03 Oct 06

Expression Engine Mini Review

In Scripts & Resources, Expression Engine, Web Development

I was first attracted to Expression Engine because it appeared to offer a solid ‘all in one’ package. Seamlessly integrating multiple pieces of software to bring a site together can be at best a laborious task and at worst impossible. Even once it’s done you then have the hassle of one login for every section of the site, whether it’s the gallery, the news section or the downloads area. The idea that I could configure every aspect of my site through the same templating system and then make updates through the same login made EE an appealing purchase.

Now that the site is up and running I’m pleased to say that in that respect EE has lived up to its promises. In fact since I started work on the site pMachine have released EE 1.5 which includes a basic eCommerce module, so the software is gradually getting closer and closer to being the first and last thing you need to install on your server when starting work on a new site.

The templating system lives up to its end of the bargain too: It’s powerful and intuitive once you get used to it. Even as a total beginner I found that as long as a Firefox tab was pointed at eedocs.pmachine.com I couldn’t go far wrong.

Once all of my ‘weblogs’ (a slightly misleading title, since an EE weblog can be dynamic content in just about any form) and templates were complete it was time to add the content. In this area EE does excel. Each weblog can be assigned it’s own categories and its own set of fields. Which means that a different selection of fields can be displayed, depending on the blog being posted to. For anyone who has plans to ‘hand over the keys’ so to speak and let their clients update their own sites, this is a very useful feature as each field can be clearly labelled and configured to suit. E.g. an input box for ‘Book Title’, a drop down list for ‘Paperback / Hardback’, and so on. Also useful is a versioning feature and ‘guided’ posting feature.

So, EE’s perfect?

No. Currently there are two issues which I think may be a show-stopper for anyone with plans to build a site which is heavily based on a gallery.

• Galleries are not searchable. The EE search currently only looks at ‘weblog’ content, so if User X is searching for some info that happens to reside in a gallery caption (such as my portfolio item details) then they are out of luck.
• Although EE does offer a ‘batch entries’ feature, it is not what most people would expect. There is currently no way to upload a batch of images to a directory and just click ‘add’. Every single image must be reviewed and confirmed, not something which will be very appealing if you regularly add galleries of 50 images or more.

But as a CMS with blogging capabilities I would say EE is a sound purchase. As with any software there is the odd frustrating ‘feature’, but certainly nothing major enough to put me off.

Overall Verdict

If you’re someone who’s tired of hacking away at core files and scouring the net for essential third party plugins then EE is definitely for you. However if you’re just looking for a script to power your new blog and you’d benefit most from a selection of free templates then Wordpress and its huge community are probably the way to go. I have spent quite a long time working with both MovableType and Joomla and Expression Engine is infinitely nicer to use than both. 

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