Seeking Django vs. Joomla comparison

[Hooshyar]

Hello Django users,

I have a question. Do you know any reference, link or white paper that
compares Joomla to Django? I know how wrong this comparison could be,
but an avid Joomla/PHP vendor is making it.

Also, if you know a reference material to compare Django to PHP, that
would be nice too, although even this one might not come across as an
apple-to-apple comparison.

Please reply here or e-mail me directly. My e-mail address is
***@yahoo.com

Thank you..

Hoosh

[Kenneth Gonsalves]

Post by Hooshyar
I have a question. Do you know any reference, link or white paper that
compares Joomla to Django? I know how wrong this comparison could be,
but an avid Joomla/PHP vendor is making it.

django is a framework, joomla is a cms - so they cannot be compared. You
should look to comparing django to something like cakephp

Post by Hooshyar
Also, if you know a reference material to compare Django to PHP, that
would be nice too, although even this one might not come across as an
apple-to-apple comparison.

django is a framework, php is a scripting language - you should look to
compare php with python.
--
Regards
Kenneth Gonsalves
Senior Associate
NRC-FOSS at AU-KBC

[justin jools]

The previous author is right Django is a framework to build systems
and not an already built system like a Content Management System, like
Joomla. If you do want a comparison you have to compare a Django built
CMS like : http://www.django-cms.org/.

I don't know the reasons for your comparison but having used most
popular CMS systems: Wordpress, Joomla and Concrete 5: http://www.concrete5.org/
I can tell you that Concrete 5 is the easiest and quickest to setup
for the user and developer. In comparison Joomla is a headache, a
messy and hard to learn system. Just check out concrete 5 demo to see
why: http://www.concrete5.org/

You should only really consider using Django CMS (although a very good
system) if you need to add custom apps and custom functionality that
you cannot find with a system like Concrete5 and you should also have
a good grounding in Django/Python to start with in order to set the
system up and seeing as you are asking this question I assume you have
not.

I am not a salesman, I have just tried many other CMS systems and
concrete5 will make you smile at its ease of use and quick build
time :)

A comparison here Joomla/Drupal and C5:
http://www.cmswire.com/cms/web-cms/drupal-and-joomla-to-lose-market-share-to-concrete5-web-cms-004347.php

Hope this helps you.

Post by Kenneth Gonsalves

Post by Hooshyar
I have a question. Do you know any reference, link or white paper that
compares Joomla to Django? I know how wrong this comparison could be,
but an avid Joomla/PHP vendor is making it.

django is a framework, joomla is a cms - so they cannot be compared. You
should look to comparing django to something like cakephp

Post by Hooshyar
Also, if you know a reference material to compare Django to PHP, that
would be nice too, although even this one might not come across as an
apple-to-apple comparison.

django is a framework, php is a scripting language - you should look to
compare php with python.
--
Regards
Kenneth Gonsalves
Senior Associate
NRC-FOSS at AU-KBC

[justin jools]

The previous author is right Django is a framework to build systems
and not an already built system like a Content Management System, like
Joomla. If you do want a comparison you have to compare a Django built
CMS like : http://www.django-cms.org/.

I don't know the reasons for your comparison but having used most
popular CMS systems: Wordpress, Joomla and Concrete 5: http://www.concrete5.org/
I can tell you that Concrete 5 is the easiest and quickest to setup
for the user and developer. In comparison Joomla is a headache, a
messy and hard to learn system. Just check out concrete 5 demo to see
why: http://www.concrete5.org/

You should only really consider using Django CMS (although a very good
system) if you need to add custom apps and custom functionality that
you cannot find with a system like Concrete5 and you should also have
a good grounding in Django/Python to start with in order to set the
system up and seeing as you are asking this question I assume you have
not.

I am not a salesman, I have just tried many other CMS systems and
concrete5 will make you smile at its ease of use and quick build
time :)

A comparison here Joomla/Drupal and C5:
http://www.cmswire.com/cms/web-cms/drupal-and-joomla-to-lose-market-share-to-concrete5-web-cms-004347.php

Hope this helps you.

Post by Kenneth Gonsalves

Post by Hooshyar
I have a question. Do you know any reference, link or white paper that
compares Joomla to Django? I know how wrong this comparison could be,
but an avid Joomla/PHP vendor is making it.

django is a framework, joomla is a cms - so they cannot be compared. You
should look to comparing django to something like cakephp

Post by Hooshyar
Also, if you know a reference material to compare Django to PHP, that
would be nice too, although even this one might not come across as an
apple-to-apple comparison.

django is a framework, php is a scripting language - you should look to
compare php with python.
--
Regards
Kenneth Gonsalves
Senior Associate
NRC-FOSS at AU-KBC

[shacker]

Post by justin jools
The previous author is right Django is a framework to build systems
and not an already built system like a Content Management System, like
Joomla. If you do want a comparison you have to compare a Django built
CMS like :http://www.django-cms.org/.

