Concerns about PHPWCMS

[GreenNuggs]

Hello all.

In my search for a truly flexible CMS I've come across PHPWCMS. I must say, I've gone through about 6 or 7 different packages and was not satisfied with any of them. But I came to this one thinking YAUCMS (yet another useless CMS) and I must say I was pleasantly surprised. All the way from the administrative interface to the installation process. All I can say is nice work!

First let me tell you my background. I currently run this pathetic site: The Dogwood Papers (http://www.dogwoodpapers.com/) Feel free to flame me for its current state. Needless to say, we've got big plans and the backing of a good number of writers. We're basically as it stands a non-profit politcal blog/outlet looking to expand into Slate (http://slate.msn.com) territory. Myself and a friend are basically the webmasters and I've come to the conclusion that with the amount of content we plan on adding to this site, there is simply no way to do this without a backend. We simply do not have the money to pay someone or pay for an expensive software package. So here I am.

Soooo, I do however have a few concerns.

1. The install went fairly easy. I did run into problems with the program complaining about not being able to see some folders even though they WERE there, so I ended up getting around it by making those folders 777. I'm not kidding, it would NOT see the directories unless I did that. I did however, manage to GO BACK and change those folders. I just wonder if I'm going to have problems. None so far though. You might as well forget this question for now!

2. How "stable" is this package? I have no idea how much traffic it would get, but we have delusions of gradiuer and I'm wondering should I get lots of traffic, can it handle that?

3. How "secure" is the package? Because its open source, will this leave me open to hackers? One thing is for certain, I CANNOT afford to have my entire site erased one day, I'd be up sh*ts creek without a paddle.

4. My goal for our intial main page, is to have a blog (yeah I know not available as of yet, I'll probably just embed GreyMatter in the meantime) and several other "blocks" with captions or summaries of the latest content in all other sections of my site. Is this easily accomplished? I suppose it would be much more difficult than simply the {content} tag. To get a feel for what I'm talking about, I have a temporary design here: http://www.dogwoodpapers.com/adam_temp_design/

I guess thats it for now. I do look forward to a blog integration. And I must thank whoever made this package and you all who support it through this forum. Great community and great wealth of knowledge. Believe it or not, I'm really a BIOS Engineer (assembly language, YEAH!) but I have some higher level skillz. So maybe I could help with some development on modules if you need help.

Thanks again,
Nuggs

[frold]

Welcome to the forum....

Soooo, I do however have a few concerns.

1. The install went fairly easy. I did run into problems with the program complaining about not being able to see some folders even though they WERE there, so I ended up getting around it by making those folders 777. I'm not kidding, it would NOT see the directories unless I did that. I did however, manage to GO BACK and change those folders. I just wonder if I'm going to have problems. None so far though. You might as well forget this question for now!

I dont know how you did it bud a little hint. If you are going to chmod the folder images in the folder content (content/images) you need to chmod content first and then images ... Im not sure if that was your problem?

2. How "stable" is this package? I have no idea how much traffic it would get, but we have delusions of gradiuer and I'm wondering should I get lots of traffic, can it handle that?

Well my experience is that it is stable - but it is still a RC(release candidate).. I dont know how far we are from a stable release but my guess is a few month but only Oliver can answer that. But the RC is more then stable enough to use. The only reason why it isn´t a stable release is that Oliver still want to add some more features before making it stable...

3. How "secure" is the package? Because its open source, will this leave me open to hackers? One thing is for certain, I CANNOT afford to have my entire site erased one day, I'd be up sh*ts creek without a paddle.

I haven´t heard about security problems in this forum - but Im not a hacker but I if I know Oliver right he had done anything to make it as secure as possible...Okay if you install some of the unofficial hacks there is no guarantee for the securety - but all of them is minor hacks...


Once again welcome to the forum

[ionrock]

One note on security, if you look into the code you see that Oliver has taken steps to keep things very random in multiple ways such as making sure links have random names and the file system does uses it own system of naming files. This kind of thing is helpful b/c it helps to keep your data safe. Also, you can make things more secure by keeping things off the doc root of your site. It can be a little tricky but it will help a great deal. Oliver has said that he gets quite a bit of traffic on the phpwcms.de site so that would be the obvious benchmark to how it handles load. As far as stability goes it all depends on what parts you use. Some of the content types are still a work in progress to the key to success is just simple testing and being creative in how you use the system. Hope that might help!

