On Sun, 2006-02-05 at 18:55 -0700, Michael Dorosh wrote:
A letter opener isn't a swizzle stick, but if it works, why not... From: Roger Chrisman Could anyone who feels with conviction that Mediawiki is NOT a CMS, please explain.
The problem that you have is that there is no concrete definition (the CMS page on WP notwithstanding) of CMS. It's a general label that has come to be applied to "that stuff that's non site-specific, and sits on top of a Web server". Because so many people first hear the term in connection with a specific CMS, they often come to expect that that CMS's features are universally "CMSish".
It is often more valuable to discuss specific terminology for specific tasks. For example, Vignette's StoryServer (now simply Vignette) was based around a workflow publishing system. Workflow is a common element of many CMSes, but not, for example, MediaWiki. Revision control is a major part of MediaWiki, and of many other CMSes, but not all. The feature list goes on.
MediaWiki *is* a CMS, but that does not mean that it provides that facilities that everyone has come to expect of a CMS (nor, in all cases, should it).