This is the usual answer - that they can't be compared because
they're apples and oranges. I don't buy it. Yes, one is a framework
and the other is a CMS. But from the position of an organization
trying to decide between a framework and a CMS, the comparisons are
valuable and necessary. In addition, because of Django's free "admin"
feature, Django is really a framework that comes bundled with a CMS.
Not to mention the fact that many CMSs have framework-like
characteristics "Django is a framework with CMS tendencies; Drupal is
a CMS with framework tendencies." It's not as apples/oranges as many
people claim it is.

These comparisons are not only possible, they're essential for a boss
or a company trying to decide on their next platform. Only us geeks
say things like "They can't be compared." Of course they can.

I don't have a Joomla comparison, but I did put together this
comparison with Drupal:
http://birdhouse.org/blog/2009/11/11/drupal-or-django/

Scot

[Torsten Bronger]

Hallöchen!

Post by shacker
[...]
These comparisons are not only possible, they're essential for a
boss or a company trying to decide on their next platform. Only us
geeks say things like "They can't be compared." Of course they
can.

Well, somewhat.

First you need a functional specification for your project,
i.e. "must have"'s and "nice to have"'s. Size and agility of the
community as well as documentation are important, too. Then you can
filter a little bit. But most established frameworks/CMSes will
still fit the bill.

The primary filter must be the language anyway. The people who are
supposed to work on it must feel comfortable with it. If they do,
they'll work as efficient with any mature tool.

But you can't compare further technical things like "this ORM layer
may be better" or "that wiki-in-5-minutes screencast is more
impressive". The worst thing are benchmarks. Never look at them.

Tschö,
Torsten.
--
Torsten Bronger, aquisgrana, europa vetus
Jabber ID: ***@jabber.rwth-aachen.de
or http://bronger-jmp.appspot.com

[shacker]

Post by Torsten Bronger
First you need a functional specification for your project,
i.e. "must have"'s and "nice to have"'s.  Size and agility of the
community as well as documentation are important, too.  Then you can
filter a little bit.  But most established frameworks/CMSes will
still fit the bill.

It depends what your "zoom level" is. For example, the org's questions
may be questions like:

- In which system can we get our site up the fastest?
- Which system will be the most flexible if we need to go in new
directions?
- In which system will it be easiest to find qualified developers?
- In which system can I mix and match data models to our heart's
content?
- Which system has the most mature 3rd-party plugins/modules/apps?
- Which system's templates are easiest to work with?
- Which system will make it easiest to convert our existing data into?
- How easy is it to create custom workflows?

These are real-world questions that apply equally to frameworks and
CMSs.

Post by Torsten Bronger
The primary filter must be the language anyway.  The people who are

The counter-argument is that languages are similar enough that
experienced / good developers can get up to speed pretty quickly even
if you change languages. In other words I'd rather work with an
experienced/good developer even if it means they have to learn a new
language than to work with a less-experienced developer for whom
learning a new language is a deal-breaker.

My .02

./s

[Kenneth Gonsalves]

Post by shacker
It depends what your "zoom level" is. For example, the org's questions

if it is drupal/joomla vs plone

Post by shacker
- In which system can we get our site up the fastest?

plone

Post by shacker
- Which system will be the most flexible if we need to go in new
directions?

plone

Post by shacker
- In which system will it be easiest to find qualified developers?

drupal/joomla (depending on the definition of qualified)

Post by shacker
- In which system can I mix and match data models to our heart's
content?

plone

Post by shacker
- Which system has the most mature 3rd-party plugins/modules/apps?

plone

Post by shacker
- Which system's templates are easiest to work with?

drupal/joomla

Post by shacker
- Which system will make it easiest to convert our existing data into?

depends on your existing data - if it is in a RDBMS then drupal/joomla -
otherwise a toss-up (one can use an RDBMS with plone)

Post by shacker
- How easy is it to create custom workflows?

plone has several out of the box

and one question you forgot

which system has regular security patches (at least twice a month)?

drupal/joomla - since security patches are rare to non-existent in plone,
suits may not feel comfortable with it.
--
Regards
Kenneth Gonsalves
Senior Associate
NRC-FOSS at AU-KBC

[Torsten Bronger]

Hallöchen!

Post by shacker

Post by Torsten Bronger
First you need a functional specification for your project,
i.e. "must have"'s and "nice to have"'s.  Size and agility of the
community as well as documentation are important, too.  Then you
can filter a little bit.  But most established frameworks/CMSes
will still fit the bill.

