Building a Content Management System on Rails
In my first post, I mentioned building a content management system from scratch. To introduce the project, I figured I should go through my reasons for it, and what I want to accomplish.
Why write my own?
Sure, there are loads of systems out there for running a web site, and it’d be really easy to take something like the incredible ExpressionEngine and get it to do what I want. However, using existing software means I don’t get the experience of writing one myself.
Also, by writing it myself, I don’t have to try and work around an existing structure to get my site to operate the way I want. If I want a feature, I can just dive into the code and add it, rather than reading through plugin documentation and existing code.
What’s it going to do?
A few of the features I want to implement:
- Blog Posts
- Link Posts (i.e. my own del.icio.us)
- Review Posts
- Portfolio Management (to replace my current portfolio)
- Comments
- Static Page Management
- RSS Feeds for everything
- Caching System
- User Management
This is a pretty general list, but as I start working on it, I’ll go into detail about each of the site’s features.
Why Ruby on Rails?
Simply put, I love Ruby, and I love Rails. If you’ve never used either, however, don’t despair! Although I’ll have a lot of Ruby and Rails specific material, my focus will be more on designing the structure of the application, rather than going through the underlying code.
Stay tuned!
I’m going to try to post pretty regular updates on my progress, so make sure to check back often if you want to see how it’s going!