CMS or code ?

Which is better ? Which do you prefer ? A CMS or building your site from scratch ? What are the advantages and disadvantages ?

 

I build a CMS myself from scratch - it takes a bit longer but it means it has the exact features needed.

 

all my sites (cept proxies) are custom coded
not being funny or elitist or anything
but other peoples code is so hard to work with, it's always messy and bloated
I find it hard to work with a lot of peoples code, I established this when I used to do some freelancing a few years back
they either don't comment it well / at all, it's got lots of shit in it that can be done a simpler way and reduce overhead, it has 40k lines of pure bullshit or it's all done in one complete class

 

i'd definitely say custom coded.. i'm no CMS hater as I've built tons of sites using different CMS systems such as Joomla, Drupal, ezPublish and even WordPress...

using a CMS can give you a quick start but at times when it comes to customizing the code you can come across a real pain in the neck there.

as for custom coding i really wouldn't start from scratch.. i'd use a MVC frame work such as cakePHP

 

Custom Coded if you know how.

 

The first thing you should do is that you make a plan first and think for what you will use your site, what can you integrate in the next future, the possibilities of a CMS or a self made site from scratch..
That depends for your experience too...if you are a good coder that you then probably know to do CMS or a self made site with java or anything else...so depends of your experience and budget.
I think a good way to start is a CMS site already made and think what you can implement in the next future, think before doing that from all the angles.

 

Heh, looks like it took me a day or so, but I finally decided to go for code with my website ^_^ I know a CMS means easy work but it can only take so far... I need to know I can do anything with a web page. Thanks all for your advice.

 

It depends on the amounts of traffic that you expect to get and the hardware that you are going to throw at it to support it. If it is a low traffic site then a CMS should be fine. If your expecting millions of uniques then you will either have to throw money at a custom coded solution or money at hardware. Its your choice. I would go for pre-built to reduce start up costs and then go for a rewrite if it takes off. The problem with Content Management Systems is that they are not always designed to do exactly what you need them to do or optimized for performance, this is where a custom solution will shine.