Simplicity is best when it comes to technology. When I need a content management system to set up a new web site, I want the simplest piece of software that will do the job. If the site must be complex and multi-faceted, then a complicated CMS may be called for. But if you just need to set up a blog or presentation web site, go simple!
Below is a list of my favorite "simple" CMS of blog scripts at the moment.
If you're setting up a blog, there are two basic technical routes you can take. Either use a hosted service, where you piggyback on an existing system, or create your own website, where you set up a script system on web hosting space.
Hosted services are quick and easy. Some are totally free. At least one allows you the option of making money from your blog. These are set up mainly for blogs, but if you work at it, they can be used as pretty good informational websites; choose a service that allows categories of content and go to it. Most of the big services automatically get you into search engines. But by using one of these services, you lose a degree of control over your content. By their very nature, the service has control of whatever you post. In the case of free hosted services, it is possible that they could turn off service to you with no notice. That's not likely if you choose one of the big players with a track record. But it's possible. The Terms of Agreement at many hosted services specify that the service owns some rights to whatever you post on your blog. They generally mean they can promote your blog in their marketing, but a few reserve the right to re-sell you words for their own profit. If this concerns you, read the fine print when you sign up.
My top picks for hosted services:
Blogger.com - The best-known blogging service, Blogger or Blogspot is also one of the best. It's free, it's easy, and it has built-in AdSense capability, which means you can make money if you get traffic. Blogger is laughably easy to set up. Coming in cold, you can have a blog up and running in 15 minutes. There are plenty of templates to choose from, you can select colors and fonts online, and if you prefer, you can easily create your own templates.
Tumblr.com - This relatively new service is fun! It offers a clean, simple interface that allows you to post text, photo, video or other types of content with just a couple of clicks. The default template is excellent, and their are others to choose from. And it's free.
Wordpress.com - An excellent blogging service, also for free. Not to be confused with the installable script named Wordpress, mentioned below. This is a terrific service. The only downside in my opinion is that you can't put AdSense or any other kind of income-generating ad on this site. If you want to make money, go elsewhere.
Xanga.com - A relative newcomer to the scene, this service looks attractive. But like Wordpress.com, you can't put ads on blogs here. Free.
Terapad.com - Another attractive alternative with lots of available templates. No ads allowed. Free.
Facebook.com - You probably know more about it than I do.
If you would rather retain more control over your content, consider getting hosting space and installing a blog or CMS script. The line between blog and CMS is not as sharp as it once was, and several scripts can serve for either purpose.
PHP is the standard scripting language these days, and if you want to go simple, it's the way to go. Virtually all webhosts include PHP in their offerings, even most of the free web hosts. You don't need to have any PHP skills to use some of these scripts; others may require a few minutes of studying to get running. But on the whole, these are all easy to install and easy to use.
When you're concerned with simplicity, one of the first choices you need to make is between a script that uses flat files for storage or data or one that uses a database, usually MySQL. For sheer simplicity, I recommend flat files. This kind of script keeps your text in simple text files on the server. This has two big benefits. First, you can host this kind of script on any server, including any free server (as long as the underlying language, like PHP, is there). Second, when you want to make a backup of your site, you just copy all the files and you're done.
By contrast, scripts that use a database to store your entries keep the data in tables created by and processed by a database engine. This means the server your site is hosted on must have that database engine installed and running. It also means that every time some one requests a look at one of your pages, the server has to run not only the PHP interpreter, but also the database engine, before it can display the page. This can make for busy servers and ultimately slowdowns of page delivery. Proponents of database storage say it is more reliable than flat file storage. I've never had any trouble iwth either method. I do know that on two free servers I've tested with a CMS script that can use either method, flat file was faster. On a regular, paid server, that situation may be reversed, but I'm not sure.
Here are my favorite flat file blogging scripts of the moment:
Kure - This is the ultimate in simplicity. The script is tiny, less than 22K in code. It is blisteringly fast. It uses flat files. It would work great by itself or as a blog include inside another page via an iFrame. So simple, you don't need a brain to install this. Free.
Flatpress - An excellent small, lightweight blogging script. Logical administrative interface. Fast. A few nice templates. Looks like creating your own templates is relatively easy. Free.
SimplePHPBlog - A great little blogging script that can also pull duty as a minimalist CMS. With just a tiny bit of coding knowledge, you can modify the template to your heart's delight. With absolutely no such knowledge, you can still modfy the color scheme and component arrangement via an elegantly simple control panel. Very easy to install. Free.
Pivot - A full-featured blogging script that uses flat files for storage. It's been around for a few years, and a new release in late 2007 made it better than ever. Larger and more complex than Flatpress, Pivot also offers more features, including a tagcloud. Easy to install. In my test installation, Pivot pages were slow to load. Free.
Here are my favorite flat file CMS scripts of the moment:
LightNEasy - A new flat file CMS script that is terrific. Nice templates. Simple as pie to make your own templates. Built-in graphics gallery capability. Very nice all-around script. Very easy to install. Free.