It depends what your "zoom level" is. For example, the org's
- In which system can we get our site up the fastest?
- Which system will be the most flexible if we need to go in new
directions?
- In which system will it be easiest to find qualified developers?
- In which system can I mix and match data models to our heart's
content?
- Which system has the most mature 3rd-party plugins/modules/apps?
- Which system's templates are easiest to work with?
- Which system will make it easiest to convert our existing data into?
- How easy is it to create custom workflows?
These are real-world questions that apply equally to frameworks
and CMSs.

Absolutely, yes. But nobody will be able to give you answers to
these, even if they claim they are. Take the template system (TS)
as an example: Fans of TS 1 will say that TS 2 is over-complicated
and hard to maintain. But fans of TS 2 will code faster in it than
in TS 1. We are talking about mature systems only, so you can code
efficiently in any of them if you abandon prejudices and fears of
contacts.

Post by shacker

Post by Torsten Bronger
The primary filter must be the language anyway.  The people who are

The counter-argument is that languages are similar enough that
experienced / good developers can get up to speed pretty quickly
even if you change languages. In other words I'd rather work with
an experienced/good developer even if it means they have to learn
a new language than to work with a less-experienced developer for
whom learning a new language is a deal-breaker.

In my experience it takes a long time before you master a language
so that you can write maintainable code in it. It's a lot more than
just writing working code. You must know the idioms and anti-idioms
that the language's community has acquired over the years. And you
must know the libraries, which are huge for today's languages.

I'd never choose Scala for example, because you don't get developers
with Scala experience. It may be a great language, but I'd prefer
Python/Java/C#/Ruby/PHP and pick from a lot of applicants with
experience in them. (Even Python was not so simple in our case, by
the way.)

Tschö,
Torsten.
--
Torsten Bronger, aquisgrana, europa vetus
Jabber ID: ***@jabber.rwth-aachen.de
or http://bronger-jmp.appspot.com

[Hooshyar]

Thank you all for your thoughts. I liked the link to article that
compares Drupal with Django. I wish there was a Joomla vs. Drupal
compariosn too.

A little background. I am a Django developer for almost 4 years.
Recently I submitted a proposal to undertake the web operation of a
community run orgnization. One vendor proposed Joomla and I have
proposed Django. Never mind, he says Joomla is a framework. That is
OK. What primarily differentiates the two proposals is that mine wants
to develop all modules in Django (and use available Django-based
softwate). While the other one wants to use Joomla as the base and and
claims it will write code to modify Joomla or develop new modules from
scratch. My proposal saves more money.

I personally think developers are used to a modern programming
language. It is about preference.

Hoosh

[VWAllen]

Post by Hooshyar
A little background. I am a Django developer for almost 4 years.
Recently I submitted a proposal to undertake the web operation of a
community run orgnization. One vendor proposed Joomla and I have
proposed Django. Never mind, he says Joomla is a framework. That is
OK. What primarily differentiates the two proposals is that mine wants
to develop all modules in Django (and use available Django-based
softwate). While the other one wants to use Joomla as the base and and
claims it will write code to modify Joomla or develop new modules from
scratch. My proposal saves more money.

Thanks for this additional background. There's a difference between a
team evaluating where to invest their time when deciding new
technologies to support as part of their service and a client making a
choice between vendors that are using different technologies to
produce a project.

You are essentially looking for a way to favorably compare your
proposal to the proposal of the other vendor, correct? In that case, I
think the Django/Drupal article would be sufficient because it tackles
the core "platform" vs "cms" issue.

Post by Hooshyar
I personally think developers are used to a modern programming language.
It is about preference.

This is meaningless to most clients, because that speaks to your
business not theirs.

You need to answer questions like:
- Will your platform be flexible enough to support changing
requirements?
- Will the client be able to find maintainers if you get hit by a bus
or are too busy to work on the site?
- If the site is redesigned in 2-3 years, how difficult will it be to
migrate the current content?
- How easy will the site be to use for the content editors?
- If 3rd party functionality is buggy or ceases to be maintained, how
difficult will it be to fix/maintain internally?
- Will the site be as easy to maintain, improve 2 years from now as it
is now?
- When a new version of your platform is released, how easy will the
upgrade process be?

These questions directly effect the viability of your proposal to your
client in the long run. I think platforms in general come out better
than CMSs in these areas (and Django in particular).

Here is a general critique of CMS systems in general compared to
frameworks: http://sunlightlabs.com/blog/2009/content-management-systems-just-dont-work/

V

[Hooshyar]

Many thanks to V and others who have contributed to this topic.

