Ultra lite CMS market analysis

A lot has changed since I first built Flyspeck in 2004. We have seen the rise of site frameworks like Joomla, Drupal, and Wordpress, which have gotten simpler, easier and more powerful than ever. There is no one fits all solution to any problem, you need the right tool for the job at hand.

I do dozens of sites for clients. And of course, if I hear that they need user self registration, forums or sections of content, I look to Joomla. But Joomla sites inevitably look the same, and template design customizations can be a rough learning curve. It also should be known that, training folks on Joomla is not exactly automatic. Once they get over it, Joomla is a tremendously powerful system. But many of my sites are prototypes or ideas that don't have any legs yet. Do I want to spend a lot of time?

There are other ultra lite CMS products around right now, going after the same idea that I had when I built Flyspeck. But inevitably, they try to do too much, getting into templates, or content structure. These products just feel like they are trying to hit the wrong chord. You are either doing a simple file based site, which really shouldn't be more than a couple dozen pages, or you need a CMS like Wordpress.
A perfect example of this was the other day, a client had an idea for a site. I found a nice html based template, customized the header, and roughed out a navigation. Within ten minutes, I had uploaded flyspeck, edited the config, and popped in some edit tags on the homepage. Even the most non technical person could hit the trigger, and update the text. If I had to train her on Joomla, and deal with databases and themes, it would have been a bust.
Another client had a simple (and hey pretty ugly) site that no one knew how to update. No one wanted to rebuild it, so I uploaded and configged Flyspeck in minutes. On to the next issue! The right tool for the job.

I have other clients that use Flyspeck happily, every day, and they don't need more. I don't have to deal with daily upgrades to Wordpress or Joomla bombarding them. Possibly someday I will rebuild the site in Wordpress, or maybe not. It DID allow me to get a client up and working, and see if the idea has legs. IMHO, Flyspeck is the "other" tool in my arsenal that I use. If it requires any more than basic page editing, it is a bigger project. Flyspeck gives me the user account and page permission control that I want.

Now what about Open Source? Another cool thing about Flyspeck is that there aren't dozens of people in the mix. It doesn't get upgraded every other minute, because the players in an open source project always want to redo everything. They have things they want to accomplish. Although this can be great, again - do I want to be on that train? I don't want to be tied into a monthly cost or external ASP either. I just want to FTP 1 meg and move.

I welcome any other ideas or opinions on this analysis, please click the Contact link above.