(CMS Epic battle) sitefinity vs episerver

[HELL DRAGON]

Dear Dani-web members ,

My management asked me to benchmark those two CMS softwares because they want to buy one of them i did so and managed to know almost all the details but i believe that dani-web's community has more experience in .Net based CMS therefore i want to discuss with you guys about those 2 softwares or any better ones.

they are currently useing Tac-soft which they say "fairly good" but i'm always looking forward for the best CMS yet cost-effective.here are my criteria:-

1. Multi lingual
2. .NET Based
3. SQL Server Database
4. Ability to create multiple websites / target different channels
5. Ability to create custom components / Flexible API
6. Standards based
7. Workflows
8. Permission Management
9. In-build modules (eg:- Surveys, blogs, feedback etc)
10. Efficient content editing tools
11. Versioning ( comparing pages )
12. Scheduling
13. File Manager / Ability for bulk upload
14. Search
15. Form builder
16. Reporting Tools
17. Easy Template Creation
18. Theme based
19. Support

[itguy007]

I would suggest that you take a look at Kentico CMS (SNIP). It has a similar feature set as EpiServer/Sitecore, but much more cost efficient than both EpiServer/Sitecore and Sitefinity.

[HELL DRAGON]

Thanks a lot , what are the limitations of this software in ur opinion? coz my company is running a mission critical website.I appreciate any feedback and comments about your experience with Kentico from you.

Thanks bro u honored me with your first post i wish you more success in dani-web and in life.

[itguy007]

Well, I wouldn't be afraid of using Kentico for a mission-critical site. It's used by thousands of websites across the world. You can scale it almost indefinitely using web farms and SQL Server replication. I'm running only a small site, but I know they have many big clients.

[gabesumner]

Hello Hell Dragon,

Full disclosure, I work for Telerik so take everything I say with a grain of salt. ;)

At the end of the day, I highly recommend downloading a trial and/or getting a demo to evaluate Sitefinity against your needs. You've listed a lot of features, but the implementation of these features varies wildly.

For example, Permissions Management might be available, but only available at a page level (vs. individual parts of the page). The Form Builder might be available, but unable to handle branching logic.

Here my own take on these subjects:

• Multi lingual - Available
• .NET Based - We're Telerik. Very few can claim deeper roots in the .NET community.
• SQL Server Database - Supported
• Multiple websites / different channels - Not out of the box. Requires some customization. We're working on this.
• Create custom components / Flexible API - Our extensibility model is unbeatable. Fluent API, LINQ to Sitefinity, RESTful WCF services, use ASP.NET controls in the CMS, etc, etc.
• Standards based - W3C WAI-A & Section 508 supported
• Workflows - Based on Windows Workflow Foundation 4.0. Not even SharePoint 2010 can claim this. Customizable workflows can be created in the Sitefinity.
• Permission Management - Available and also very granular. Permissions can be set on a page level, item level or page region level
• In-build modules - Yes, to some, not to others. New modules can be created relatively easily though.
• Efficient content editing tools - Test our online sandbox to evaluate our usability. We invite comparisons!
• Versioning - Available.
• Scheduling - Available for content items, not yet for pages.
• File Manager / Bulk upload - Available. We also have dedicated modules for handling images, documents, etc.
• Search - Available. Everything is based on Lucene.NET.
• Form builder - Available. Doesn't not handle branching logic [yet].
• Reporting Tools - Built-in analytics. We use the Google Analytics API to visualize statistics inside Sitefinity.
• Easy Template Creation - Available through the CMS or through ASP.NET Master Pages.
• Theme based - Based on ASP.NET Themes
• Support - Telerik's support is unmatched.

I won't compare directly to EpiServer because I'm biased and not terribly familiar with their feature set.

Hopefully this post was helpful. I've tried to present a fair look at Sitefinity based on your requirements (instead of simply pimping our own product). Best of luck with your project and let us know if we can help.

Gabe Sumner
Telerik | Sitefinity CMS

[HELL DRAGON]

ohh thanks alot gabesumner for the detailed information , u saved me a lot of time , but as u said i need to download and test all the softwares proposed .

thanks again mate :)

[kentico1]

Hi Hell Dragon,

I can see itguy007 has already recommended Kentico CMS. I work for Kentico, so let me provide more details based on your requirements:

1. Multi lingual
Kentico supports any languages, including Chinese and right-to-left languages, such as Hebrew or Arabic. Every language version of the site can have its own structure and we also support fallback to the default language if the required page is not translated.

2. .NET Based
Kentico supports .NET 2.0, 3.5 and 4.0 and Visual Studio 2008 and 2010 (we always support at least two latest versions).

3. SQL Server Database
You can use Microsoft SQL Server 2005 or 2008, we also support SQL Server merge replication if you need high availability/performance.

4. Ability to create multiple websites / target different channels
Kentico was designed for multi-site support from the beginning, so you don't have to use any workarounds or compromises. It allows you to host thousands of sites in a single installation and share users, code, settings, data and content accross the selected sites. You can also export a selected site and use it as a website template for newly created sites which is useful if you need to create many microsites using the same design. I believe that Kentico has the best multi-site support in the .NET CMS market.
You can also build mobile sites that may have their own structure and content or re-use content from your main website. You can find an example of such site in our sample Corporate Site.
Generally, if we're talking about different channels, all content in Kentico is stored in structured format and can be transformed using ASCX code or XSLT transformations. So you can use it also for RSS or XML feeds or integrate it with external software for creating print materials.