More info. I guess I am coming up to speed now. The decision makers
are not managers, but a private organization who members will read
both proposals and ask questions from both vendors. At then end they
vote democratically. One member, one vote. For the most part the
members are not computer experts. They care about ease of use as they
would be operating the final programs/modules -- be it updating the
content of the public side of the web site or in the back-office
applications. For this reason I have suspected that a simple user
interface will do the job, and therefore, I am better off just develop
the programs as opposed to adopting one CMS and be restricted to that
interface. I have a team of Django developers. I cannot say we are the
best, but we are very comfortable and rapid developers in the Django
environment.

Good questions, V. Thanks
.

Post by VWAllen
- Will your platform be flexible enough to support changing
requirements?
- Will the client be able to find maintainers if you get hit by a bus
or are too busy to work on the site?
- If the site is redesigned in 2-3 years, how difficult will it be to
migrate the current content?
- How easy will the site be to use for the content editors?
- If 3rd party functionality is buggy or ceases to be maintained, how
difficult will it be to fix/maintain internally?
- Will the site be as easy to maintain, improve 2 years from now as it
is now?
- When a new version of your platform is released, how easy will the
upgrade process be?
These questions directly effect the viability of your proposal to your
client in the long run. I think platforms in general come out better
than CMSs in these areas (and Django in particular).
Here is a general critique of CMS systems in general compared to
frameworks:http://sunlightlabs.com/blog/2009/content-management-systems-just-don...

Great article. I learned few things. Specially this one: "... but the
software crosses the line into content management systems when it
starts providing default user-experiences out of the box. This means
you have to un-do the way default behavior works and apply what you
want as desired behavior rather than writing behavior from scratch."

Very interesting. He explained this one in such a way even a 4-year-
old could understand.

Regards,
Hooshyar

[Federico Capoano]

Bytheway Joomla is also a framework.. is a Content Management
Framework. I've been using it for years but I have to say that from a
performance point of view is CRAP.

I also think that the scopes of Django and Joomla are very different.
Django will never have the large adoption that Joomla has, because
Joomla is focused on the community and has a so called community
driven development (hilarious from my point of view).
Django has a development that is driven by a community of smart
developers, while Joomla has a development that is driven by a
community in which the majority are not-so-good self-proclaimed web
masters that do absurd feature requests.

Joomla is for the mass, Django is for the nieche.. and personally I'm
happy with it.

Post by Hooshyar
Many thanks to V and others who have contributed to this topic.
More info. I guess I am coming up to speed now. The decision makers
are not managers, but a private organization who members will read
both proposals and ask questions from both vendors. At then end they
vote democratically. One member, one vote. For the most part the
members are not computer experts. They care about ease of use as they
would be operating the final programs/modules -- be it updating the
content of the public side of the web site or in the back-office
applications. For this reason I have suspected that a simple user
interface will do the job, and therefore, I am better off just develop
the programs as opposed to adopting one CMS and be restricted to that
interface. I have a team of Django developers. I cannot say we are the
best, but we are very comfortable and rapid developers in the Django
environment.
Good questions, V. Thanks
.

Post by VWAllen
- Will your platform be flexible enough to support changing
requirements?
- Will the client be able to find maintainers if you get hit by a bus
or are too busy to work on the site?
- If the site is redesigned in 2-3 years, how difficult will it be to
migrate the current content?
- How easy will the site be to use for the content editors?
- If 3rd party functionality is buggy or ceases to be maintained, how
difficult will it be to fix/maintain internally?
- Will the site be as easy to maintain, improve 2 years from now as it
is now?
- When a new version of your platform is released, how easy will the
upgrade process be?
These questions directly effect the viability of your proposal to your
client in the long run. I think platforms in general come out better
than CMSs in these areas (and Django in particular).
Here is a general critique of CMS systems in general compared to
frameworks:http://sunlightlabs.com/blog/2009/content-management-systems-just-don...

Great article. I learned few things. Specially this one: "... but the
software crosses the line into content management systems when it
starts providing default user-experiences out of the box. This means
you have to un-do the way default behavior works and apply what you
want as desired behavior rather than writing behavior from scratch."
Very interesting. He explained this one in such a way even a 4-year-
old could understand.
Regards,
Hooshyar

[Kenneth Gonsalves]

Post by shacker
These comparisons are not only possible, they're essential for a boss
or a company trying to decide on their next platform. Only us geeks
say things like "They can't be compared." Of course they can.

in which case compare drupal/joomla with plone. Plone will win hands down.
--
Regards
Kenneth Gonsalves
Senior Associate
NRC-FOSS at AU-KBC