Modx Revolution against the other CMS's

We all know about the upcoming new Modx.

But we (or at least I) don’t know what will be his position compared to the other CMS.

I wonder if Modx Revolution will be able to compete at the same level with Drupal for Webzines or Wordpress for Blog.

I’ve read several forum which precise that Drupal, despite the harsh learning curve for styling, is more appropriate for webzine (like www.rue89.com).
I’ve also made some blog with Wordpress and some functionality are really handful (nested comments, pingback, social bookmarking...) and not available for the current ModX.

I really love Modx, styling it is a real pleasure, but what about those great functionality that made those CMS’s more appropriate in their own domain? Do Modx must be only limited to simple blog, or static corporate pages (talking about the average users, since i’ve seen some pretty advanced ModX website)?

My take on MODx is that one is limited only by imagination in what you want your MODx site to do and the kind of functionality you want it to have.

In this regards, MODx is a DIY CMS. To me it’s modular: I can build it out as the needs arise, where as with Joomla and Drupal, that’s all there is: you squeeze whatever into it’s box and hope it doesn’t break.

Put it this way: with Joomla and Drupal I was always saying "no". Now I say yes before I even know how I’m going to pull it all together. One of my sites had a fairly complex timer. Display this chunk until it’s 18 hours or less to deadline. Then at deadline no longer publish at all. I have no idea of how I would be able to have that kind of CONTENT (not a mod or app) in D or J.

It’s better to think of MODx for what it is: a CMF. YOU write the CMS using the core snippets. And that’s where one is limited only by their imagination. It’s fun as all get out. I can’t imagine having to use any other CMS. And don’t get me started on how easy eCommerce is: we all have Brett and Luke at foxycart.com to thank for that.

For a WebZine, I would say MODx wins, hands down. If want your Zine to have it’s own look and personality and you want it easy to manage, you’d have to go with MODx.

For a Blog, it’s a tougher call. I just designed my first Bog site and ended up using WordPress. I had a full-featured working Blog up in about an hour after my decision to go with WP. Another hour or so and I had the options set the way I want them, some nice plugins (dropshadow for images, an Amazon link tool, and Mollom for spam-proofing), and a design I could live with (sort of).

I estimate that to get the exact same Blog in MODx would have taken me at least a week even though I’m very familiar with MODx and knew nothing about WP. OTOH, throughout the process I couldn’t help thinking, "if I this was MODx, I could do X." Stuff that’s trivially easy in MODx is nearly impossible in WP and WP ties your hands on so many issues. I ended up having to hack the core the first day I used it for something I should have been able to handle with CSS.

MODx was never meant to be an out-of-the box solution but rather a maximally powerful and flexible tool for building custom Web sites. That said, at some point someone will write a killer Blog Component for MODx Revolution that will blow WordPress away. If it’s not done a year from now, I might do it myself.

I have no experience with Revolution but I am enjoying kicking the current version around.

I will throw this out there to the MODx elders: Do you guys want MODx to become a HUGE thing with tons of enthusiasts or would you prefer it to remain sort of the domain for a smaller community?

It would be great to see all the hard work pay off and see wide ranging acceptance. But if this explodes big time will the community be the same? One of the things that finally tipped me over into the MODx camp is this community and this Forum. I find it to be a brilliant mix of technical wizardry, fellowship and generosity to new users. To my eye the forums over in the D & J camps could not match this combination here in MODx land.

After spending some time on this forum you begin to recognize names, their styles, areas of interest and communication strengths.

I welcome MODx progress but I also hope that the tight, helpful community aspect of this forum does not suffer with a large expansion of interest and participation in MODx...

Thoughts?

Max

Quote from: PeterB at Mar 01, 2009, 06:48 PM

My take on MODx is that one is limited only by imagination in what you want your MODx site to do and the kind of functionality you want it to have.

It’s better to think of MODx for what it is: a CMF. YOU write the CMS using the core snippets. And that’s where one is limited only by their imagination. It’s fun as all get out. I can’t imagine having to use any other CMS. And don’t get me started on how easy eCommerce is: we all have Brett and Luke at foxycart.com to thank for that.

I totally agree with you, i was talking about the "basic user" who wants to set a website as simply as wordpress.
But you’ve made me realise that the principal od Modx is DIY. And that’s exactly why it is so flexible.

Quote from: BobRay at Mar 01, 2009, 09:06 PM

For a WebZine, I would say MODx wins, hands down. If want your Zine to have it’s own look and personality and you want it easy to manage, you’d have to go with MODx.

