The Explode Code presentation was last night. I spoke about The Alternative CMS. It was about the problems with Wordpress, why WYSIWYG is hard, and why Flat File and Markdown could be the solution you are looking for.

Pretty good reception overall. Some of the things people asked were about complexity. The real answer is if you are doing things that are super complex, you should'nt really use a flat-file cms.

the idea is really more 60% client and 40% developer

I don't mention this in the slides, but the idea is really more 60% client and 40% developer. Using that flat-file is much faster to develop, but it makes it easier to manage for the client.

Here is the download.

Here are some of the links to things I mentioned in the talk:

Flat File CMSs

  • https://github.com/PhileCMS/Phile
  • https://github.com/gilbitron/Pico
  • http://assemble.io/
  • https://ghost.org/features/
  • http://getkirby.com/
  • http://jekyllrb.com/
  • http://octopress.org/

Markdown Editors

  • http://mouapp.com/ -- OSX Only
  • http://pad.haroopress.com/ -- Node Webkit
  • https://stackedit.io/ -- Online
  • http://dillinger.io/ -- Online
  • http://www.sublimetext.com/ -- Duh
  • http://macromates.com/ -- TextMate
  • https://github.com/plasticboy/vim-markdown -- Vim markdown
  • http://jblevins.org/projects/markdown-mode/ -- Emacs
  • https://gist.github.com/james2doyle/9045390 -- Markdown Cheatsheet
  • https://gist.github.com/james2doyle/6540193 -- Mou Markdown Cheatsheet

Full CMSs With Markdown Support

  • http://anchorcms.com/ -- markdown only
  • http://buildwithcraft.com/ -- wysiwyg, markdown, simple/text
  • https://www.pyrocms.com/ -- wysiwyg, markdown, simple/text
  • http://wordpress.org/plugins/wp-markdown/screenshots/ -- who knows
  • http://dropplets.com/ -- markdown and simple/text

Inline Editors (Content Editable)

  • http://jakiestfu.github.io/Medium.js/docs/
  • http://www.zenpen.io/
  • http://mattduvall.com/grande.js/
  • http://ckeditor.com/demo#inline
  • http://sofish.github.io/pen/
  • http://goo.gl/b4ECsb -- pen, grande, medium breakdown

Again you can find the PDF here.