Benefits of Using Joomla

We have been working on Joomla for years, many years now! We have worked on Joomla sites from all calibers and we have dealt with many Joomla administrators. We think that we now have a clear understanding of the advantages of Joomla that made it one of the most popular content management system (CMS) on this planet.

Let us list, in order of no importance, the top 20 benefits of Joomla based on our experience:

1. Fast, safe, and easy editing: Let’s say that you’re not using a CMS and you want to edit one of the pages on your website. What you need to do is to use FTP, download the file, make your changes, and re-upload it. But what happens if the upload was cut-off? And what happens if someone else was trying to make an edit to the same page? And what happens if you’re not a technical person who doesn’t know how to use FTP? And how do you know which file you need to update? All these are legitimate questions which make editing CMSless website a hassle.

   Of course, one can argue that any CMS can address the above issues – but Joomla does everything better, here’s why:

   • A standard CMS does not care about data integrity. Joomla, on the other hand, ensures the integrity (safety) of your data by locking content when someone is editing – which means that no one will be allowed to edit content (article, category, module, menu item, etc…) if that content is currently being edited by someone else.

   • Editing content with a standard CMS is easy, but Joomla makes it even easier, simply because Joomla uses powerful editors that will make the person editing the website feel as if he’s editing a Microsoft Word document, and not content on his website.

   • Finally, editing content in Joomla is a breeze – this is because it is easier (in most of the cases) to locate content in Joomla than in other CMSs and to edit that content.

2. Powerful and easy menu creation tool: Perhaps the number one reason that made Joomla so popular in the CMS world is its easy menu creation tool. All CMS veterans can attest that Joomla has the easiest and most powerful menu creation tool. Their supporting argument is that anyone (even those with no programming experience whatsoever) can easily create hierarchical menus consisting of various menu items pointing to different locations internally (to the website) and externally.

3. Hackable core: By hackable core we mean that Joomla’s core can easily be changed by anyone with PHP experience. This is because Joomla’s core code is clear, well written, and well documented. Hacking Joomla’s core is sometimes necessary to extend or to optimize Joomla, but comes at a potential expense: it many no longer be possible (or it’ll be very difficult) to upgrade Joomla.

4. Open source infrastructure: We remember the days where the term “open source” meant “geeks who do not like to use Microsoft products to develop websites”. Fast forward 10 years from then, and now open source software powers most of the web.

   Joomla is created using PHP and (usually) uses MySQL for data storage. PHP is the most important open source web scripting language at the moment (by the way, Facebook is powered by PHP), and MySQL is the most powerful and most used open source database. This strategic (and old) decision of using PHP and MySQL has made it easier for many developers to support Joomla and to program new Joomla extensions. Additionally, Joomla is typically hosted on a Linux server and is (also typically) served by an Apache web server – this makes Joomla 100% open source, in its code and its infrastructure.

5. Infrastructure versatility: While, in most cases, Joomla is a LAMP web application (LAMP stands for “Linux Apache MySQL PHP” – the 4 cornerstones of open source on the web), Joomla can also run with…

   This makes Joomla a very versatile CMS – that is able to adapt in nearly any environment. Note that we are talking about Joomla’s core, some extensions do not support one or all of the above – and thus need to be modified to run in an environment other than LAMP.

   • MSSQL (Microsoft Sql) or Oracle (yes, Joomla can work on Oracle) as a database
   • LiteSpeed or IIS as a web sever
   • Windows as a server

6. Built-in caching: Joomla’s cache is one of the most important – and yet most dreaded – features of Joomla. It makes any Joomla website much faster (we’re talking about 20 times faster in many of the tests we ran), and it avoids overloading the server that is hosting the Joomla website. On the other hand, caching can be a curse rather than a blessing, if misused or if it conflicts with other extensions. In fact, the first action that we ask our clients to do if they elect to debug their own Joomla website themselves is to disable caching. Nevertheless, caching is must-use feature in Joomla that dramatically increases its performance and its response time.

7. Built-in basic SEO functionality: SEF (Search Engine Friendly) urls are built-in in Joomla. All you need to do is to enable them for them to work on your Joomla website. It is a known fact that SEF links bring huge benefits to your SEO rankings. Additionally, Joomla allows you to explicitly set the meta description and the meta keywords of any page – which also props up your SEO standings. In short, Joomla allows you to do the basic SEO yourself – instead of paying top dollars for a consultant or a 3^rd party company to do it for you.

8. Multilingual support: As of version 1.6, Joomla is natively multilingual. This means that you can build a website in English, and create another version of the same site in other languages, such as French and/or Spanish. Joomla thus will easily give you access to a broader audience. Note that there are some 3^rd party extensions, such as JoomFish, which are used to support multiple languages in older versions of Joomla (<= Joomla 1.5.26) and to complement native multilingual support in newer versions.