5. Ability to create custom components / Flexible API
You can create custom pages, integrate custom applications/modules, create custom webparts or widgets, write custom providers, custom event handlers, custom field types, custom membership providers, etc. Every feature of the CMS is accessible through a flexible and well documented API, so you can easily script any action or call it from other systems.

6. Standards based
Kentico allows you to create standards-compliant site (XHTML, W3C WAI, Section 508). There's also a free add-on that allows users to validate the page for XHTML, broken links, accessibility and mobile devices.

7. Workflows
Kentico allows you to define workflows with any number of steps through a browser-based interface. Each step can have one or more authorized approvers/editors. The workflows can be defined based on content type, language or site section and you can enhance them with custom code executed when the document is moved to another step.

8. Permission Management
You can specify permissions per language version, site, site section or content item. You can also define permissions for particular modules and define your own permissions for custom modules.

9. In-build modules (eg:- Surveys, blogs, feedback etc)
You can use our On-line forms for surveys, the same for feedback forms (they can even send the data by e-mail or send a "thank you" autoresponse and their design is fully customizable using HTML). Blogs are also supported including tags, categories, moderated comments, trackbacks, social bookmarking and other features. There are many other built-in modules for Kentico, including: Staging, Web Analytics, Reporting, Rating, Tags and Categories, Media Library, Document Management, Forums, E-commerce, Event Calendar, Booking System, Newsletter, Image Galleries, Friends, Polls, Wiki/User generated content, Google/Yahoo/Bing maps, Message Boards, Groups, Workgroups, Project Management or Private Messaging.

10. Efficient content editing tools
Everybody says their CMS is easy to use, so I have to say the same :) But you need to try it and see how it works for your end users. If you have many users, you can leverage the user interface customization to provide them with simplified interface. Another important aspect of efficient content editing are page templates that allow you to define the page structure and let the end users enter only text without
changing the layout or breaking the site design. On the other hand, you can use widgets to allow them define their own page structure. Kentico allows you to give the end users as much or as little power as you want.

11. Versioning ( comparing pages )
Kentico supports versioning, archiving, rollback and recycle bin. You can also compare two versions side-by-side with red-lining of differences.

12. Scheduling
If you're asking about scheduling content - yes, you can do that with any content item and schedule both publishing and unpublishing. Moreover, you can schedule a multiple new versions of the same page to be automatically published in the future.
If you're asking about general task scheduling - yes, you can write your own code and plan its execution in the future using the powerful built-in scheduler.

13. File Manager / Ability for bulk upload
You can upload files as any other content in the content repository or you can upload it to media libraries (which is recommended for large files you do not want to store in the database). You can use the built-in image editor or have the CMS resize the images on the fly, while keeping the original image. Kentico also supports WebDAV which allows you to edit the files in Office applications directly from the website, without downloading the files on your local drive and uploading them back. If you need to bulk-upload files, you can upload them through FTP or use a third-party add-on for multi-file upload through web browser.

14. Search
Kentico uses Lucene.NET search for the content and Microsoft SQL Server Search for uploaded files, such as Word or PDF documents. The Lucene search is highly configurable, so you can define which content fields should be searchable. You can even build your own search indexes that contain selected content, but also data from other modules. The search itself can use the Lucene search queries.

15. Form builder
The browser-based BizForms module allows you to define on-line forms. It offers dozens of predefined field types with many options, including regex validation rules. You can even develop your own field types. The submitted data is stored in the database and can be exported to Excel. Moreover, you can use e-mail notifications and e-mail autoresponders. Both the form and e-mails support custom HTML code, so you have full control over their design. You can also write a custom event handler that will execute custom code when the form is submitted.

16. Reporting Tools
Kentico has its own built-in Web Analytics (that can be even extended with your own measures) or you can easily use Google Analytics.
Moreover, Kentico has a built-in Reporting module that allows you to define your own reports with graphs and tables that display data from the CMS database.

17. Easy Template Creation
Kentico allows you to create templates either as standard ASPX templates (and use ASP.NET master pages) using Visual Studio or you can use the browser-based interface to create page templates using web parts, without programming. Or you can combine both of these approaches. You can create page templates with predefined structure of content and re-use these templates across many pages, so your editors only enter the text and images and you keep the site design consistent. The templates can easily contain your own code. You can also define page templates that can be further customized with widgets by end users if you need to give them more flexibility.

18. Theme based
You can use CSS stylesheets that can be assigned to the whole site or to a single page and you can also use ASP.NET themes.

19. Support
Kentico provides e-mail and phone support by a team of 11 experienced support engineers (you can find testimonials on our website).
We also have highly experienced solution architects who can help you with choosing the right architecture and optimizing your website performance.
Plus we have over 1,000 solution partners in 80+ countries and training partners across the world.

20. Mission critical
Kentico is used by many mission-critical sites with huge traffic that prove Kentico stability. For example, NewsMax.com handles 20 million page views per month. Kentico supports web farms and SQL Server merge replication which makes your system highly available and scalable.
Kentico also provides highly flexible and efficient caching. You can find more in the Performance Report on our website.
Moreover, you can separate the editing and live environment using our Staging module that allows you to develop and edit the site in your local network and then synchronize the changes to your live servers. It increases the security and also provides great performance if you have huge number of editors.

We will be happy to provide more details, case studies and third-party comparisons of Kentico and other .NET CMS systems upon request, so please feel free to send me a private message.

Regards,

Petr Palas, Kentico