Open Source CMS Solutions

CMSers -

My first CMS experience was implementing Vignette back in 1998. I was
introduced to the bizzarro world of TCL (pronounced "tickle") and Vignette's
strange architecture. Up until the time I entered consulting I had always
fared just fine with open source software. I had created psychology web
journals and a peer review process all in perl with mySQL running on Apache.
All for free. There is a website I've had running since 1996 with the same
perl scripts and the same database that hasn't gone down once in 7 years. No
COTs CMS vendor can make the same claim.

Of course, the usual rebuttal is that perl and PHP are not robust enough
development platforms to do serious development on. I totally disagree and
have a pile of evidence and experience to support my opinion.

What's Going On?
As a management consultant, I have usually walked into companies baffled at
the fact that the CIO had already purchased a content management system
before developing a business case or in many cases, even consulting the
business. If I learned anything during the bubble it is that technology
without a business strategy is completely useless. In many cases, it was not
only useless - it hurt the bottom line of companies who thought they were
doing the right thing.

Don't get me wrong, there is a time and a place for implementing the big
guns: Interwoven, Documentum, Vignette, etc. In my experience, only about
10% of the time are these software juggernauts actually necessary. Usually
purchased in a vacuum to do a proof-of-concept these products bring millions
of dollars in tag-on consulting fees. It really is out of control.

The Truth From the Trenches
There are some interesting statistics that CIOs should be aware of before
making the leap: 20% to 25% of CMS solutions will become shelfware
(Gartner). At around a million dollars an implementation, this is really
pretty expensive shelfware.

The truth is that there are open source solutions like Mambo Open Source
that are an excellent way to pilot how your organization will respond to
content management. Mambo is not Interwoven, but then again most
organizations don't need Interwoven. I don't know about you, but before I
drop a couple million bucks on an unproven technology, I would certainly
want to pilot a proof of concept with a free content management tool like
Mambo. There is even a web site (www.opensourcecms.com) that provided free
demonstrations of several of the web's most popular open source content
management systems.  Test the waters and see how far you can push these free
solutions. More importantly, see how your organization will respond to these
new changes in they way they do their work.

Matthew Clapp
[email protected]

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