6 replies to this topic

[justsachin4u]

Frz, all we know today in Web Development, CMS plays an important role. Anyone whether he has programming background or not, is creating websites using CMS like Joomla or WordPress. In any company where I go for PHP developer job, they ask just only one thing to me - Do you know CMS? Have you good knowledge in Joomla? I tell them I just know the basics of CMS, but my programming skill is good and I can apply good logics to solve the problem. You can ask me anything regarding HTML, CSS, JavaScript, PHP and Database. I also have some good knowledge in AJAX and jQuery. Then they speak it's ok. That's good. But we want a person who is fluent in CMS. Our whole project works is done in CMS.

So frz plz tell me if a layman can create his own website in CMS by just using clicking method then where is PHP???

[WingedPanther]

A CMS is very useful for certain types of sites. WordPress is ideal for a blog, for example, but can be used for far more. The point of them is they already react to the existence of content and update themselves to reflect that. With a Joomla site, for example, you don't have to update the PHP to add a picture to a photo gallery, just upload the photo and Joomla takes care of the rest. You can roll your own, of course, but at that point you're spending energy coding something that could simply exist.

There is a downside, however. There was a period of several months where people were using out-of-date versions of Joomla that had known security vulnerabilities. Not everybody was focused on upgrading to the latest version, and could have had their sites hacked, as a result. Can you roll your own? Sure, but you will probably have security vulnerabilities as well that are common mistakes that all hackers/script kiddies try to attack.

The reality is businesses want to have the most productive employees possible. If you know how to use a CMS, there are a lot of website updates that become trivial to implement, which makes employees more productive. It also makes it easier to filter out applicants. "Do you know Joomla?" is easier than assessing your actual skill level with PHP.

[Shaddix]

I have to agree with that

I'de like to add that if you need to do a lot of custom code, a CMS might not be the best option
instead you might want to look at frameworks like CodeIgniter (my personal favorite), CakePHP, Zend,...

both frameworks and CMS have 2 big advantages that WingedPanther also sugested:
- experience on security, efficiency, ...
- they take a lot of work out of your hands -> quicker development

building websites from scratch with PHP might be good to train your PHP skills, but from a business/productivity based view I can't see any point in not using a CMS or Framework

[Orjan]

And a new addition is that many CMS might need new modules/plugins that needs to be coded by php to produce exactly what the customer wants. This is very likely that you need to know how to create own modules to these CMS and use their API for best result.

[justsachin4u]

My frz you replied to my thread. thanx. I agree with you. But my question is still not answered properly. I know in my India where i live and do job, some people in IT business don't have coding skills whether he is the boss of IT firm or just an employee, but manage to create and develop websites very quickly and with enhanced features. I never saw them opening dreamweaver in windows xp and writing coding and testing. they just do all work in cms. they used so highly interactive plugins like calender, clock, conversion table and many more. A person who don't know much about programming thinks how much talented that programmer. But real fact is that such developers just do copy paste. They are not even know how to create drop-down menu. I myself have created drop-down menu in javascript and css. But my knowledged has not been evaluated there. People create such things very easily with cms. I know several developers in Web development personally whether they are my frz or just known to me, still not able to find out HCF of two numbers. Yet not able to reverse the string without using "strrev()" function, but do their jobs and draw good salary because of this CMS. I think people due to this major reason opt PHP line and not dot net. A person not able to do form validation in javascript, feels home in creating Joomla sites. I am very annoyed for all these things.

[WingedPanther]

There is a strong market for the creation of basic websites that look good. CMS lets "developers" create such sites quickly and easily, as you said, and generate a good revenue with minimal training and work. It sounds like you need to look in a different direction. There's a market for people who can create web-portals that let users view data in other systems. When there's a custom system, with a custom database, and a lot of architectural features, CMS starts to have less utility. I would look in that direction.

[bbqroast]

I laugh how people refer to CMS as a programming language! Really they should say "Do you know how to use [name of CMS]?" CMS is just a type of software.

Its good to know PHP but its true so many websites these days are just using a CMS system, one day you will find a company who wants to have their own website programmed for them (or more likely would like you to setup a simple CMS). Knowing PHP is good, especially if you study the more popular CMSs workings (like Joomla).

One day a company will need something that they can't find a suitable plugin for, that's when you will be needed.

I know what you mean, if the employers spent half an hour working out how to create and edit a page they could save hundreds of dollars. About using that function to reverse text: thing is just that its there and is easy. One day they will need to reverse a string without using a built in function, but right now they haven't had that need- human knowledge is constantly growing at a exponential rate. You can't yell at someone for not knowing something, you can for not being able to learn it when they need to know it.