Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Which forum software do you prefer? Do you prefer PHPBB forums or VBulletin forums?

Forums are always been loved because an active forum allows you to interact with a large number of people and get help quicker than commenting on a post or even doing a Google search (sometimes). I actually have experience being an administrator and a user of both forum types. Here are some of the Advantages & disadvantages of both
PHPBB Forums
PHPBB Advantage
• Open source &FREE.
• Easy to setup.
• Easy for just about anyone to use.
• User friendly.
• Takes little time to get modding done
PHPBB Disadvantages
• Options are limited.
• Not very SEO friendly (as of version 3.0).
• MODS are very limited, mods released are very less.
VBulletin Forums
VBulletin Advantages
• . Installation is easy. Just one click away to install it.
• Generally better looking.
• More features.
• Plugins/Add-ons available.
• More SEO friendly than PHPBB.
• Social networking is good.
VBulletin Disadvantages
• Takes lots of time to install custom MODS.
• Costs $100-$180.00 per license.
• Constant Maintenance/Updates required.
• Targeted by Spammers.
• Not very Fluid.
Both forum types have skins available for free and for sale, so I didn’t mention that above. It is also important to mention that you can easily convert your PHPBB forum into a VBulletin forum (I’ve read this, haven’t personally tried it).
In summary, as a user, I’ve always felt that to be considered a serious forum; you need to be using VBulletin. It just looks more professional, has more options, etc. From an administrator’s standpoint, however, I’ve enjoyed running PHPBB forums more. VBulletin forums seem to attract a ton of spammy posts and sometimes moderating posts and banning users can be overwhelming (in my experience) and I feel like I have to update the software every few weeks. It also seems to almost have to many options!
So that is my experience with both PHPBB and VBulletin. I would love to hear about your experiences and preferences between the two. Have any pros or cons to add to the list? You can write from the perspective of running either type of forum or from the user perspective (reading/posting) on either type of forum. If you haven’t used either, you are welcome to share your experiences with BBPress.

Tuesday, March 23, 2010

JOOMLA or WORDPRESS which is the best in BUSINESS?

When you start to look for brilliant blogging software, take in account that the best blogging platform is one that best suits your needs. I do not believe in a general classification and in a general valid solution. That is in the case of e-commerce platforms. There are many variations, some as rich in features or other options. The best is that which meets the requirements of the future store. So when you start to look for brilliant blogging software, take in account that the best blogging platform is one that best suits your needs. I do not believe in a general classification and in a general valid solution. That is in the case of e-commerce platforms. There are many variations, some as rich in features or other options. The best is that which meets the requirements of the future store.

Why joomla? Because it was been discovered by experts that the power of this CMS in building fast and cheap a site and realized that developers statements under which Joomla! Is one of the most powerful Open Source system for content management on the planet, being used worldwide from simple websites to complex corporate applications and is simple to install and use, are true.

One of the reasons why JOOMLA can be chosen is:
* Costs very little for maintenance and development
* SEO and SEM optimized
* Very flexible, intuitive and easy to use
* Manage text, images, documents and media files
* Unlimited possibilities of development of web pages
* has wide spread and support a strong and very active web community

What Wordpress is good in?
If you try to compare this blogging software, Wordpress Development, with Joomla CMS don’t forget about that wordpress is just a blogging platform, while joomla is a free open source content management system for publishing content. So, it depends what you need for blog or portal. I agree that is pretty difficult to compare them, but I’ll try to do this by compare them as personal publishing platforms. Even completely different software can be compared in terms of expandability, usability, speed and potential for future growth.

Finally it can be stated that
Joomla was created from the ground up as a CMS, while Wordpress was designed as a publishing platform that has developed gradually into a CMS, offering each unique capability.
Both platforms work well for managing a website, Wordpress is the best option for small to medium business and Joomla is fantastic for a website that requires multiple user privileges or custom database work.

