Joomla Justifications - RFP

[diabolka]

We have Joomla sites and currently are in a RFP process. There are some vendors who are wanting us to move to a new CMS because they are stating Joomla is not moving with the times, etc. While we need to be open to all suggestions, we were tasked to have counter-arguments on why Joomla is still a good CMS to use, how it does move with the times, etc. Please advise. Thanks!

[dhuelsmann]

http://www.opensourcecms.com/general/cm ... tshare.php
https://developer.joomla.org/cms/documentation.html
https://w3techs.com/technologies/histor ... management

Here are some advantages of Joomla:
Intuitive interface and management panel
What-you-see-is-what-you-get (WYSIWYG) editing
Rich formatting capabilities
Thousands of downloadable templates
Full text searches
Plug-ins for commercial sites, including complete shopping carts
Search-engine optimization features
Scheduled publishing

https://crosstec.org/en/blog/846-why-yo ... oject.html

[sozzled]

We have Joomla sites and currently are in a RFP process. There are some vendors who are wanting us to move to a new CMS because they are stating Joomla is not moving with the times, etc.

Well, of course some vendors would say that because—no surprise here—they have a vested interest in selling you something else! There could be good reasons why vendors would suggest an alternative platform (e.g superior service/functionality, better support, more productive usage, improved accessibility and/or revenue or their inability/incompetence to use Joomla, etc.) but "not moving with the times" is an empty cop-out in my opinion.

Sure, J! 3.4 had its problems (and it took a while to fix them). J! 3.5 added some great improvements to site administration and, from what I've experienced with J! 3.6, Joomla is certainly "moving with the times." Admittedly there are those nay-sayers, doubters, cynics and self-proclaimed experts whose opinions we'll never change and I say, "so what?"

Every site owner and business has their own needs and requirements. Selecting a CMS is primarily a business decision that should not depend entirely upon its technological features or organisational strength. When people ask me what [CMS] product I would recommend to them, the first question I ask in reply is "What do you want to do with your website?" Then I listen to the answers and we discuss those things: Joomla is good for some things; Wordpress, Drupal, ColdFusion, MS SharePoint are good for others. It really depends on (a) what do you want to do (b) how much time and money you have and (c) what kind of support do you need.

I've managed many major ICT projects in my lifetime (including those worth millions of dollars) and when you are involved in the tendering/RFP stage you need to keep your sceptical business hat on at all times. If I encountered a vendor who introduced themselves by rubbishing their competitors or specific products because they were "not moving with the times", that's when I would move on to the next vendor. You would be amazed at how much you can accomplish in 5 minutes! It's almost self-evident when people introduce themselves in a way like that that the main reason they're rubbishing something is because they're doing so from a position of ignorance. Do your own research/background checks. Establish the facts for yourself!

And, if hearsay was gospel, we might as well rubbish the likes of Microsoft, Oracle, Volkswagen, Exxon Mobil, Google, the Catholic Church and most of our elected officials for "not moving with the times". I suppose, if we were all "moving with the times", we should petition [email protected] instead of saying a prayer.

... we were tasked to have counter-arguments on why Joomla is still a good CMS to use, how it does move with the times, etc.

Rather than provide a one-page summary of why Joomla is a good CMS to use or how it does move with the times, task the vendors to provide their justification about why they consider Joomla is not an appropriate solution in your case. Make them do the work for you to prove that their claims are valid. If they know the business then it shouldn't take them too long to do that task. If they take forever to get back to you then you know they're hiding something, don't you?

[AlexVega]

Hi there,

Also check this great article:
http://magazine.joomla.org/issues/issue ... ose-joomla

Cheers.

[Gany]

Okay, that should be easy.

1- Management after installation:
Joomla is MUCH better at this. If the site has lots of articles and/or lots of images, forget WP. It can't handle it.
We find it normal to create a folder for images, but WP doesn't. It throws all images in the media gallery, triples it and then you have to try to find something back based on month only.

2- Multilingual
Even worse here. If the site has multiple languages you really want to work with Joomla. Admitted, with an extension. Native isn't a good idea. But it, again, beats WP hand down.

3- Server load
I've got a site that grows about 400 Mb each week. Bandwidth is now 50 Gb. Why? Because WP doesn't worry about bandwidth a lot nor about file sizes. If you have a dedicated server, WP is not a good idea. It works best on shared hosting - and that is business wise a very bad idea.

[Per Yngve Berg]

The major advantage of using an Open Source CMS is that it's not tied to a specific vendor. If the relationship breaks, you can hire someone else to maintain it without losing you Web site.

[diabolka]

Thank you all!