Preface

There are many powerful Open Source Content Management Systems (CMSs) available to take the pain away from managing a web site. These systems are feature-rich, often easy to use, and free. Unfortunately, there are so many choices that it's tough to be sure which CMS is the right one for your needs. How can you be sure that you are selecting and working with the right tool?

This book will guide you through choosing the right CMS for your needs. You can be confident in your choice of CMS for the needs of your project. It will also help you make a start using the CMS, and give you a feel for what it's like to use it—even before you install it yourself.

Are you bewildered by the many open source CMSs available online? Open source CMSs are the best way to create and manage sophisticated web sites. You can create a site that precisely meets your business goals, and keep the site up-to-date easily because these systems give you full control over every aspect of your site. Because open source CMSs are free to download, you have a vast choice between the various systems.

There are many open source CMSs to choose from, each with unique strengths—and occasionally limitations too. Choosing between the bewildering numbers of options can be tough.

Making the wrong choice early on may lead to a lot of wasted work because you'll have a half-finished site that doesn't meet your initial requirements, and you may have to restart from scratch.

This book will show you how to avoid choosing the wrong CMS. It will guide you through assessing your site requirements, and then using that assessment to identify the CMS that will best fit your needs. It contains discussions of the major CMSs and the issues that you should consider when choosing: their complexity to use, their features, and the power they offer. It discusses technical considerations such as programming languages and compliance with best practice standards in a clear and friendly way that non-technical readers can understand.

The book also contains quick-start guideslines and examples for the most popular CMSs such as WordPress, Joomla!, and Drupal. You can experiment with these CMSs, get a feel of how they work, and start using them to build your site.

After reading this book, you can be confident that your CMS choice will support your web site's needs because you have carefully assessed your requirements and explored the available options.

The author has created a special website for this book—http://www.cmsbook.info/. You can communicate with other readers and get additional insights and support from there.