Monday, March 22, 2010

What CMS should we exactly use

Comparison between JOOMLA & DRUPAL
There exists a very common question within the beginners that weather they should use JOOMLA DRUPAL or any other CMS.
Well for this very question there is a simple answer DRUPAL is one of the superior than any other CMS. The main reason for saying it is because it is very SEO friendly. It can cater your needs, can be used for simple FAQ sites or a large million visitors site.
Lets us compare first the 2 best CMS DRUPAL & JOOMLA

DRUPAL.
• Rock solid & high quality platform
• Real multi-site-feature (only one installation for several sites
• Any Kind of user groups & user permissions, OpenId compliant in Version 6
• Can run membership and community sites, not only CMS etc
• Powerful templating system. Any XHTML or CSS template can be easily converted to Drupal.
• Drupal needs a little time investment to realize all the huge possibilities of Drupal
• Clear, high quality code and API (easy to integrate with other solutions etc)
• Flexibility and no known limitations
• Many high profile sites use Drupal (e.g.: MTV UK, BBC, the Onion, Nasa, Greenpeace UK, New york observer. )

JOOMLA
• If you are not techy its good to start
• Easy install & setup with your mouse
• Easy learning curve
• Cannot integrate other scripts etc. to your site
• Generally you cannot create high-end sites, without investing huge amount
• No SEO out of the box, URLs are not search engine friendly.
• Server resources utilization is more compared to DRUPAL.
• Only one site per installation
• No Single Log-in to several sites
• No User groups & permissions
• More intuitive administration user interface
• Some polished modules for things like calendars, polls, etc.
• Modules cost you money

Systems those are required for each of these CMS
• Drupal can work with MySQL and Postgres while Joomla is known to support only MySQL
• Drupal can work with Apache or IIS while Joomla is known to support only Apache
• Joomla support SSL logins and SSL pages. Drupal not known to support it.

Site Management
DRUPAL has free added on for Workflow management. Joomla not known to have one.
• Drupal has inbuilt Translation manager. Joomla has a Free ad on for the same
• Drupal has more granular privilege management
There are all together 8 fields where we can figure out as which is the best CMS

Site Building
Flexibility & Power: Drupal looks significantly more powerful — much more flexible. Drupal gives a huge advantage over Joomla with looks like views, CCK, Panels. You simply can’t get that flexibility with Joomla. Joomla developers design around their own design with very little flexibility.

Performance
In initial tests any one can notice that, Drupal blows away Joomla. With the new version of Joomla, the good template makers junk them up with gee-whiz gadgets that are not suitable for the enterprise

Learning Curve
Joomla is far easier to get up and running. Even with all the free videos, blogs, etc, Drupal is still a lot more challenging. Big oppty for comprehensive business business/enterprise book/education

Templates
Joomla wins by a huge margin. For example, companies like Joomlart, Joomlashack the best of JOOMLA development companies do a good job. Drupal theme companies are simply horrific. What’s needed is a Template strategy that emulates the requirements for the top web sites in the country and, bundles modules, blocks etc. that work out-of-the-box to give businesses a head-start

Code developers
It looks Drupal coders are much more professional, skilled, disciplined. Good Joomla coders are rare. Must have something to due with the Drupal culture. I’m sure the Joomla developers are just as capable, they just don’t institute the same rigor

Admin
Drupal’s backend admin functionality is bad. The front end, backend separation is tenuous and confusing. Joomla is far better.

Content Management
- Drupal’s taxonomy system is excellent. Joomla’s “strait-jacket” approach is poor. Joomla’s admin console is much easier to organize, find content. Joomla’s Pro is better than the options available for Drupal.

Content Presentation
- Drupal’s tools are very, very good — they don’t come close to the built-in power of IBM tools but they’re light years better than Joomla, but wonder why they aren’t part of the code base. Seems odd. With Joomla, you have to acquire components that will meet 60-80% of your needs. For example, Joomla has a tremendous news component, but it will never meet the capabilities of Drupal’s CCK, Views, etc.