[Novalug] Best COTS ecommerce/sharepoint-like Linux bundle

[Paul D. Bain]

---- Margret Treiber <margret at live-evil.com> wrote: 
> 
> >
> > YES!  I am still alive and lurking, just sold my soul to a MS shop.  :)
> >
> > Anyway, help me remedy that!  I need recommendations for a good COTS Linux
> > package that would have something Sharepoint like that I can show upper
> > management that we can use.  They would also like a good ecommerce package
> > bundles in that.

Margret,

     I have a few points in reply. First, and mostly obviously, any software package that tries to do too much generally fails to do anything well. For example, a package that tries to provide ecommerce features (or community features) as well as content management (CM) features almost _always_ fails to do either well. That is one reason that no one uses, e.g., PostNuke anymore. PostNuke tried to be a CMS and "community-ware (CW)," software that facilitates the  building of web-based communities. It failed to accomplish either task; it failed as both a CMS and a CW. Second, one of the few Sharepoint experts on this list is Tim Ferro. I know a great about OSS CMS's, but not Sharepoint or other proprietary CMS's, except that which I read about them. Third, selling corporate management on the virtues of OSS seems to be largely a waste of time unless management already has a reasonably good understanding  of the OSS revolution. Fourth, the best, general-purpose OSS CMS's are probably Plone, Alfresco, Typo 3, Drupal, and OpenCMS. Bricolage is still the _best_ and most powerful of the OSS CMS's, but it is _not_ a general-purpose CMS. Fifth, I cannot recommend any of the PHP CMS's (not even Drupal or Typo 3) due to the unending stream of security vulnerabilities (SV's) that spew forth from PHP. It appears that the team that develops PHP simply does not care about SV's. A damned shame. Finally, far and away the most _popular_ OSS CMS is Joomla. I simply cannot believe the amount of "buzz" that Joomla generates. Anyone who tells you that Joomla is a good CMS probably knows little or nothing about OSS CMS's. Joomla is popular for the same reasons that Windows NT was popular years ago: it is easy to use and its proponents are completely ignorant -- its proponents know absolutely nothing about, e.g., information security (just as the MCSE's knew nothing about InfoSec) or CMS's.
 
Sincerely,
Paul Bain