Joomla! is a free content management system.

 Joomla! is a free content management system.

With Joomla! you can create sites of any complexity, and regular blogs, and online stores. Joomla is an extensible system, a huge number of templates, components, modules and plugins are implemented for it.

Joomla is not inferior to WordPress in terms of functionality and capabilities, however, using Joomla is not as convenient as WordPress, which is probably why Joomla is less popular than WordPress. On the other hand, WordPress and Joomla have been the most popular free CMS for a long time and they are most often used to create blogs.

Benefits of CMS Joomla!

Free

Easy Installation

Extensibility: many components, modules and plugins

There is a lot of information on the Internet on working with CMS

CMS Joomla: pros and cons

Versatility. ...

Minimum cost. ...

Ease of use. ...

Ease of installation. ...

Russified interface. ...

Built-in caching system. ...

Variety of design options. ...

Own security module.

The convenience of use

Most hosting systems install Joomla automatically. You only need to pay a tariff (there are even offers optimized for the engine), connect a domain and select a CMS in the catalog of applications available for installation. The system interface is completely Russified, support forums and training materials are also presented in Russian, so there will be no difficulties with mastering the administrative panel.

The main features of the engine:

Technical optimization for the requirements of search engines.

Create an unlimited number of pages.

Pre-installed registration system with 9 user groups with different access rights.

Visual editor for minor design changes and quick addition of new materials without logging into the admin panel

A content manager that helps you monitor how site visitors react to posted content.

The engine is also equipped with several features that distinguish it from other free CMS: accelerated page loading, debugging mode and the ability to communicate with users in private conversations organized through a common mail system. All this is basic functionality, which is significantly expanded by installing plugins.

Modules that add new features are available for download from the official Joomla catalog or from third-party resources. You can also create them yourself - this is the advantage of the open source code of the system. The CMS configuration depends on which plugins you add. It is unlikely that you can do without them completely, because extensions perform a number of very important tasks:

protect against unauthorized access and spam;

allow you to create backups;

help to optimize the site for the requirements of search engines;

increase the usability of the site by adding useful widgets and applications;

Each plugin has a set of settings responsible for its functionality. This makes Joomla a very flexible system that can be used to create a wide variety of websites. If for the implementation of the project there are not enough opportunities that offer ready-made solutions, you can customize the system at a deeper level. Joomla is PHP and JavaScript scripts. These are common programming languages, so there is no problem finding specialists or training materials for self-study.

The engine has a high level of protection against hacking and unauthorized access. Developers regularly release updates, including new security tools. However, extensions remain the weak point of the system. It is not possible to control the quality of plugins downloaded from unknown sources. Therefore, it is recommended to use only add-ons from the official catalog and make sure that the developer does not abandon their support.

Design

The appearance of the site depends on which template you took and how you changed it. There are several design options:

Download free templates for Joomla.

Purchasing premium themes.

Independent creation of the layout.

Order the development of an individual solution.

The choice of method depends on what skills and budget you have. In most cases, the first option is enough for the first site - free templates for Joomla. Fortunately, there are many offers, especially if you search on foreign sites. The only difficulty is that such themes may not support the Russian language, but this is fixed by editing the files.

The Joomla admin panel does not have a built-in template library. Therefore, the theme you like must first be downloaded to your computer, and then uploaded to the server through "Installing Extensions". After adding the file, the new theme will appear in the "Template Manager" section, where you need to assign the "Default" status to it.

Customizing the appearance of the site is performed in two ways:

Using preset template settings. Their functionality depends on the theme itself. Free templates usually offer minimal features like changing the background, logo, colors, and font. On premium themes, there may be significantly more options for customizing the design.

Editing template files written using HTML, CSS and JS.

Template files are stored in the Templates folder. It is recommended to download them to your computer, create a backup copy and only then edit. If you make minor changes, then you can get by with the built-in editor, but for deep customization, it is more convenient to work with files downloaded to your hard drive.

If you are creating your first site, then you can do without working with code. Just pick a more or less suitable theme and use its standard settings to customize the design. Most useful actions, such as creating a site menu, are performed using visual editing tools. If you have a budget, you can shift some of the responsibilities for customizing the appearance of the site to specialists - finding an offer for such services for Joomla is not a problem.

Search Engine Optimization (SEO)

ProvThere is minimal optimization possible immediately after installing the engine. This is done through the "Site" tab in the section with general system settings.

Specify the name of the site - it will be displayed in the search results and on the tab in the browser.

Write down the description and key phrases by which the site will be determined by search robots.

Enable NC shaping and forwarding.

After filling the site with content, share it so that other users can see the pages.

Allow indexing to make pages appear in search results.

These are standard SEO features offered by Joomla. Such a setting will be enough to ensure that search engines do not ignore the site and it gets at least some position in the search results. If you are creating a project in a competitive environment and want to break into high positions, then you need to work on further optimization and promotion.

To add additional SEO tools, you need a plugin. Joomla has both free and paid extensions. The choice depends on what functionality is required. You can start with one of the free plugins - EFSEO or SEOBoss. After installing them on Joomla, it will be possible to add and edit meta tags on each page or post.

If the capabilities of free plugins are not enough for promotion, you can switch to the licensed version of the iSEO extension. It costs $147 and offers maximum optimization tools.

Rates

Joomla is a free system. The engine distribution kit can be downloaded from the developer's website or automatically deployed through the hosting administration panel. You don't have to pay for templates and plugins either - there are usually free alternatives that do the job well. This is possible, among other things, thanks to the user community that has formed around the system. At some point, you may want to purchase a paid solution because it will solve an important task, but in any case, it will be your choice and not an obligation to invest money.

Required expenses include domain and hosting costs. The size of the budget depends on what kind of website you are creating and in what domain zone you are going to host it. For example, to launch a blog or a small store in the .ru or .rf zone, you will need about 200 rubles per month for hosting and 100-200 rubles per year as payment for the domain. Total maintenance will cost about 2500 rubles a year.

The larger and more functional the site, the more expensive the hosting will have to be bought. Large projects may require hosting on VPS and dedicated servers due to lack of resources on shared hosting. But if you are making the first site, then the budget will most likely increase gradually. The situation is similar with the cost of a domain: you can limit yourself to a simple address in the .ru zone or buy out a whole pool of domain names in different zones - the choice is up to you.

Creating a site on Joomla

On most hostings, Joomla is installed in one click from the list of applications. Some hosts even offer pre-installed CMS plans. But even if you have to install Joomla manually, this will not be a problem. Need to:

download distribution;

upload it to the hosting via FTP;

go to the site address, connect the database;

complete the installation of Joomla.

The installation wizard will guide you through the steps. Once the installation is complete, you will have access to the Joomla admin panel. In fact, the site has already been created, then you need to configure it and fill it with content.

General site settings

The settings differ depending on the type of site, but there are basic parameters that are the same for all projects. They can be set in the "General Settings" section of the admin panel.

On the Site tab, enter the name of the site.

Make sure the site is enabled and its access level is Public. While the site is not configured, you can make access restricted.

Add metadata - description and keywords.

Turn on the CNC and add a suffix.

If you need a URL redirect, connect to the site via FTP and rename the htaccess.txt file to .htaccess.

Go to the Server tab and enable gzip compression. This will speed up the loading of pages for users. Here you can also enable SSL to secure traffic.

On the "Permissions" tab, set the access rights for user groups. For example, unregistered people can only view pages, authors can add new materials, editors can edit other people's materials and publish them in the public domain.

These are just the basic settings. To learn more, check out the Joomla documentation.