Cms to plugin to a multiple controller php site

Question

I have a php site setup with multiple controllers for the different sections of the site.
e.g index.php, gallery.php, faq.php etc.
Currently I have a base template which I call from each controller, which in turn includes the relevant content for the page. I also use tinymce to edit this content file. So it's really a very simple cms.

Edit: To clarify, I have several new features I would like for my cms. e.g Specific section editing, menu editing and a few others.
But I thought instead of continuing development on this and reinventing the wheel, I'd try to find a cms which can plug in to my multi-controller system, instead of forcing me to develop my app in it's framework. I guess I want it to manage just the content, not any other backend stuff of my site.

Hope this is understandable.

Answer 1

I'm not sure if I'm understanding your question correctly. You have a site with a basic CMS using a template system and multiple controllers. You don't want a framework to port your site to, but you instead want a CMS that will "plug in" to your current site? What exactly do you want plugged in to your site? (i.e. What features/functionality are you looking for?)

Edit: I still think you should consider an MVC framework like CakePHP if your goal is to build a more robust CMS without re-inventing the wheel. Building on a well-designed framework would also make extending your site's functionality in the future much easier (as well as make it easier to maintain a complex web application).

The only other option I can think of is to simply replace your existing CMS with a more robust one, like Drupal/Joomla/Wordpress, which you could then extend with modules. But that would probably give you less flexibility, not more.

Answer 2

Le me see if I have this right. You want a CMS. But it has to be one that will conform to your arbitrary way of doing things that you can drop in and have work. You want a CMS that isn't frameworkish at all. A CMS that will only do the frontend, and not the backend.

You don't want a CMS at all. A CMS, by its very nature, does backend work. That's the point of a CMS. What you want is Dreamweaver-esque magic template handling.

Or maybe you should adopt a real CMS or framework, and work from there. It's not really reasonable to expect this sort of magic psychic power from a CMS.

Answer 3

i also recommend Drupal. its very well organized and is easily adjusted to almost any style of website. you can use it as a pure cms or add plugins w additional features as needed .. the core package is fairly small, very easy to set up and play with, and very well supported .. worth looking at

Answer 4

If you wrote a very basic CMS for your own use it seems to me that you should have no problem adopting an existing out of the box solution like Drupal, Joomla, etc. These are full featured CMSs that are ready to go and with some graphics work and a little hacking on your end can look like anything you want.

Your other option is using an existing framework like others have suggested such as CakePHP, CodeIgniter, etc. These are all frameworks which basically give you all the tools you need in order to build a more robust custom CMS than what you have now.

It seems to me that you know at least a little bit about what you're doing. I would suggest you check out the different frameworks that are available and run with that.

CodeIgniter

CakePHP