Introduction
In the ever-evolving world of web development, choosing the right tool for the job is crucial. As a full-stack developer, y...
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The detailed breakdown of use cases, advantages, and limitations makes it easier for developers to decide the right approach for their projects. I especially liked the section on headless CMS and how they integrate with modern frameworks.
I saw a worst solution of combine next.js with contentful, using inhouse npm module. A real maintanance nightmare.
Oof, I hear you—bad integrations can be a nightmare! 😅 Next.js + Contentful can work great, but yeah, poorly designed in-house modules can ruin it. Did you find any better approaches or solutions? Always curious to learn from others’ experiences!
No, I move to another company, another problems :) - a bad react architecture with poorly designed AWS use. Currently fixing those.
Bad React architecture and AWS misuse can definitely be a headache. Good luck fixing those—sounds like a great learning experience though.
Thanks a lot! 😊 Really glad you found it useful, especially the headless CMS part. It’s such a game-changer for modern dev workflows.
"Traditional" CMS solutions can provide a rest API, for example Drupal. It is not a headless CMS service only feature.
With the headless CMS services there is a vendor lock-in. So they can go up in cost or strip features. I knew one project where the headless service just stopped, so they had to migrate to another CMS.
It is easy and fast when you use a service, but for long term projects I recommend a solution that gives you more control.
I would not call Shopify, WooCommerce and Magento CMS solutions. They are e-commerce solutions. While they have some content management, they are focused on selling things. Like a CRM manages user content, the main goal is to provide ways to attract and keep customers.
Great points! You're absolutely right—traditional CMS platforms like Drupal can also provide REST APIs, which makes them quite versatile. And I agree that vendor lock-in is a real risk with headless CMS services. It’s always a trade-off between speed/ease of use and long-term control, and for some projects, having more control over the stack is definitely the way to go.
As for Shopify, WooCommerce, and Magento, I included them because they often overlap with CMS use cases, especially for businesses that need both content management and e-commerce functionality. While their primary focus is on selling, they do offer robust content management features that make them a hybrid solution for many use cases.
Thanks for sharing your insights! If you’ve got any recommendations for balancing control and convenience in CMS/e-commerce setups, I’d love to hear them.
I understand you point of view about the ecommerce solutions.
I see a CMS more as a framework, and that can contain specialised solutions like e-commerce, CRM, DAM. Most of the time they are used without a clear distinction between the different parts, like Shopify and Magento.
But I wouldn't use the two solutions only for the CMS,
I agree with your conclusion every project has their own requirements and constraints. And we have to decide what the best solution is based on those terms.
I just wrote my own CMS and use it for every project. It's very scalable, so if a project requires additional features, it's very easy to add them. I try to keep my CMS updated and it was completely rewritten twice (the first time I completely changed the architecture, the second time moved to Vue 3 and also changed the architecture). Sometimes even just change the frontend HTML part and remove (or just disable) unnecessary modules and project is ready for production 🙂
That’s seriously impressive! Building your own CMS is no easy task, and it sounds like you’ve really nailed the scalability and flexibility part. Rewriting it twice—especially with the move to Vue 3 and architecture changes—shows some serious dedication. Hats off to you!
Thank you!
I've often wanted to bring this up with individuals who are relatively new to web and web application development. No matter how much I try to explain, they just don’t seem to grasp it.
Hopefully, they'll come across this article and give it a proper read. Only then might they start to understand and appreciate that web development isn’t a one-size-fits-all approach, especially when clients have specific demands.
Fantastic article btw 👏
Thanks a lot! 😊 You’re so right—web development isn’t one-size-fits-all, and it’s not always easy to explain that to newcomers. Hopefully, this article can help clear things up a bit. Really appreciate your kind words!
Simple, clear, and valuable. Exactly what I needed—great work!
Thank you! 😊 Really glad you found it helpful.
I have also written a blog on CMS. Take a look!
wpfolk.com/blogs/wordpress-like-cms
Nice! I’ll definitely check it out. Thanks for sharing! 😊