does not impose markup or styling or anything else that affects your output through the use of Themes, and this is a good thing.

That said, we are going to be developing and encouraging the development of custom vertical distributions in the very near future that include everything needed to get started with MODX for a specific purpose like blogging or e-commerce or whatever. This has been the intention from the beginning—provide a solid framework as a foundation for creating and distributing modular and extensible solutions for specific needs.

Do you really think that one designer, working alone (and taking time to eat and sleep) should be able work through intial design, mockup, complete coding, exhaustive browser testing, and release of a high-quality template (such as, for example, this one) in days rather than weeks?

Yes; more like hours.