I do like the ease of building a custom theme/site in EE. The custom channels and fields are pretty easy to work with and implementing the EE tags within your templates is about as easy as it gets compared to WordPress.

With that said, I have spent more time figuring out WordPress and I think I’ll be using WP for most of my projects now on. Once you figure out how to customize the dashboard and create custom post types you can basically create the same type of system as EE (from the clients perspective). It does take more work to create custom post types and customize the dashboard, but once you figure it out you can just re-use/modify the code in the future.

So, for me it has now come down to the expense of implementing a CMS… WordPress is free, along with thousands of free plugins. EE costs $300 (commercial) for just the EE package, and once you start buying needed plugins (Matrix, Playa, FieldFrame, .htacc generator) for it (there are very few free, decent plugins/extensions) your initial cost of just setting up the CMS can get up $500-$600.

I used EE and I agree is powerful. I would consider it for more robust projects, but WordPress can accomplish anything EE does with little hacks.

After days of searching for a good forum where to post this message, I have found none. Therefore I apologize if this is not the right place but if you know of a better one, please tell me.

I’m new to the web dev industry and am trying to figure-out this CMS thing.

Firstly, allow me to clarify that I am a project manager and NOT a programmer. Still, on behalf of my client, it falls under my responsibility to make the decision about which CMS platform is best for this project OR, if one is necessary at all for his website. I am however, designing the site.

This website is rather small but despite it’s size, it does have a decent level of complexity due to the functionality the client wishes to have.

In case someone out there mentions the “F” word, let me say that Flash is something the client wishes to avoid (Just personal choice). Instead, we will be using the usual suspects: HTML, CSS, Javascript/Jquery. Possibly but not sure PHP and AJAX. Remember, I’m not a developer, this is what I’ve been hearing from speaking to various developers.

Without further ado, let me describe in more detail:

The main function of this site is to showcase my client’s work as a video editor. He has a total of 19 short video clips and about 30 pictures.

The website will have a total of 7 pages but 3 of them are what I refer to as “video pages”. These video pages will share the exact same design, layout and functionality and are the ones which will showcase the 19 video clips divided as: 7, 7 and 5.

Each video page will implement two main components: A jquery video player with a customized skin to match the design and a jquery thumbnail picture scroll (also with customized skin) who’s function is to control what the video player “plays”. I.e., when the user clicks a thumbnail in the scroll, the video player plays corresponding clip. I’ve seen this done with pictures but not with videos.

One of the site’s pages will have a photo gallery (with the 30 pics) that shares the same design, layout and similar functionality as the video pages. That is: user clicks on thumbnail in the scroll and a “picture player” displays corresponding picture.

Finally, and to make things trickier: the jquery video player and picture player will implement a lightbox feature where if the user clicks on the video or picture, a lightbox zooms on top of the current web page to display the content at a larger scale.

My client plans on swapping, adding or removing a couple of videos two or three times a year. Depending on what movies he has worked on.

Another important fact is that he doesn’t want to deal with updating the videos. Instead he would like me to provide this service.

Before I move on to my questions. I should note that I am aware of the existence of custom CMS systems and their downsides such as lack of documentation. On the other hand, I’ve been told that an open source CMS will have too much overhead for this project.

Also important: I wouldn’t need the CMS to compress the video clips or resize the pictures. I will be doing these tasks.

Now to the million dollar questions (please excuse any dumb ones):
Based on the number of videos and pictures, functionality and estimated frequency of updates:

a) Does it make sense to implement a CMS system at all in this case? Please keep in mind that the CMS should be able to not only swap, add or remove videos and pictures. But it should also allow for thumbnail pictures in the 4 scrolls to be “independently” swapped, added or removed. This is necessary b/c client needs flexibility in choosing thumbnail pics that could be different that their larger counterparts.

b) Can a CMS (open source or custom) add or remove assets while also taking care of the dimensional modifications necessary to the jquery scrolls as a result of these changes?

c) Once you choose a CMS (open or custom) are you stuck with it or is it possible to switch over to an open source one with reasonable effort and cost?

d) If you recommend open source, which do you think would fit best for this unique and fairly complicated project?

Any brave takers?

Thanks!