remind me what that website challenge site was?

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So maybe 4 years ago there was a thing where some non-biased group designed a lorem ipsumy site and got a wordpres, drupal, and joomla team to each build the same thing. They then did a report on how long it took, how extendable the product was, and how painful/easy it was to edit.

This was NOT the nerdery's overnight website challenge, which while looking like a fun event, is really as much about your teams ability to work together and manage the expectations of a non-profit.

This was NOT any of the networking events where some team gets up and talks about their favorite CMS for 15 minutes.

Does anyone remember what I'm talking about and can remind me of the url?

frz
 
jessicadunbar replied on at Permalink Reply
jessicadunbar
http://overnightwebsitechallenge.com
frz replied on at Permalink Reply
frz
looks like the promo site is gone, but here's the news release:

http://www.cmswire.com/cms/web-cms/sxsw-web-content-management-syst...
jessicadunbar replied on at Permalink Reply
jessicadunbar
Maybe we can talk to opensource.com to run a non biased event. What do you have in mind?
frz replied on at Permalink Reply
frz
Ideally....

A pretty thoughtful analysis done by a panel of well known pundits representing design, development, and agency business management. The product would be a website and white paper.

The challenge would be a typical agency production hand off. There's a finished IA, set of comps, project brief and requirements doc for some lorem ipsum-y company site. There's a bit of ambiguity and opportunities to add flair. It's not all content, there's some functional elements but nothing particularly intensive; pr room, blog, find a dealer, etc.. Probably not serious ecommerce or app stuff.

The CMS's involved would each get a best of breed rock-star team behind it. They would work from where they work and report what they do in the way they report it. In the end the report/site wants to know number of hours worked by types of people and whatever narrative they have to share.

The final sites would remain up in some demo'able mode.

Videos of the judges talking about the different solutions as they reviewed them (http://peek.usertesting.com/ maybe?) paired with a more detailed written review.

They go through the front end and back, each having to achieve a few common client management tasks.

Available for free, run by some analysts who don't work for any of the cms's. Not too many choices to be useless - a dozen systems at most.

One might be able to get any number of independent but related sponsors; hosting, adobe, in kind magazines, etc..

just sayin' ... ideally. . ;)
JohntheFish replied on at Permalink Reply
JohntheFish
Maybe add a limited budget for additional software to the pot. There are a lot of things in c5 that would need a heap of custom code, or a $20 addon.
ssdscott replied on at Permalink Reply
ssdscott
+1 to this idea: add a budget for add on purchases.

I was just talking to a friend of mine about building a new web-site, and how I - a software developer by trade - am nonetheless VERY interested in what I can buy. It's totally a "how much is my time worth?" question. While I would *love* to build it all, I don't have time since I'm trying to meet a client's timetable. (The "client" in this case is a relative, so they have some tolerance for my learning curve - but it's not endless: thus my interest in buy-vs-build.)

I think an assessment of how much $500 will buy is an equally good metric for the assessment of a CMS.
katz515 replied on at Permalink Reply
katz515
Found it!

Lucas Anderson joined this contest 3 years ago as team "Concrete5.mn"
http://blog.nerdery.com/2011/02/choo-choo-choosing-teams-for-nerder...