9. Vibrant and friendly community: Unlike other CMS’s communities, Joomla’s community is vibrant and thriving. You have a question on Joomla? There must be someone, somewhere who asked the same question before (probably differently – but the essence will still be the same) and there must be someone, somewhere who answered him. Joomla’s community is also very friendly (there are always some exceptions – but we’re talking about the whole community here) and is always eager to help.

10. Reliable support by 3^rd party companies: While Joomla is not directly supported (by directly we mean helping people with their websites – we do not mean introducing updates and upgrades) by Open Source Matters (the organization behind Joomla), there are many high profile 3^rd party companies, such as itoctopus, offering reliable Joomla support for Joomla websites. The 3^rd party support that Joomla websites enjoy is one of the best among the CMSs.

11. Security updates: Open Source Matters releases security updates whenever any maintained version of Joomla is reported to have a security issue. These security updates ensure that Joomla websites all over the world run smoothly and securely.

12. Huge library of extensions: Do you need to create a custom form in Joomla? Well, there’s already a component for that. Do you need to integrate social networking into your Joomla website? Well, this is already done for you! Do you need to integrate a forum? Yes, you guessed it, there’s already an extension for that as well! Do you need to do anything in Joomla? In most cases, whatever functionality you can think of already exists in Joomla’s huge extensions library. In many cases, Joomla’s extensions are free. Paid Joomla extensions are priced very reasonably.

13. Vast collection of templates: Whether you want to create a fishing website that only die hard fans will visit, or whether you want to create a corporate website to serve your international clients, there is a Joomla template for you. There are so many Joomla templates out there that it’s hard for anyone not to find one that suits his business. And in the rare case where you need a Joomla template and you can’t find a premade one that works for you, then it’s easy and cheap to get one developed for you. A couple of things to note about Joomla templates:

    1. Many Joomla templates are commercial – meaning you have to pay money for them. However, there is still a lot of Joomla templates that are free to use.

    2. Joomla templates are not compatible across all Joomla versions. For example, a Joomla 1.5 template will not work on a Joomla 2.5 website (and vice versa). So if you find a template, make sure that it matches your Joomla version before buying it/downloading it.

14. Access control lists (ACLs): Joomla, since its inception, is blessed with a very powerful ACL component. That ACL allows you to set who views what, who edits what, and who creates what. As of Joomla 1.6, the ACL has been completely revamped to make it more flexible. On the downside, Joomla’s ACL can be the reason behind a lot of problems – and many Joomla administrators inadvertently break their website when toying with the ACL. Our advice, when it comes to ACL, is not to touch it if you don’t understand how to use it. You can easily break your website if you make a very simply mistake with the ACL. You have been warned!

15. An enormous number of Joomla websites: According to our research nearly a year ago, about 1% of the world domains are powered by Joomla. This means 2 things:

    1. Joomla is here to stay. Even after several years of its inception, Joomla has kept its momentum and is still acquiring territory on the web.

    2. Joomla is reliable. 1% of the domains in the world is about 2 million domains. If 2 million domains are using Joomla then it means that Joomla is worth using – and worth keeping as a CMS for many, many content administrators out there.

16. Frontend editing: We can’t think of many CMSs that allow frontend editing. Joomla does. Frontend editing means editing content on the website itself – for example, if you’re logged in to the website (and of course, you have the right permissions) and you see a page that needs editing, then you can edit it directly without going to the backend. This is an important feature especially for those Joomla website owners who have little Internet experience/knowledge. Note that this feature currently only works for articles – custom modules and other content still need to be edited from the backend.

17. Free to download, to use, free to upgrade: Joomla is free – period. You download it for free, you use it for free, and you upgrade it for free. You only need to pay for your Joomla website when:

• You are downloading a paid extension.
• You are asking a 3rd party company to do some work on your Joomla website – including debugging it, fixing it, and extending it.

Scalable engine: Joomla’s engine is scalable, and can be modified to sustain large amounts of traffic – we’re talking about hundreds of thousands of visitors per day. Of course, the modifications need to be heavy – very heavy to handle this amount of traffic.

1. Secure by default: Joomla, by default, is secure. What we mean by that is that when you download the latest Joomla zip file and install it onto your website, then your website is secure. A Joomla’s website security is compromised mainly because of one of the following:

   We have discussed before, in depth, the reasons why a Joomla website get hacked.

• Ignoring/Not installing security updates regularly.
• Using insecure 3rd party extensions.
• Hosting with a bad host.

1. Compatible with nearly all browsers: A Joomla website, by default, is compatible with all browsers. Browser compatibility issues on a Joomla websites are caused by either the template (if it’s not developed by the Joomla team) or by non-standard extensions.

And now the 21^st benefit of Joomla:

21. Reasonable learning curve: Creating a Joomla website from scratch can be done in a day – even if the person has never used Joomla before. That’s a clear advantage over other CMSs such as Drupal – that require the person to be at least a system administrator to merely operate the website.

As you can see, the reasons for using Joomla are many, and it’s very clear that any business, whether small or large, can benefit from the power of this CMS.

Source: Itoctopus

Go Back