[carol]

... Also, you can make things more secure by keeping things off the doc root of your site. It can be a little tricky but it will help a great deal...

Please, when you say "keeping things off the doc root" do you mean
not to install the phpwcms files within the root of the site, but in a folder
within the root? Is it just that, or I'm missing something?

Thanks in advance.
Carol

[ionrock]

What you can do is make the phpwcms root below your doc root. For example, most web hosting companies have a folder for you and then you have a directory for actual pages.

Code: Select all

myfolder/ <-- your folder
myfolder/www/ <-- your website doc root

You could then install phpwcms in the folder below your doc root so it is inaccessible from the web. Php will still allow you to include the files needed to display the pages and things while others can't do somthing like a wget http://yourdomain.com/include/..../secretfile.php

You would still need to keep your index.php file in the doc root but other than that I think they all can go below it (in the myfolder directory show above). I hope this makes sense.

Also, on the blogging side of things, I wrote an article on how to integrate blogger into phpwcms. It worked really well and allows you to use things like the blogthis feature of the google toolbar or other tools like blogtk in linux (I don't know of the windows alternatives). I am messing a bit with wordpress as well to see how that can integrate but it is a little more complicated although I like the comment features so eventually I will have something going. I also wrote a blog addon but I haven't made it up to date with the latest release so you are on your own if you use it. I don't plan on supporting it b/c I think it is better to use something like blogger, movable type, wordpress, etc. Good Luck!

[carol]

Thanks very much, Ionrock, for your detailed explanation!

Carol

[GreenNuggs]

I'm going with it. Thanks for the help. When I get it finished, I'll be sure to post the results here.

[DX57]

Hi Folks,

I'm in a similar position to the fellow who started this thread.

I run the site http://www.4clubbers.net - again feel free to flame
I've found the installation of this system good also.

We have a lot of traffic (60,000 unique visitors a month) and a ludicrous amount of content - all HTML, and various bits of half-a**ed php coding and an installation of various bits and bats that we want to integrate into one system including PHPBB and Coppermine photo gallery... plus a mailing list and all the things you might expect on a general portal, news, links, community site about nightlife.

Does anyone know of a post/article anywhere that gives a decent and reflective **** of the pros and cons of all the most popular CMS systems? We're trying out a bunch but really it's hard to know until you see it implemented/spend a lot of time on each.

[GreenNuggs]

Hey DX57,

I never really found the answer I was looking for! What I do did however, was install PHPWCMS and loved it right off the bat. I've gone with it and haven't looked back. It required some learning on my part, but thats really all the better and I appreciate it now more than ever (thanks Oliver!)

Your current site is pretty good. My only complaint is the nav buttons are kinda slow.

I think you could do your site in PHPWCMS, but it would take some time. Not sure how many people you have available to you. Keep in mind, this IS open source, so if you're worried about people hacking into it or it not providing the features you need in the time frame you need them, you might want to look elsewhere.

I did find a site searching for open source CMS and it listed open source and systems for sale. All the open source ones on this list I tried, well not all but most, but didn't like any of them. Depending upon if you have revenue or not, you might want to look into a package that you pay for. Here's the link: http://www.cmswatch.com/ContentManagement/Products/

The PHPWCMS does NOT have PHPBB integrated into it as of yet and I don't think thats at the top of my list. For now, I'm simply putting a link to the PHPBB page until it does, you may have to do the same if you go with it. Also, the "all html" you aluded to below will only be needed for a template, you can separate the content from the design and thats what I love about it. I'm about a week from rolling out http://www.thedogwoodpapers.com and plan on redoing 2-3 other of my existing sites with PHPWCMS.

GOOD CMS systems have detailed demos and sample logins to check out how they work. But you are right, it is very difficult to find the right one without trying. Good luck!

[DX57]

Thanks for taking time to reply GreenNuggs - I bit the bullet and am now 'fighting with' PHPNuke! It has a big range of features and a big user community plus all the phpBB integration etc. done for you... Still gonna be a steep learning curve