Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Content Management Systems For Linux?

Posted by Cliff on from the does-this-exist? dept.

zoneranger asks: "I've recently been for an interview with part of a large global news company (naming no names)... I'd been sent for jobs in Linux Sysadmin, but found out shortly after arriving that they only used Solaris. Enquiring more deeply, they were basically using Netscape Web Server (mmm...) and Net Gravity, with an unnamed RDBMS in there as well. They also said that instead of taking out maintenance on the boxen, they would just buy another one if problems occurred, and roll it out. It occurred to me therefore that the only reason they weren't using Linux on whatever hardware was simply down to software availability, so my question is: Are there any CMS's for Web Development/etc. under Linux that the 'big boys' would use? Are people using Zope, etc., out there to enable just about everyone to submit content? "

18 comments

  1. Slash, of course by SEWilco · · Score: 1
    Obviously, the answer is "Slash".

    :-)

  2. A review of content systems out there ... by mrgrumpy · · Score: 3
    This is an email I sent to some friends on this exact topic ...

    After having slaved away for several weeks building an per/xml based content engine (Kumera), I started having a look around to see what else was out there, and got suddenly depressed.

    The only saving grace was that is Australia, the cost of running a dedicated server is way too high, and so there is still space for a cgi-bin perl based system.

    Although you may not be interested in all of this, I'm doing it for my own sanity and clarity ...

    In my wandering I have found ...

    http://slashcode.com/ - the content engine that slashdot is based on. Runs in mod_perl (or cgi-bin I guess), very sofisticated. Has daemons that run to collect content for the slashboxes and everything else we know and love about slashdot.

    http://www.zope.org/ - not sure, I think it's a python based application server that has some content systems built around them, including (just to confuse you) http://squishdot.org/ which is the slashdot code ported to zope (I think)

    http://frontier.userland.com/ - is a news system/engine that has a thing called manilla, http://manila.userland.com/ which is a front end to editing and so on. Frontier isn't free or open source, but very popular.

    http://java.apache.org/jetspeed which is a portal based engine built on top of turbine which is an applicate framework for building applications. There is a content engine and discussion group system that are developed by someone else, who are expecting to open source the discussion groups, and provide source and binarys for a low cost of the content engine.

    And there are a few more application systems, which are not exactly content management systems as such, but could be used to build some ... like cold fusion, active server pages, java server pages, php3, and the list goes on and on and on ...

    The more I look there more there is ...

    --
    -- Huh, what?
    1. Re:A review of content systems out there ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      While I am happy Slash is finally out for public use, the codebase is an absolute mess and not suitable for a company that wants a solution they can deploy quickly or reliably.

      Then again, there is also the mod_perl problem. I know, some companies have managed to make it work - and if you are extremely careful it looks like mod_perl can be useful - but truley mod_perl is a case of the emporer having no clothing.

      Rampant limitations on your perl code, rampant problems of memory leaks, module incompatabilities, special cases, special coding needed and heavy process size. Thread problems, core dumps and so on.

      If you really need to use perl to script pages, your better off running IIS/Asp with Activestate's perl system for ASP.

      That being said, when we looked at all this we realized there are no good systems out there yet - we had to write our own.

      &sign($AC[0]);

    2. Re:A review of content systems out there ... by Lindus · · Score: 1

      Not that I have used it but what about Enhydra? Shouldn't it be a worthy contender in this space? It is afterall a Java based solution and this is usually something "the big boys" like more than something as non-industry standard as PHP.

    3. Re:A review of content systems out there ... by damyan · · Score: 1

      I have to second that. I've been looking at Enhydra, and am very impressed with what I've seem.

      What Lindus forgot to mention was the Enhydra is open source!

    4. Re:A review of content systems out there ... by mrgrumpy · · Score: 1

      Enhydra is an application development platform. It also have EJB and ORB support through Jonas and Jothathon. But again (like Zope and Turbine), you still have to write the Content Management System.

      --
      -- Huh, what?
  3. Midgard by jlaporte · · Score: 2

    You might also want to take a look at Midgard. I just installed it a couple days ago as my first foray into application servers. It runs on top of apache and a patched version of php3. You can check it out at http://www.midgard-project.org

    It currently only supports MySQL, but with the forthcoming 2.0 version all ODBC compliant databases will be supported.

    As for whether or not the "big boys" would use it, I don't know, you could probably answer that better than me. My guess would be that while it only supports MySQL the answer would be no, but once the ODBC support is integrated the answer might change.

  4. Zope, Squishdot, and the PTK by webmaven · · Score: 2

    Squishdot is not a port of the slashcode, it's a clone of some of the basic Slashdot functionality that was produced long before the recent release of the slashcode. It currently lacks features such as self-registration, member pages, post ranking, member pages, etc.

    Nevertheless, it is an astonishingly useful product, and can be set up on a working Zope installation within about 5 minutes.

    Some sites running Squishdot include:
    Technocrat.net
    Gnotices, Gnome developer News
    70South
    eBiquity.org
    91.266A - Numerical Methods

    and my own FIAWOL site.

