Which Web Content Management System? Why I Chose CushyCMS

This article has been written for web designers, specifically those that have created static (flat) HTML websites for other people and now want to give those people the ability to maintain the content themselves.

Customers generally don't want to rely on (or pay) a web designer to make small wording changes to their site. Equally, web designers would generally rather be designing the next site than get bogged down in text amends.

I found myself in this same situation recently, and so began my search for a free flat file content management system. My criteria were simple, it had to be:

• quick to implement,
  
• easy to use (for both me and my customers), and ideally
  
• free!

After much research I decided to use CushyCMS...

CushyCMS met all of the criteria, and then some! The do have a Pro Plan, but effectively all you are paying for is the ability to brand the CMS (with your own colours, logo and domain). If you don't want to hide the fact you're using CushyCMS from your customers - free will do you just fine.

I highly recommend taking a moment (3 minutes actually) to view the intro video on their home page. If you're more of a 'reader' than a 'watcher', then the way CushyCMS works is as follows:

• Set up an administrator account
  
  From here you can add any number of websites and web pages (see next point). In order to do this, you must enter FTP details into CushyCMS. You can also add users and give them permissions to any number of web pages.
  
  
• Tell CushyCMS which page elements can be edited by the users
  
  This is done by adding class="cushycms" to various entities (e.g. the P tag). If you want to make a number of elements available, you can enclose them in DIV tags (with the CushyCMS class). See their designer documentation for more details.
  
  
• Update web pages using their online WYSIWYG* editor
  
  That's it! You (and any users you've added) can use their editor to update content. This includes titles (H1, H2, etc), text and styles (bold, italic), images, links (including properties such as target frame), and much, much more.
  
  
• Publish updated pages at the click of a button
  
  A nice touch is that CushyCMS keeps a revision history for administrators making it easy to roll-back if necessary.
  

The only thing that I've really found lacking is any documentation for users (rather than administrators). It is so easy to log in and use the online editor, that arguably the documentation isn't necessary. However, if as a web designer, you're looking to hand over the management of these minor updates to your clients, the more they're able to help themselves, the better.

The good news is that I plan to address this with a series of short videos on the most common functions. I'll make them publicly available for your use too. Sign up for free updates (at the top right of this page) to make sure you don't miss them.

* In case you were wondering, WYSIWYG stands for What You See Is What You Get (i.e. it looks the same in the editor as it will when published on the live website - almost!).

UPDATE...

Since writing this post a few hours ago and tweeting about it, I gained a new follower called SurrealCMS. I had a quick look at their site and they offer something very similar to CushyCMS. In fact, at first glance it actually seems a little more comprehensive as you can use CSS within it to make the WYSISYG editor better reflect the design of the site. Users can also submit support requests to the administrator. It is also possible for users to manage page titles, descriptions, etc. Note that their free version is limited to just 3 sites whereas I believe CushyCMS is unlimited (stating on their site "unlimited free use").