Web Developers → CMS for dummies

There are a ton of CMS options out there... I've been digging around for one that is drop-dead simple for a non-technical person to use. In other words, it can be complex as hell for the person making the template and migrating an existing site into, but it has to be extremely simple for the person who will be doing ongoing updates.

Any opinions? Joomla, for example would be a horrible choice. Drupal as well.

I'm going to install Concrete5 to see how it looks (»www.concrete5.org/), but was wondering if anyone else has dealt with the challenge of giving a non-web-savvy person a simple solution...

I've always used MODx for those situations.

»www.modxcms.com

why in the world would Drupal or Joomla be a horrible choice, after the site is setup? once setup, Joomla or Drupal (most CMS's) are like using MS Word? Wordpress is another easy example

For the technically minded, yes, but Joomla is far from intuitive if you don't understand how to use it. The sheer business of the backend will scare people away.

For a developer, it can be a win - they sell a CMS and then the client pays them to make updates because they can't figure it out. But in this case I need something a non-tech person can figure out. Using Joomla as an example, I'd say if you had just the menu manager and article manager visible, that would be a start.

CMS Made Simple is pretty simple.

»www.cmsmadesimple.org/

Maybe i dont understand what type of "updates" your non-technical person will be doing..

I assumed you meant, updating content, posting articles, etc.. But it sounds like your non-technical person will be applying patches, updates, modifying things, etc ? IF that is the case Wordpress (self hosted) is the easiest i've seen.

Plone (»plone.org) rocks for non-technical, content editors. I've been using it for a statewide project, hosting public library websites and training non-techy-savvy library staff to use it.

On the back-end, it's been a pain-in-my-ass at times But I can do quite a bit without knowing any Python...

That's on the test drive list now, thanks. Looks pretty good so far. Any downsides you've found?

It's not for those looking for lots of plug & play modules and a library of ready to go templates. It has a skilled coding team that has rarely focused on user documentation. Don't worry too much about the downsides because of the friendly and helpful user community is always ready to offer help..

All I'm looking for as far as "modules" is a gallery I can hack apart and a "news" module. It looks like they probably have both, so this may be it.

Anyone else ever mess around with concrete5? Those are the top two I'm looking at now...