gregprogramming

Many people, myself included, are using WordPress for business by turning it into an easy to use CMS. Iv’e done a number of sites in WordPress and clients generally like it and it saves me time since the majority of my coding really just comes down to me creating a few WordPress pages and the styling the site.

The Problem/Task

A couple of weeks ago a previous client asked about ways they could update their site which was an old SHTML site.  We thought about using WordPress again for the same reasons we always do; however ever this site was fairly large and page heavy.  The goal wasn’t to trim down the site (unfortunately) but to make it editable without needing HTML experience.  The client wanted each area to have it’s own administrator to control over what is posted, event management, etc all your typical stuff.  A couple of coworkers of mine gave it a shot but what resulted was a website that was confusing hodge podge of pages and posts in categories that they weren’t organized in any simple fashion.  Add to that the admin area was a beast on it’s own trying to use rolescoper for permissions and it still just wasn’t working.

The Solution

The project was put on hold for weeks and then somehow made it’s way to me; I think I had some downtime so I was fair game.  I could remember how the last attempt just didn’t fly but figured that there still had to be a way to do it.  That’s when I remember about WordPress MU.  So I started building out the site by making major each section a new blog and then built each one separately.  I can’t remember what theme I used since I only used it because it supported child themes.  I ended up stripping it down to the barebones and using it on each blog.

Final Thoughts for WordPress MU as a CMS

I use it for development since I can create my development/test sites and manage them all from one area with one login and database.  And I’ve been thinking lately that it might be a good idea for creating a store section of the site (ie site.domain.tld).  It definitely has it’s uses though you at the same time it can be overkill if your just doing a simple blog or pamphlet/brochure website.

The Good Parts

• Each Blog/Section could have it’s own administration
• Plugins could be controlled better from the Site Administrator account
• Users Could have access to only certain sections of the site admin
• Advertising could be better targeted (though there advertising was lacking it had more potential)

The Bad Parts

• Not every Plugin worked in WordPress MU
• Some Plugins were ok to work separately on one site and not others but the rest were now harder to manage
• limited MU specific plugins available

I guess I could have gone over security and updates but I figure that that is too much for this post so sorry if that is what you were looking for.