| Author | GreenNuggs |
| Date | 2004-04-01 03:36 |
| Posts: |  Hello to all! In my search to find the best CMS, I've stumbled across this site. I'm in a quandry right now. My friends and I have started a political site that is going to be growing bigger than what normal HTML pages will allow. I've come to the conclusion that I should really have a database backend to it.
For a frame of reference, here is the current (and pathetically layed out) site. http://www.dogwoodpapers.com/ Also, here is the new design I'm rolling out on the 18th, albiet without the backend. http://www.dogwoodpapers.com/adam_temp_design/ What I would like, is to have something similar to that new temp design front end, but with a backend to the whole process. Has anyone ever been to Slate? This is what I'm looking for, much simplified naturally: http://slate.msn.com/ As far as sections are concerned, I have 10 sections. 1. Editorials - My writers and I will each have individual sections branched off this. I want each of them to have their own page (that I will maintain, but they will update content) 2. Hammerwatch - Blog-like run by one person 3. Staggering Stats - Blog-like run by one person 4. DogForum - a public forum for any person to contribute to 5. DogBlog (archived) - Blog on the first page (its the crux of our site), also archived 6. Good Reads - Listing of external news articles and political editorials 7. The Wire - business news and stock quotes run by one person 8. The Progressive - Listing of external politcal organizations and their latest causes 9. Friends of Dogwood - Just links to my friends sites 10. Campaign Petition - we're submitting a petition to both presidential candidates this summer. OK, the reason I gave you all that is I want to know, a.) Will OpenPHPNuke work for me and if not, can you recommend a different package? Is a "portal" really what I'm looking for? I don't want normal readers who come to my site to have to login unless posting in the forums or responding to a blog entry. b.) How much custom coding will I need to do. Realize that some of the above sections are similar in nature, they'll just have differently categorized content. I'm an assembly language programmer, but only 2 years out of school for Computer Science in higher level concepts and languages. I did take a Perl/CGI/HTML course 3 years ago. I'm at my wit's end. I don't have thousands of dollars to buy a package or hire a programmer. My friends and I are 2-3 years out of college and working stiffs like the rest of us. If it comes down to it, I'll continue to do what I'm doing now, which is just boatloads of HTML pages. But I fear in the future, this could come to bite me in the ass. If ANYONE has any suggestions for me, I would appreciate them immensely. Thanks for taking the time to read this. Nuggs |
