I've been so busy lately that I haven't had time to put out a plug for my review of the Magnolia CMS on CMS-Connected last month. This was probably one of the easiest shows I've done in the sense that the Internet connection was good and the rest of the show seemed to complement my own segment well. My thanks to Boris Kraft, Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer for Magnolia, for briefing me well about their product and spending some extra time with me during the demo.
Magnolia is an open source java-based content management system that is used in more than 100 countries across the world, by governments and leading FORTUNE 500 enterprise. Magnolia is just now beginning to pick up steam in my neck of the woods, with 31% of their new customers coming from North America. While you may not recognize a Magnolia CMS site, I'm betting you do recognize some of their customers including the United State's Navy, Alltel, American Express, Barclays, Nissan, Texas State University, and Zumba.com.
Some of the features about Magnolia CMS that impressed me most included their rebuild of the software for a tablet and mobile first design, customized apps, and their notification system (called Pulse). In Magnolia's future with version 5.3 the roadmap takes us to improvements in personalization, the content pool (content types, tagging, publishing), and digital assets management (DAM).
Perhaps what I like most about Magnolia is that the developers appear more concerned about providing you the best content management experience and less inclined to providing you an all-inclusive suite that promises more than it delivers. There are too many small fish out there claiming they do everything. It is refreshing to see a company like Magnolia be very decisive and focused on which features they're willing to support in their software.