Hello,

My site, iDevGames goes back to 1998 (ancient in the world of the web :p )
I started with a static site in 1998, then moved to an in-house CMS (back when they weren’t called CMSs)
I then switched to Mambo back in its very early days.

For about one year, I did some heavy testing and & researching of various CMS systems—from open source to commercial stuff.
My short list came down to:
* Matrix (MySource)
* Xaraya
* Civil (spell?) offshoot of Drupal
* EE

One of the most important functions for me was the custom field ability. I was also looking for a system that produced good output. I went with EE for those two reasons, and also through a srong recommendation from a staff member of MacTeens.com.

So far, my staff and I are happy with EE. I do need to spend more time in learning the templating system though. From a business standpoint, I think pMachine should release a “free” version of EE with the following restrictions:
1) The code is encoded (so no peeping eyes)
2) Limited to the # of staff and categories that can be made

I like to see MORE users on any software that I migrate to—it helps to have a bigger community and keeps the vendor in business. Anyways, thatt’s my two cents on the biz side.

I’m not sure if there are “template” competitions in this community, but I hope that there will be, since many newcomers base their initial selection off of the default templates they see.

I’m now pondering if EE should be used for my other ventures (sites). With a limited budget, deploying several EE sites might be out of my reach though. :(

Well, I hope anyone is is interested in making games, or develops on the Mac will visit idevgames.com

Hi, I’m curious about the various native Mac OS X apps (Java is OK) that allow for blogging (adding content) to my site, so my staff doesn’t have to login to the EE backend. Any recommendations?

Thanks,

Carlos Camacho
Editor-in-Chief
iDevGames.com

What about emailing posts to EE? Not sure if that exists, but might be a good plugin candidate. I know moblogging exists, so that’s basically email right?

I agree with your comments about the communtiy and the price of EE. I always wished they made a couple of tweaks to pMachine Pro before so more people would use it. I feel they kept features out of it to drive current users to purchase EE. But now I feel they might be pushing potential customers away by having a blog system that’s now too limited and a cms that’s too cost-prohibitive. I fear for sustained growth of the community with this model.

I too have looked at many many cms’s, and continue to but EE has such a great tag system and custom forms are just essential, I end up looking for this in other systems. The depth of categories and subcats are fantastic too. I could go on, but the price is prohibitive. I work with non-profits and while EE would be PERFECT for them, they just can’t afford it. So I’m stuck hacking WordPress to do what I could get out of the box with EE. *sigh*

Site is looking great, best of luck. Templates are super fun and easy once you get it down.

The moblog takes emails and processes them to either the gallery or the moblog - so yes, that is exactly what it does, fifteen.

I’m now pondering if EE should be used for my other ventures (sites). With a limited budget, deploying several EE sites might be out of my reach though. :(

You can actually use EE to run multiple sites (depending on your hosting provider.)  The code limitation of this is that you cannot install more than one forum.  I use this feature to run like 5 different domains that do nothing but collect dust.  =)

I think pMachine should release a “free” version of EE

I generally disagree.  I honestly think the reason EE is so much better than the open source systems is that EE is developed and supported by paid developers.  I believe this because I have taken the same journey (as has many in this community.)  After trying many systems and wasting many hours banging my head against the wall I found EE to be a great value.  On the other hand, if there were a free version of EE (like MoveableType) then EE would probably get much more exposure, though I would hate to see EE go to the MoveableType pricing structure.  In all, EE has a great price considering everything you can do with it.

I’m not sure if there are “template” competitions in this community, but I hope that there will be, since many newcomers base their initial selection off of the default templates they see.

There was a template competition in which many of the current templates were made available.  I agree that the selection of templates leaves something to be desired, but really I think many members have little need for templates.  Certainly most if not all of the corporate users will have no use for the templates… same for designers, same for anyone that wants a unique looking website.

Nice site by the way… and welcome to EE.

>You can actually use EE to run multiple sites (depending on your hosting provider.) The code limitation of this is that you cannot install more than one
I run my own dedicated server. Are you saying I can have it running www.site1.com and www.site2.com? Sounds like a bit of a mess in the database, admin of EE though to go that route.

>MoveableType pricing structure.  In all, EE has a great price considering everything you can do with it.
I didn’t mean to imply that current pricing and product licensing terms were bad. They are fine. What I said was the a low-end version which is limited should be added to the product mix. At some point, the users of said entry level product will want to move to the commercial versions. In retail terms, such a product is referred to as a “lost leader.”

>same for designers, same for anyone that wants a unique looking website.
Yep. Though it is always nice to have a nice looking selection of templates to use as you learn the system and get to the point where you are ready to rollout your own template.

Cheers,

Carlos
Editor
iDevGames

I run my own dedicated server. Are you saying I can have it running www.site1.com and www.site2.com? Sounds like a bit of a mess in the database, admin of EE though to go that route.

Yes, that is the same thing I do.  Not sure why it would be a mess of the database… EE is beautifully designed.  I guess the best way to check out this feature is to give it a try.  Check out the link…

http://expressionengine.com/docs/install_subdomains.html