Item: Concrete CMS
Rating: 10
Author: Doug Dawson

Overall Satisfaction with Concrete5

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

As a web developer, I'm always interested in content management and blogging tools. Many of my customers need an easy-to-use tool for managing their websites. However, too many CMS applications make it very hard on the developer to do what needs to be done. When I came across Concrete5, I found it to be one of the easiest to develop for without sacrificing ease-of-use for the content managers. The support by the Concrete5 developers and other users on the Concrete5 forums has been excellent and the documentation has been very useful, as well. Concrete5 also has an excellent marketplace for plugins and themes. Concrete5 is still my favorite CMS!

Pros and Cons

Pros

Setting up templates in Concrete5 is easy. You can do normal HTML/CSS development and then convert that to a template without excessive CMS-specific alterations.
The administration functions of the site are easy-to-use and look really sharp.
Adding your own functionality to the site is not as difficult as other CMS applications.

Cons

Converting an existing website to Concrete5 can be a challenge, especially if each page is a little different.
Getting the application setup and running isn't hard and the process is well-documented, but if you have your own hosting provider and you get stuck, it may be hard to get assistance. Hosting providers often don't provide specific application support.
Be thoughtful about upgrades. Upgrading Concrete5 can break older add-ons and any customizations that have been made.

Return on Investment

Rapid website setup, reusable components and relatively easy customization
Users really enjoy how the site administration works
Excellent support and documentation
Requires some additional developer training

Alternatives Considered

Sitefinity,DotNetNuke,WordPress,Drupal,Joomla!

I think Concrete5 is much easier to do web development with than Drupal, DotNetNuke and Joomla. For me, Drupal, DotNetNuke and Joomla were harder to template and customize than Concrete5. I find Concrete5 to be more flexible and useful for general web development than Wordpress. Sitefinity is my favorite .NET CMS, but Concrete5 is my favorite CMS, overall.

Likelihood to Renew

The application is actively maintained, the support is excellent for a free application and the documentation is good. The templating in Concrete5 just makes sense to me and I like that I can add my own custom PHP pages or add-ons without much trouble. Hosting for PHP tends to cheaper than .NET hosting, so it is cost effective, as well.

Likelihood to Recommend

Concrete5 is an excellent tool for content management. If you have content that needs to be changed frequently or if non-technical users need to make updates, Concrete5 is a good tool for the job. Content that doesn't change often or if developers are making the changes, the learning curve and overhead may make Concrete5 inefficient to use.

Comments

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.NET developer's favorite CMS is Concrete5?!