For a Blog, it’s a tougher call. I just designed my first Bog site and ended up using WordPress. I had a full-featured working Blog up in about an hour after my decision to go with WP. Another hour or so and I had the options set the way I want them, some nice plugins (dropshadow for images, an Amazon link tool, and Mollom for spam-proofing), and a design I could live with (sort of).

I estimate that to get the exact same Blog in MODx would have taken me at least a week even though I’m very familiar with MODx and knew nothing about WP. OTOH, throughout the process I couldn’t help thinking, "if I this was MODx, I could do X." Stuff that’s trivially easy in MODx is nearly impossible in WP and WP ties your hands on so many issues. I ended up having to hack the core the first day I used it for something I should have been able to handle with CSS.

MODx was never meant to be an out-of-the box solution but rather a maximally powerful and flexible tool for building custom Web sites. That said, at some point someone will write a killer Blog Component for MODx Revolution that will blow WordPress away. If it’s not done a year from now, I might do it myself.

Again, i’m totally agree with you.
Thus, i tried to set up a blog for testing purpose with Modx and adapt several Freemium wordpress theme into it, that was pretty easy, a real pleasure. But i missed a simple function like nested comments.

I plan to use Modx but i also must think ahead about time issue regarding my coding skills. I’m pretty sure that Modx can achieve most of my desired goal but Drupal as for exemple much more Modules to achieve it more quickly.

Since i’m really in love with the templating system, i’ll probably stick with ModX, but i was asking if the available tools will evolve and finally be on par with most user oriented CMS’s

It would be great to see all the hard work pay off and see wide ranging acceptance.

I don’t think it ever will be because, as BobRay notes, it’s not an out of the box solution. It took me nearly 6 months to unlearn the boxy ways of thinking.

Like any other thing, MODx’s strength can be it’s weakness, and for me it’s flexibility. No two MODx sites are alike, at least not the ones I’ve created and I’m looking forward to getting Revo’s concepts applied in my head so I can have one MODx install and pick and choose between ready to use solutions.

I don’t know if it’s possible but I’m thinking that Contexts can be websites, say 20 websites and a Resource will be a snippet chunk so I can pick and choose my Resources that I’ve developed for one Context to use in another.

Is that going to be possible? Or have I been reading too much code?

Quote from: PeterB at Mar 02, 2009, 05:37 AM

I don’t know if it’s possible but I’m thinking that Contexts can be websites, say 20 websites and a Resource will be a snippet chunk so I can pick and choose my Resources that I’ve developed for one Context to use in another.

Is that going to be possible? Or have I been reading too much code?

You could use Revo for such, yes. You could create a Resource in one Context, and either create a Symlink or duplicate the Resource to use the same content in the new context.

One word to this thread and with my hat of.

F R E E D O M

I think it’s a bit early to draw comparison of Revolution with other CMSes, since we’re still in alpha. You can definitely identify that Revolution has tremendous potential since it’s even more flexible than the current branch is and which is already the most flexible CMS around IMHO.

Now a key component of Revolution’s success compared to the competition will be how many (talented) developpers will contribute code and create addons. If we deal with the transition properly and communicate efficiently towards developpers, I think Revolution has greater potential than the current branch since the framework part of the equation will offer far more capabilities. Also, the documentation (and dev blog, check Shaun’s post) is already taking shape and will help in this regard.

The way I see it, the beta will play a critical role in helping Revolution gain momentum toward a first release. I think it’s very important that key addons are available when the first stable rev is released. I think we’ll quickly now how successful Revolution is after a few months, based on contributed modules, snippets and plugins. I think everything the team is doing right now to boost modx will help making this happen.

Then you’ll be able to make comparison.  Keep in mind things are also moving on the market, new apps appear and established ones continue improving... Revolution is a step ahead I think because it will occupy a segment which is not really crowded at the moment, somewhere in between CMS and web application frameworks such as CodeIgniter, CakePHP or the likes...

Quote from: splittingred at Mar 02, 2009, 07:58 AM

Quote from: PeterB at Mar 02, 2009, 05:37 AM

I don’t know if it’s possible but I’m thinking that Contexts can be websites, say 20 websites and a Resource will be a snippet chunk so I can pick and choose my Resources that I’ve developed for one Context to use in another.

Is that going to be possible? Or have I been reading too much code?

You could use Revo for such, yes. You could create a Resource in one Context, and either create a Symlink or duplicate the Resource to use the same content in the new context.

I’m not sure, but I think he’s asking mainly about using snippets and chunks in the various contexts, rather than resources.

Just to be clear for others reading this thread:

Content Elements (AKA elements): Template, Template Variable, Chunk, Snippet, Plugin (category, property set -- maybe)

Web Resources (AKA Resources): Documents, Weblinks, Symlinks, Static Resources.