Help choosing CMS... Vivvo or Subdreamer?

I have been doing a lot of research and have come up with two viable CMS options. Before I get to the options, let me tell you what I've tried and used.

• Miraserver. I have used this in the past, and really liked it, but it seems mostly dead now, so I am sorry to have to give up on it.
• Joomla! Again, I have tried to use it, but I just don't like it. Too jumbled, and way to complex for what I want. Also, I had to hack it to death to get a decent looking News site. And I bought the iJoomla News add-on. Still never went live with the site, as it is just too clunky for real life.
• vbDrupal. Sorry, I know some love it, but I hated drupal. Way too mush work to make it not look like a blog.
• vBAdvanced CMPS. Just not a professional News site, no matter what I do, it still looks too much like vB.
• vBFNews. (Formally made by Mary vBNews) Nice app, really nice. I think this is almost there, and for a new site, would be fine for a little while. But it is missing some standard logic, that just makes it a little less than professional.
• PHP Cow. I think I like the look of the script and the admin side of things, but the sites all seem the sam, and I have read a lot of questionable reports on the ownership of that script, so it is out.

So now I am looking at two paid scripts, SubDreamer ($99) and Vivvo ($199).

I have got to say, I am leaning heavily towards Vivvo. It seems to have all I want right out of the box, and I like the way the Admin side is set up, very easy to use. It also handles the front page display of news and articles exactly how I like. I have set up the 21 day demo, it is very cool. Templates are easy to work with, and the community is decent.

SubDreamer, however, seems to have a more robust hacking community, and seems to have more users. But without demo software that I can load on my server and play with, I can't be sure about the usability of it. Also the themes seem much more difficult to work with.

So, has anyone used these scripts? What did you think?

I didn't mention it, but my site is a news site, so I want to be able to emulate a top news organisation: Top Stories, Breaking News, Articles, Editorials, various other news categories. Both of these scripts can handle my needs as far as I can see. Your feedback is greatly appreciated.

here is an example of my Joomla! site: www.champcarfanatics.com/frontpage/

here is Vivvo: www.champcarfanatics.com/vivvo/

 

Well personally I do not have experience with either as Im on the hunt for a CMS as well. I like some styling cues from both, but the Vivvo site looks more professional in my opinion. But I'll be keeping an eye on this thread and see what others have to say.

 

just chek out about mailing list integration. In vivoo lot of stuff which seems simple and should be in box comes in paid category. Check their plugins.

also check expression engine

 

I should add, that it needs to be compatible with vBulletin.

Thanks for the recommendation of Expression Engine, I'll look at that.

 

Have you tried WordPress? It's really nice.

 

Good post Clark ! I am also looking for similar options.

Just go thru below topic once. I had listed out some possible CMS+vB options...
http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showthread.php?t=633079

 

I have read too many negative comments about SubDreamer. And mostly it seems to suit only personal / medium sized websites that don't plan to extend toomuch in future. Also I am not convinced about look & feel of SubDreamer templates. They look far less than professional.

VIVVO seems to be little better option at the moment. However I am not fully convinced yet that it's the best option. The decent templates cost you some additional money. And there does not seem to be too active community using Vivvo (may be because of it's high cost). Also need to get full confidence in their customer support (hasn't tried yet).

ExpressionEngine seems to be the best paid solution. However the only thing that's stopping me from using it is that there is no integration with 3 rd party bulletin boards (like vBulletin). You have to use ExpressionEngine's forum, that is, I can say somewhat limited in functionalities (When compared to vBulletin / IPB). You may surely consider ExpressionEngine if you don't need vBulletin integration.

 

Suri.CMS, your original thread is what I found in a Google search that lead me here!!! Great thread! That's how I found Vivvo.

I think I am going to give Joomla one more try before I spend the big bucks. I renewed my rockettheme membership and will try one of their themes, they have a cool new one from this month for news sites... I fi dont like this I will go with Vivvo, I think...

 

Rockettheme templates are decent. I think worth trying. However just be aware that there 'may be' some performance problems for high traffic Joomla sites. So try to confirm with experts before implementing your full news site project in Joomla. (When your site is new, any CMS suits well. But the performance problems surround you when your site visitors increase in future.)

Did you find any good Joomla + vBulletin bridge ? What you are planning to do for that ?

And what are your findings on VIVVO ? Any negative points ?