    There is also a big project underway to build a 'Portal Toolkit' (PTK) for Zope. You can find it here. The features of the PTK include self-registration, member pages, wizards for member contributed content, a review mechanism for member contributed content, multiple integrated sources for user authentication, most portal content 'discussable', etc.
    --

    --
    The real Webmaven is user ID 27463. I don't rate an imposter, because my ID is such a lame-ass high number.
  5. openCMS by JEL · · Score: 2

    It seems to me that opencms could be a system for you although I didn't succeed in installing it. As far as I understood, there is a news function, folders, workflows and other things making sense in CMS. I don't know if it's already really useable but you could give it a try.

  6. How do you define a CMS? by sobiloff · · Score: 1

    There's some confusion amongst the previous responders (and myself, I guess) about what you're considering a content management system. Do you mean dynamic page generation (a la PHP), or do you mean revision control (a la CVS), or do you mean something like a templating system and an easy interface for non-technical users to contribute info (a la Interwoven's TeamSite), or do you mean digital asset management (a la Artesia Technologies' TEAMS)?

    1. Re:How do you define a CMS? by zoneranger · · Score: 1

      I'm a bit late in responding, but I guess (having looked at PHP and the like myself) that I really mean (and should have originally posted) some sort of system that provides: 1) Revision control (as you mentioned) and allowing multiple people to update the same sort of info 2) A templating system and an easy interface (as you mentioned) with an option for adding things such as images (possible using HTTP file upload) 3) A system able to accept and then massage contributions via email, other web-feeds, etc. Those are the main bits I guess, particularly the template-based system to basically allow anyone (and everyone) to contribute. Mediasurface offer such a system (I believe) which someone told me is now appearing for Linux, and I remember seeing a system based on Java applets... I guess at the end of the day I was meaning a system that was built for the people more concerned about getting the content out quick without worrying about the technical bits, or (in the obvious case of longer written stuff) the design.

  7. Shared Workspace by SEWilco · · Score: 1
    Another approach might be to use the "shared workspace" style. A shared office design rather than a bulletin board design.

  8. Zope Documentation by webmaven · · Score: 2

    The following information sources are usually a bit more productive that the current manuals:

    The Zope Documentation Project

    The mailing lists

    The How-Tos
    --

    --
    The real Webmaven is user ID 27463. I don't rate an imposter, because my ID is such a lame-ass high number.
  9. Zope by Shadowlore · · Score: 1

    Zope is used my a respectable number of sites, that we can verify anyway. Netcraft only reports the servers running straight Zope(Zserver), and not the cases where Zope runs behind another server. In the measured category, it tops Roxen (which may be underreported due to the config option to change the Server string) on their list of .coms in March ( March Report on Zope in .com ) Zope is quite a powerful system, content management is one of the key aspects of it. I run it in conjunction with Roxen, and it provides for a good platform.

    The PTK (Portal ToolKit) is coming along nicely, and makes for a very nice, easy to use platform.

    If you try it, do try to remember the recommendation that complicated logic should be done in Python, not DTML. The D in DTML does not stand for 'Dynamic', it stands for Document. DTML is a Document Template Markup Language. Python is for programming. Keeping this in mind will significantly help you keep your sanity.

    --
    My Suburban burns less gasoline than your Prius.
    1. Re:Zope by yomi · · Score: 1

      > But the documentation will be a killer until the first O'Reilly book comes out, I expect... :(

      Yes, we are all eagerly expecting the O'Reilly book. There were some messages about a couple of weeks ago that mentioned a release date around december.

  10. Roxen Platform by Dowser · · Score: 1

    One player you should not overlook is Roxen Platform (www.roxen.com)
    And the web-server (Roxen Webserver) is GPL!
    Also, dont forget to check out Roxen Community where you can get a better idea of what people are saying about it!

  11. Zope and Content Management by Bwanazulia · · Score: 1
    I have been using Zope for months now and once you get over the early documentation issues (meaning: there is very little in the way of starters, but there is plenty if you have a good sense of Zope) you will find that it has some extreme power.

    On the content management side, it has built in users, groups and roles which allow you to easily break content out to different people. I have about three or four people working on content and it is easy to control. The interface might take a half hour to get used to but after that, even the most novice user "gets it.".

    Coming soon for Zope..
    - ZEO (Zope Enterprise Option) which will allow you to easily "cluster" a Zope installation over servers.
    - PTK (Portal Toolkit) which will make it easier to set up, develop and manage a website (portal)
    - More Products. There are 2-3 very useful products release every week.

    BZ

  12. Zope by bko · · Score: 2

    I've had a chance to use Zope recently, and it's a great piece of software. I expect that in a year or two everyone who's doing this stuff will be seriously interested in it -- it will let you do just about everything from the web, it should start getting tool support to make integration with tools more transparent, and it will be documented.

    However, until that time, the documentation is a significant source of headaches.

    As an example, in trying to write some DTML (Zope's dynamically generated HTML variant) to do some coding, I spent several hours trying to figure out what syntax was needed to reference a variable. This was WHILE reading the manuals, looking at every faq possible on the Zope site, etc.

    I consider myself a good figure-outer of things that are poorly documented, as I'm willing to experiment mercilessly, but this was ridiculous.

    That said, power isn't lacking in using Zope. The web front-end makes using it easy for non-full-time developers, the versioning makes it easier to recover from mistakes (it keeps a complete revision history for all of the files in Zope), the software is Open Source and Free Software (BSD-licensed), and you can extend it with a real language (Python).

    But the documentation will be a killer until the first O'Reilly book comes out, I expect... :(