As some of you may know I have recently been designing a website for a client using Joomla’s Content Management Software. The reason I went with this software is because the old webmaster had designed the previous site using Joomla.
Had I known what I know now about Joomla, I would have stuck to WordPress and rebuilt the site from the ground up.
I was forced to rebuild the site anyway because of limitations of the existing site and requirements for the new one. I didn’t mind learning a new CMS. I actually enjoyed it. My only complaint was how Joomla seemed to “over think” simple things like inserting an image or link.
After 20 hours I had completed the site and now all I had to do was implement a new theme and some modules to finalize the project. Unfortunately I had waited until last to do this. This is where I ran into a very disappointing surprise regarding Joomla.
As I searched for themes, (templates) all the ones I came across that looked halfway decent were “Paid” themes that you had to buy ranging from $25 to $300 dollars depending on the site and the subscription. A lot of the modules I was looking at also carried a hefty price tag to use with this “Open Source” software.
I found some themes that seemed decent, but they were for old versions of Joomla and required you to enable a legacy plugin, which tends to break various functional parts of the site in the new versions of Joomla.
After looking around for awhile I decided my best option was to go the Legacy route and cross my fingers that I could find something that would work with the majority of the site I had created.
I decided I would change the images in the theme to give my client’s site a unique look. My eye twitched a little when I saw what a Joomla theme consisted of… 2 PHP files, a CSS file and an images folder.
So this is what people are charging for?
I have seen many AMAZING WordPress themes that blow this theme out of the water, and they are all FREE to use. Look at a theme like the “Options Theme” by Justin Tadlock, which he gives away for FREE and offers personal support and online documentation through his forum. That is what I love about the WordPress community, and unfortunately that is what I expected to find with Joomla. I was sorely mistaken.
Don’t get me wrong. I’m sure Joomla does has a great community overall, but the developers and designers out there that dominate the SERPs and monopolize on this open source software really make me sick.
For any future projects I do for clients, I will be going with WordPress installations hands down. I now understand why people say it’s such a versatile and easy to use CMS.
You can read about another users similar experience in this blog post at Smashing Templates
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