Zend with CMS Advise

[BeanoEFC]

Hey Everyone,

 

I am looking for some advise with regards to CMS. I have built applications with Zend in the past and I am fairly competent when it comes to the Framework. I have been given a project which now requires a CMS. In the past i have created my own CMS, but these have by no means been brilliant, they have simply got the job done. I have looked around and i have seen that Drupal and Joomla! are recommended CMS, but i have no experience with these CMS applications.

 

Am I reinventing the wheel by creating my own CMS? If so are CMS like Drupal and Joomla! easy to drop into the Zend Framework?

 

Also, if i create an application, which is intended to be white labled, and sell the application on do i infringe on the license agreement of CMS such as Joomla! ?

 

What are the advantages/disadvantages of using an open source CMS instead of a custom build CMS?

 

Any and all opinions are welcomed =)

 

Regards,

-Ben

[gizmola]

Ben,

  CMS's are pretty much a world unto themselves.  You will not be able to integrate them with your zend built apps in any practical manner.  They have their own MVC equivalent architecture, and people that work with them learn how to code up modules that work within their paradigm.

 

For licensing:

 

Joomla is under the GPL.

Drupal is under the GPLv2+

 

I'm not sure what this means to you in terms of "white labelling".  If you write software that you sell to people who then use it under their brand, using a GPL license is a pretty big problem, because the GPL mandates that you provide your source code for free.  You can't even for example, write a bridge that integrates your proprietary code with Drupal unless your software carries a license that is GPL compatible.  I'm not a lawyer but in general the goal of the GPL is to insure that source code is freely available.    GNU has a political agenda in wanting software to be free, and for developers to make money in other ways -- providing service, support, customization etc..  This is in general referred to as "Copyleft" in response to the idea of "copyright" which they are against philosophically.

 

AFAIK, you can charge for your software via a reproduction fee, but you also would have to make it all freely available to anyone who wanted it.  You can compare that to the http://framework.zend.com/license for example.