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Eric, What's great about some of these systems is that there are modules written to do exactly what you are talking about. For example there is a Drupal module that will allow to export your Wordpress site and import it into Drupal. Most of the PHP/MySQL CMSs I've played with have an underlying framework that makes this much easier than messing with the database tables natively. Also, many of these systems are looking to expose their data in structured ways which can be accessed by other systems. So web services are becoming a big part of these systems. I believe that Silverstripe has web services natively and there are several web sevice modules for Drupal. In terms of vendor lock in, I just don't see it that way. Because Wordpress and Drupal are open source, support can be provided from a variety of vendors. Many Drupal "vendors" contribute modules and other code. Because of this variety you aren't reliant on a single provider to chose to continue to support a particular product. If an open source CMS does go away then many, many community members will be doing migration and it is VERY likily that migraiton scripts/modules will get written and shared with the community. Certainly I saw this when huge numbers of blogs migrated from Movable Type to Wordpress. Hope this helps. Karen On Mon, Jan 4, 2010 at 10:17 AM, Eric Lease Morgan < [log in to unmask]> wrote: > On Jan 4, 2010, at 10:54 AM, Alejandro Garza Gonzalez wrote: > > > I second John Fereira's comment re: putting this information into a CMS > =) For instance it'd be awesome to browse by language... > > > For the past week or so I have been trying to evaluate content management > systems (CMS). Boy, there are bunches of them out there! Lot's of choice. > The market is so much more mature in this area compared to librayr-specific > open source applications. (Ironically, MyLibrary is/was sort of like a CMS > in that it was intended to create certain types of Web pages based on the > content of a database. No HTML knowledge required.) > > But the real question I want to ask is, "To what degree do existing CMS > applications force a sort of vendor lock-in?" The vast majority of the > applications I've looked, briefly, are PHP/MySQL combinations. This means > some relational database is created, complete with application-specific > tables, records, and fields. The PHP code then does I/O against the database > to create and maintain website content. Cool. > > Suppose I invested my time and energy into one of these systems? For a long > time it does what it is expected to do. Suppose then it breaks, becomes no > longer supported, or a newer/cooler application comes along. How am I > expected to get my content out of the first CMS and into second application? > At least in Library Land we have MARC records (ick) to allow for some sort > of migration path. I'm a bit hesitant when it comes to CMS application. > Should I rely on the community at this point to come up with a solution? > > Yea, I can read the underlying database, create a cross-walk, do some > magic, port from one system to anther, and hope to retain the better part of > my functionality, but some things always get lost in translation. > > To what degree should website administrators be concerned with such things? > Back-end content creators might simply see the easy-of-use of creating > content. Geeky people, like me, might see a severe problem for the future. > > Y'alls input would be greatly appreciated. > > -- > Eric Lease Morgan >