CMS and Web Administration

[raffy]

A very senior Puppy enthusiast (who actually hosts this Forum) has suggested in this thread:

Just a little comment

I always kinda liked XOOPS when themed correctly and with the right modules ... With some PHP hacking it is easy to customize too.

I have used it a couple of sites and it worked well.

Cheers
JohnM

Am inclined to:

(1) request John to get the CMS started in puppylinux.org; and
(2) give him the "keys" to the puppylinux.org root.

These actions will allow him to help with the CMS and also eventually transfer the Forum to puppylinux.org.

What do you think?

(PS - John, have you considered just adding the CMS extension to PhpBB?)

[MU]

Hi, I will not vote, as I did not follow that thread in detail.
I will trust you guys who put so much work in it, in finding a good solution

Mark

[puppian]

I won't vote either

I suppose, if a poll is needed, it's something like what's mentioned in this thread:
http://www.murga.org/~puppy/viewtopic.php?p=23245#23245
And it suddenly becomes something like:
1. John - yes
2. John - no
With any poll like this no one will vote for no (and I won't too). It's just like polls asking
1. puppy user A - yes; 2. puppy user A - no
1. puppy user B - yes; 2. puppy user B - no
Obviously no one will vote for no. The answer will likely to be 'yes' with whatever name you put there.

[. . . . .]

PS. From what I understand so far I think people like what they are seeing at the test sites. Take a look at those long threads
So what do you really dislike about the test sites? I really haven't heard from you about that, and I even received you pm okaying the installation of php-fusion. If all your concern is to have the member's page you mentioned, as I had suggested in this thread at the very beginning, we can just keep your member pages and folder concept. If the problem is that you don't feel alright to share the root access for whatever reason, you can just do what you have suggested in this post - "If we get to decide on one CMS later, I can help set it up then somebody else will be its admin."
So what's the problem? I'm confused (maybe the problem is me? well...)

[jcagle]

I won't vote either, as I've had little (if any) experience with Xoops.

I've played around with a few CMS's, and the only one that I found fit my needs for my web sites was PHPWCMS.

[rarsa]

I think that we started at it with the wrong foot.

Here is what we know:
- There are some requirements regardless of the CMS. I haven't seen them listed.
- There may be multiple CMS that may meet those requirements
- The sooner we make the decision the better.

Here is what I propose:
- List the requirements for the CMS
- Select a CMS that uses open standards in case we need to switch
- Start using it.

The functionallity of a CMS by itself is irrelevant. Remember that most of the time functionallity goes hand in hand with complexity. How much complexity we are willing to take on (I hope not too much) and how much functionallity we really need must be the most important drivers.

I learned some time ago that when you have to decide, the second best option decided on time is better than the best solution delayed.

From my point of view, the wikki should be our CMS and put the effort on customizing it to have a puppy specific frame.

[puppian]

- List the requirements for the CMS

Do you mean something similar to this or this?

I learned some time ago that when you have to decide, the second best option decided on time is better than the best solution delayed.

Agreed.

[JohnMurga]

Hehehe ...

I didn't offer to do this anyway (although would do if asked).

I think that raffy just wanted to get things moving as quickly as possible, although obviously it is probably a good idea to a) ask people before volunteering them for stuff and b) making sure that the chosen option is the best for everyone.

Although I do have to say that I have always been deeply skeptical of "Mob Rule by Committee", so I would favour finding someone within the foundation to take responsability for this, someone eager with proven skills who is then willing to make a decision that they are willing to follow through with.

I appreciate this probably wouldn't work for many people (most?), but then again (as Rarsa would say), "Experience tells me ..." that choosing the best man for the job works better than choosing the most popular.

Additionally rarsa's request for requirements is a fair one, as it would hopefully make the decion making process easier and provide a sanity check for any decision that finally gets taken.

BTW - I do like the test sites, they look great ... This could be great for member's pages, but for a documentation effort of any size I'd expect to see more in terms of change-history, export/import and RSS feeds.

On another topic, the reason why the CMS extension hasn't been added to PhpBB is that I have a whole slew of updates to push out that I haven't had time to do (I hope this will change) ... Which really demostrates how bad it would be for me to take on even more responsability within the Puppy infrastructure at this time.

Cheers
JohnM

[rarsa]

Although I do have to say that I have always been deeply skeptical of "Mob Rule by Committee". so I would favour finding someone within the foundation to take responsability for this, someone eager with proven skills who is then willing to make a decision that they are willing to follow through with.

I also agree that that's the best approach. I think that all the things that have gone right with puppy have been done that way a) puppy, b) the new look, c) The forum, d) the wiki, e) DotPups, etc.

A camel is a horse designed by committee.

[rarsa]

- List the requirements for the CMS

Do you mean something similar to this or this?

No, I mean exactly the opposite.

List what requirements we have for a puppy CMS and then choose a CMS that meets them.

There may be 10 CMSs that meet them, then just choose whatever you like.

Here are two examples of what I mean:
- If a CMS can manage millions of pages is irrelevant in our comparison as we will not be generating that many pages.
- If a CMS uses a obscure language for configuration and extensibility, is relevant as it is a barrier to new contributors.

Here is my fist stab at it:

What do we need a CMS for?
- Communicate news and project status
- Organize information about puppy in a clean and accessible way
- Organize self-help in a clean and accessibel way.

What features it should have:
- Is easily extensible in a well know language (php, C, python, etc) so it is easier to contribute.
- It is simple to administer as we won't have 'full time staff' to administer it.
- Does not have heavy server requirements either in hardware or software so we can move it to another server if need be

Maybe the wiki already meets these requirements and we just have to put some effort to puppyfy it... maybe not.

[raffy]

Thanks everyone for your comments.

For your info, Rarsa has a related comment in another thread.