For the past two days I have been playing with EE. I am new to EE and come from a background of open source software, think of a big name and more than likely I’ve worked on it.
I have finally got my head around the groups, what determines a URL, and how things are setup in the backend. However this took me two days and I am no newbie, so it really makes me wonder how hard it is going to be for new people who don’t know anything or are new to computers and their interfaces. What are your experiences or thoughts?
Another thing is that although EE has great functionality and control there is no centralized management center. For example, if I want to create a new weblog. I have to jump around quite abit. If I didn’t know where to go next it would be hard to do something. Thankfully there was video tutorials! Still usability is the process of not making someone think, and in EE you have to think pretty hard!
I did manage to integrate coolcommerce + EE + Foxycart though. Benefit is that EE has tight security, and even though it has two other addons I am confident enough in its ability to now handle e-commerce securely. And I was able to integrate Google tools much easier than other CMSs.
Overall these are my thoughts:
For someone who has skill such as a designer or a developer, EE is the clear choice.
For someone new, EE needs to be alot easier.
Fortunately EE2.0 is on the way and from the previews it is going to be quite easy to use. Also was it just coincidence or luck that the new version of EE was 2.0, inline with other web 2.0 type things? Either way that is a good omen/sign that EE2.0 is on track for success.