MuCMS - Also known as Matt's Micro Content Management System, this gem of a script uses flat files but offers many features of the database-backed big guys. It has built-in statistics, automatic page cacheing to lighten server load, and a very slick administrative interface. It comes packaged at the moment with only two templates, but they're both beautiful. And the author offers an in-depth tutorial on converting any standard template for use with MuCMS. Installation is very easy if you put the script in your root directory. If you're more advanced and choose to put in a subdirectory, you need to follow the author's excellent directions, but this could be daunting if you know nothing about HTML. You also need to know very basic HTML to set up the menu system via the online form, which basically just presents the menu code in a window. Once the script is installed and the menu configured, this script is clean and easy to use. Highly recommended. Free.
FuzzyLime - An interesting CMS script that uses flat files. Pretty, very good control panel with logical layout. A couple of nice templates. I couldn't get the built-in poll to work at all, but the gallery module and everything else worked well. Free.
Drake CMS - A very interesting script that offers you the choice of flat file or database data storage. You can even switch back and forth at will! Even if you are using flat files, the script can create an SQL backup of the site's data, allowing you to restore it to a wide range of databases, or back to flat files. Drake includes a range of modules including calendar of events and forum. Several nice templates are available, and are easily modified if you have a smattering of HTML knowledge. Like many of the more complex CMS scripts, Drake's administrative interface takes a while to get familiar with. This is one of my pet peeves with Drupal (which is a wonderful CMS for large site with complex requirements). In both Drake and Drupal, the administrative interface seems designed for the installer rather than the content producer. What I mean is that when you log on as the administrator, you are presented with dozens of menus, with the commands to create a new post or article buried in there somewhere. I may be exaggerating, but not much. Free. As of early 2008, undergoing a name change to Lanius CMS.
Here are my favorite MySQL blogging scripts of the moment:
Gelato - The most fun in a blogging script right out of the box. Easy-as-pie setup. Terrific default template, and other templates are available. Administrative interface so clean and logical that it makes every other blogging system look stupid. And it works great! The only thing I'd like to see the developers add is some way to categorize posts; that way, it could be used as a content management system that's actually fun! I've seen Gelato compared to Chyrp, and I guess I see the similarity in structure. But Chyrp is more complicated to set up, the admin interface is not as clean, and the templates aren't as good. I'll take Gelato, please, and gosh is it tasty. Free.
Wordpress - Available at Wordpress.org (not wordpress.com, which is a hosted service using the same script), Wordpress may be the most popular blogging script on Earth. It is excellent. Simple to install and configure, hugely extensible and reliable. By using some off-the-shelf extensions, it can easily function as a very good CMS, too. And it is free.
Here are my favorite MySQL CMS scripts of the moment:
Drupal - After putting together a fairly complex site with Drupal 5, I have a love-hate relationship with this capable CMS script. On the positive side, Drupal and its hundreds of plugins can do almost anything you need to do. The site I am still working on includes a shopping cart, several newsletters with different subscription lists, banner and button ads, extensive article archives, blogs and online surveys, among other things. Drupal can do all that and much more. On the negative side, that complexity comes with a price - complexity. Installing the base script was very easy. Adding most modules isn't bad. But when you get into more complicated modules, such as a shopping cart, things get grim. The shopping cart module I installed required more than a dozen other modules be installed first, then each one had to separately configured. When I had trouble, I discovered that the online help forums for the shopping cart were filled with other folks' troubles, and some had answers while other didn't. My main quibble with Drupal itself is that to do one thing, like activate a module, typically requires that you navigate through a morass of seemingly unrelated control panel areas, designating settings for a variety of things. One module I installed required me to visit five different control panel pages; what irked me was that two of them were never mentioned in the documentation or on the forums. Anyway, if you are creating a site with complex requirements, use Drupal. But be prepared to spend some time. I've heard Drupal is much easier to configure than some other scripts, particularly Typo3. If that's true, I can;t imagine the headaches that might result from using Typo3.
Joomla - This is probably a good CMS choice if you just want to set up a site quickly and are satisfied with one of the many stock templates. Installation is very easy. The control panel is quite nice.
I've tested some other scripts that turned out to be second-stringers. Some looked okay, but weren't as nice as the scripts I've chosen to write about. Some were clunky or slow. And some either were ridiculously difficult to install or failed to install at all.
Here are scripts that show promise, but I have not yet tested extensively: ModX, MemHT, Website Baker.
Here are the scripts I cannot recommend:
Because they were good, but not great: Jaws CMS (promising), Bloofox CMS, BigAce, e107, Falt4, Typolight (very ugly default template), SilverStripe.
Because they're difficult to install and/or use: Typo3 (the setup process was a nightmare), phpCMS (looked promising, but I couldn't figure out how to create a site with it).
Because they have ugly interfaces: XOOPS, PHP-Nuke, Guppy, and others that seem to force every site built on them to look like very busy portal sites, indistinguishable from hundreds of others.
Because they're too dated compared to fresher scripts: SiteMan2, JAF CMS, CuteNews (though I used to love CuteNews).
Because they failed either during installation or during test use: 1024, AIOCP, Enano CMS.
3/19/2008
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