CMS - Content Management System

[Delirium]

Hi, can anyone recommend an user/adult-friendly content management system software please?

I'm a complete newbie when it comes to CMS so any advice would be much appreciated. Also can a CMS be integrated into an existing site, or does it have to incorporated into the design/setup before the site is completed?

Thanks in advance for any help...

[Jedi974]

I use Awiz deluxe for one site and I am currently trying Sitedepth on another. Both are very fairly priced compared to others and take care of all my members area and free pages.
I can't say which one I prefer out of the two as I haven't had time to play with my SD installation too much yet.
Awiz was a real bitch for me to setup but support is very good.

Integrating in to an existing site is difficult with both and I had to create a different directory structure to rebuild the members area using the CMS. I linked to the new members pages from the index once I had the new setup ready to go live.

Now setup it is a real luxury to leave the site running on auto pilot and I save quite a bit of time now on having fewer pages to create myself now.
Some knowledge of html and php would be pretty useful in the setting up of a site with Awiz or Sitedepth. For an extra fee though Awiz can also redisgn your site for you. I chose to go it alone but admit to getting a few grey hairs in the proccess.

[puretotty]

Always used SiteDepth and I love it

[paul jones]

Use the opportunity to do a total redesign/setup.

[Delirium]

Thanks Jedi that's really useful info... exactly the type of advice I was looking for... !thumbsup!

I've had a look at both packages & I'm leaning towards Awiz. It seems to tick all the boxes... any idea why Site Depth is more expensive. I.e. does SD have some essential feature(s)/function(s) that Awiz lacks?

[Jedi974]

To be honest as an overall package I think that Awiz has more features.
It has a useful security tool to monitor who is in the members area and to automatically suspend users using to many ip's to combat password sharing. I disabled this though as I use Strongbox which I think is the best you can get for security. Awiz also has a useful search box and member ticket system you can integrate into your members area if you wish.

The only thing I don't like about Awiz is that you have to rename all movies to a generic name of your choice and then the software renames them again to something that you have no control of.
This is one of the reasons I am giving Sitedepth a try. I like the fact that it allows you to keep whatever name you want for your movies, thus members don't have to rename it after download to remember what it is.
As extra secuity though Sitedepth feeds all its member content from a directory outside of the public domain.
Sitedepth also has the ability to create clips from uploaded moives which Awiz does not I don't think.
Omar at Sitedepth has also told me that I can use SD for several members areas on different servers (with a bit of tweaking) where I am led to beleive that all domains which Awiz can run have to be on the same server.
He also gave me a good Xmas discount to sweeten the deal.

I think that both are very good CMS and I wouldn't neccessarily say that one deserves to be more expensive than the other. The owners have probably priced them as they felt appropriate.

[Delirium]

Thanks again Jedi... this is the type of really useful information you can only get from a user. They should ask/pay you to write a user review for their site... because users have a completely different perspective from developers.

I think I'll be able to live with the auto renaming of video clips in Awiz - no doubt they'll add a custom naming feature in a future update? It does have a lot of features I like. I also like the fact that they'll integrate it into your site for an additional fee.

I still haven't decided which CMS to go for yet, but your unbiased advice has certainly clarified a few things for me...

Cheers !happy!

[Jedi974]

Glad to be of assistance. I wish I could have found more info on these products myself when I was looking for a CMS. Good luck