Questions before choosing modX as CMS

Hello,

I actually searching about informations concerning modX. Actually I've to choose one CMS for an university website. We use Infoglue but the community becomming smaller day by day, so we need to install a new CMS. I have some constraints so I need more informations about if modX do this functionality or not.

It's possible to do a intranet ? I mean it's possible for example to do a website and inside to have a part able to be visibled for only few members ?

I've seen that we can download a plugin to have LDAP/CAS authentication but there are no update or anything since 2007. The plugin exist ?

I've seen too that we can manage several websites. It's possible to manage rules or group for each website ?

Is there any plugin for CMIS protocol or any plugin to protect files ? For example, with Infoglue (the actual CMS) we can say "This group can access to this page after its connection, and see this link to download this file. If it's not logging, he can't see the link" but if you give the link to another person the person can download the file after all.

There are a plugin for Shibboleth connection ?

Sorry for my english, if you don't understand a question tell me and I'll try to explain more

Thanks a lot

I can answer some of this. Security is very flexible; you can protect any pages you want. Resources are assigned resource groups, and users are assigned to corresponding user groups. You can have different domains or subdomains managed with the same MODx installation using Contexts, and the user management can be configured to work with these contexts.

Files can be protected by using static resources. These have all of the attributes, including user management, of any page; instead of content they point to the file. The links will be links to the resource, not to the file, so no one ever sees the actual path to the file. And the files can be outside of the web root, so that adds to their security.

Hi t4Shiro. Susan above is right (of course!) in saying that a mixed intranet/public website is a very good use for MODX and that MODX security will protect files as well as pages.

James Rotering, who is a long-time MODX contributor, has done some work on getting Shibboleth to work with MODX: see https://twitter.com/jrotering/status/212225675296391169 (and you may be able to PM him from the forums here).

An LDAP authentication solution is at https://forums.modx.com/index.php/topic,44833.msg283013.html - quality unknown.

And your English is pretty good ...

You can also use media sources for each context so you can keep your files organized and you can restrict access to these based on the context and or user group.

Most of the things you are asking can be accomplished but they won't be easy to do especially when learning how the MODX ACL security works I'm just being honest here I don't want you thinking you can pull all of this off by clicking on a few check boxes.

Thanks for your help.

@sottwell I see that modX have a rules management better than other CMS or maybe more configurable, isn't it ?

@David Walker : I'll contact him. Thanks for my english. I work hardly to improve it.

@benmarte : You mean that modX can do the things that I asked but It's very complicated. I think is the same with others CMS like Druppal or Typo3. I'm wrong ?

I can't talk about Drupal or any other CMS security since I don't use them so I can't say your right or wrong

In terms of security yes it can be complicated but once you understand how it works you will see how granular you can get in terms of security which is what I think you want.

So to answer your question can it be done? Yes.

Will it be easy? Expect to shed some tears and pull out some hair.

Make sure you see my ACL tutorial and Bobs so you can have a better understanding how MODX security works.

Ok, I'll glanced at your tutorial

What's about sharing of plugin and templates between users if we have several websites ? Can you define if a user can access to a template or a plugin ? All the plugin are ordered sort by website ?

How the publishing workflow works ? One person submit and another validate in order to publish the article ?

I am by no means an expert on Shibboleth, so let me tell you what I've done and you can judge for yourself if it would be relevant and useful to what you need.

I have installed the Shibboleth module on my web server (the one I run MODX on). I have installed config files that connect to our university system's statewide Shibboleth-based authentication hub (https://kb.wisc.edu/helpdesk/page.php?id=13938)

In an Apache/Shibboleth config file, I can specify one or more URL paths within my website as requiring Shibboleth authentication. When someone tries to visit those URLs, they are routed out to our statewide authentication hub, where they select the campus they are affiliated with and then enter their username/password credentials for that campus. Once they have successfully authenticated, they are routed back to our server, where they now have permissions to view the restricted URL.

Up to this point, MODX has not had anything to do with my Shibboleth setup. Here's where it starts to. Instead of restricting a URL that resolves to an actual file, I am restricting a URL that resolves to a MODX resource. Within this MODX resource, I have a custom snippet that *automatically logs the user in* - either as a generic "university system" user, or as an individual (Our statewide shibboleth portal sends back the user's email address in the $_SERVER array).

In other words - merely visiting this page - this MODX resource - automatically performs a MODX login. No password is provided, and no username is even explicitly given. Visit the page, and MODX just logs you in (thanks to the snippet). The catch is that in order to visit the page, you have to have first authenticated via Shibboleth.

So basically, I haven't written any sort of a "Shibboleth plugin" for MODX. I simply have Shibboleth and MODX working side-by-side to provide custom user authentication.

I hope this makes sense. Again, I do not have any broad experience with Shibboleth, so I am not sure whether our statewide university system is using it in a "standard" or "atypical" way.

In fact, we use LDAP and CAS protocol to connect to the website with a portail. Shibboleth will use for people who cames from another university or the guests. I will show your explanation to my tutor (because I don't have many knowledge in that (but I think I could be good) and speak with him about that.

Thank you [ed. note: t4shiro last edited this post 13 years, 6 months ago.]

Quote from: t4shiro at Apr 18, 2013, 08:08 AM

Ok, I'll glanced at your tutorial

What's about sharing of plugin and templates between users if we have several websites ? Can you define if a user can access to a template or a plugin ? All the plugin are ordered sort by website ?

How the publishing workflow works ? One person submit and another validate in order to publish the article ?

You can share plugins context wide but you are going to have issues with a few of them like gallery that will list all galleries regardless of the context you may be on, if you need to use some sort of gallery component I suggest you use MIGX.

You can restrict templates, chunks and other stuff by putting them in categories and giving the user group access to these categories for each context.

I also suggest you use ContextRouter when hosting multiple sites on a single install it will make your life much easier in terms of routing and not breaking plugins in other contexts.

MODX doesn't have any workflows or approval process out of the box so you might have to create your own I know BobRay made StageCoach but I'm not sure if it supports all the features you are looking for.

Like I said you can pretty much do anything in MODX it all depends on your skill level and knowing what extras are out there that can help you get the job done.

Good luck.