 

i think Vivo does not create wordpress like SEO url and then mailing list is an issue.

As far as i think, wordpress has best SEO capabilities

 

They say that it creates SEO URLs. And there is a mailing list component. Don't know how good it is.

 

you've read correctly. I've used it for years and they do absolutely nothing to upgrade the software, it's still stuck in the early 2000's, framework-wise.

 

Hi Clark,
Any update on what you chose finally ?

 

I'm still looking... Still hate Joomla! The rockettheme templates look great, but ultimately don't save the CMS from itself.

Still kinda like Vivvo, may just have to cough up the bucks.

I may also give up on the vB integration and try ExpressionEngine...

 

Ok fine, Let me know if you reach a conclusion

vbAdvanced seems to be decent option (if you want integration with vBulletin) to make a portal home page even though it's not a CMS.

Just in case, be aware that Vivvo hasn't integrated with vBulletin 3.7 yet. You need to use vBulletin 3.6.8 if you go this Vivvo route. And there seems to be (not sure) few bugs in the integration with vBulletin. So read their support forum completely before taking decision on this. Otherwise, Vivvo seems to be okay in terms of features.

If you give up vBulletin integration, ExpressionEngine seems to be a decent solution.
You may also try WordPress + vBulletin combination (without integration) that I am trying now.

 

Read my article at http://cmstester.com/news/26/57/How-to-choose-a-CMS
or you can examine my site.

I list all free CMS platforms (as well as blog and wiki) and review, provide news and right relevant articles to help people like you make the right choice. I also will be interviewing some of the major players in the CMS market shortly.

Regards,
Mike
http://www.cmstester.com

 

This can be easily solved by using aMember Pro.
For years, I've been trying to find the bridge between these two software products.
Now that I've found this solution, I can't fork out enough budget to get it yet.
Perhaps, after my next pay, I'll give it a whirl.

 

I have tried both Vivvo and Subdreamer among over other 50 CMS.
Both are fine, it all depends what you do.
My prioties are

• Security issues
• Easy admin for the non-tech administrator
• Easy template design
• Plugins available
• Templates available (unless you can design your own)
• Flexibility
• Community support

Vivvo is fine, but there are no many plugins available. Of course the available ones are enough for most of the sites. What could be included is the expiry date of the news/articles. Also if you wish to have different layout from page to page (eg Poll / Vote left positioned in the first page and right bottom positioned or not even displayed in the other pages) you will have to create another template, because you must hardcode a php call specifically to a poll-function in your template. I believe this is a down point. CMS Made Simple works pretty much the same and actually lot of cms do the same.
In Vivvo you have an extensive set of sub-tempalets for each template that are stored in different folders, for example, homepage, articles etc, plus templates for headers, footers, boxes etc. This gives you the ability to create professional templates but it is a headace.

Subdreamer works the other way round. You create a template (for which you may have similar designs) and in the HTML source you include a php function to call the main menu (pages), plus 1 or 2 or 3 or any number of php chunks for the plugins. If for example you have a design with 3 columns and for each column you want up to 10 plugins, you include a php for each column that loops 10 times to retieve each plugin. Articles are also plugins, so you can imagine the flexibility. Then in the admin panel for each page you define (by just selecting from a drop down list) which plugin goes where. For example for the home page, latest news plugin in position 1, vote plugin in position 2, etc.
And of course for each page you can select a design from a drop down thumbnail list. It is a really smart way to generate a page and you are never lost in a complicated design and project.
A very useful feature is that plugins can be cloned. So you end up with plugins having the same funcionality but different attributes / characteristics.
In other words you can make complex things in a simple way. Plugins is not an issue, there must be 100s available (from real estate to quick time and windows player), both free and paid.
Almost 2 years ago I started developing a cms for my needs, to work exactly as Subdreamer does. Maybe that's the reason I like subdreamer.
The only thing makes me hessitant, is that Subdreamer should be a high flyer by now in terms of new releases, new development, popularity etc.

Joomla is beautiful, but it can be complicated for the average user (administrator). My opinion is that it should be used for projects really need it.

Security is always the main issue, but I don't have feedback for any of them.

 

If I were you, I don't pay since there is free & dependable options.

 

Many thanks, alexmal, for the insight into Vivvo and SubDreamer.
If you also used ExpressionEngine, could you let us know what you think of it, please?
Perhaps, a new thread about EE might be appropriate, if it's not too much trouble for you, of course.