For boutique content management vendors like Digitalus CMS (news, site), flexibility comes comparatively easily. There are no multiple corporate hoops to jump though, and development cycles seem to be moving a bit faster (which can also turn into a double-edged sword).

Not long ago, we looked (in detail and with a fair portion of constructive criticism) at Digitalus 1.5. The vendor informs us that they've heard us and made templating changes in the newest version of the product -- Digitalus CMS 1.8.

It seems the chances of breaking the entire front end are now minimized.

Only one week behind schedule, but with a slew of changes, CMS Made Simple v1.6 has recently seen the light of day.

One of the open source, PHP-based content management systems out there, CMS Made Simple (news, site) introduced new permissions in this release. In addition to that, there are new themes, templates and modules. Not to mention a gazillion of bug fixes.

Let's just say it doesn't look like it's going to be an easy upgrade, but it may very well be worth the effort.

Installing everything needed for a CMS can be quite daunting, so it comes as welcome news that eZ (news, site) has developed an all-in-one installer for those just starting out or switching in the open source CMS world.

If you're looking through here and feel that your project was left out, we invite you to send us an email at pr@cmswire.com with a pointer to who we should contact at your project for updates.

But all was not lost. Instead of settling for something less than perfect, Resolve Digital decided to take matters into their own hands and build an all-new CMS from the ground up. After 5 years under the hood, RefineryCMS is not only up and running, it’s also up for grabs. 

The world is not enough. Following the recent opening of its U.S. office, the open source ECM vendor Nuxeo (news, site) keeps expanding its global reach with a new partnership announced today.

Kisiwa, the content management solutions firm, signed an exclusive strategic and distribution agreement with Nuxeo to provide sales, professional services and support in Southern and Eastern Europe, Russia, Middle East and Africa.

The conference, held in Basel, Switzerland, will consist of keynotes and sessions with business and technical topics in regard to Magnolia CMS (news, site). Speakers include Pascal Mongold and Boris Kraft, Magnolia's CEO and CTO, respectively. Additionally, some folks from Day Software, Aperto, and several other companies and institutions are scheduled to make an appearance as well. The whole shebang will then close with an "Unconference-style" event run by the attendees.

Here's a closer look at the schedule:

Presentation Day, September 10th

During Presentation Day, participants of Magnolia Conference will gain the knowledge they need to build simple open source content management solutions with Magnolia CMS through expert instruction, hands-on tutorials and case studies.

Community Day, September 11th

Community Day will be an Unconference. This means that attendees themselves will be responsible to propose talks, vote for talks, present, share, question, inquire and otherwise make the event.

For more information on the event, including a detailed schedule of speakers, head on over here. If you aren't going to be anywhere near Switzerland but would still like to get out and shake some hands, check out our complete list of events for something a little closer to home. 

While the project doesn't promise that every idea will be implemented, they intend to use this system to understand what Plone users want to see added and improved. In particular, the team recommends that anyone interested in contributing to the project should take a look and see what ideas are the most in demand and sound like something they may want to work on.

If you find something and end up working on a significant new feature or change, then you'll pull together a Plone Improvement Proposal, or PLIP. This PLIP will be reviewed by the Framework Team assigned to the major release you're aiming for (as an example, the deadline for Plone 4 PLIPs just passed).

For more information:

• See the FAQ "How to suggest a feature for Plone"
• Submit and browse Plone improvement ideas
• Read the official idea system launch posting

With eZ Systems (news, site) starting its eZ Conference and Awards bash today, it warms up with news of a new integration deal for its open source web CMS eZ Publish with WoodWing's (news, site) publishing solution.

We imagine the creation of Bluenog’s (news, site) flagship solution went down a little like this: Someone was tired of switching between their portal, content management system and business intelligence tools, so they threw all three into a melting pot, stirred it up, and *BAM!* out popped Bluenog ICE.

OK, so maybe that’s not how it went. Whatever the case, the recipe is still a stellar one, and the recognition the company’s received certainly proves it. Today at Boston's Enterprise 2.0 conference Bluenog announced that ICE is back for another round, this time as version 4.5. The new software includes an Enterprise Wiki, secure group calendaring features and enhanced centralized administration.

When it was decided to build Momentum's, um, momentum, by bringing its free content onto the Web, Challenger took on the project. Free and open source seemed a no-brainer between his scientific background and the free, community nature of the magazine. At Open Web Vancouver 2009 (news, site) he shared his experience.

The new Global, 24x7 Service Level Agreement (SLA) is designed to provide assistance via a ‘round the clock support desk for any aspect of the MySource Matrix system. Support is provided on a per-system basis, regardless of location or language. Meaning? As Squiz puts it, “Backoffice users from Victoria to Venezuela can simply pick up the phone at any time of day to get a system fault resolved.”

Standard Squiz SLA offerings also include a 99.9% system uptime guarantee and a complete system warranty.

“We’re introducing our Global 24x7 SLA in order to make Supported Open Source CMS an easier choice for large multi-national organisations and to help them reduce the complexity of managing a distributed web CMS environment,” Said Squiz CEO and founder John-Paul Syriatowicz. We know that this new support offering makes a standard, commercially licensed CMS SLA look arcane and hopelessly expensive by comparison.”

Need more convincing on the "arcane" and "hopelessly expensive" bit? Check out the inner workings of our Australian friends here.

We’ve covered their previous version -- Hippo CMS 7.0 -- in some detail. It was a major release with serious changes to the content management system’s core.

This 7.1 release does not bring significant news, but does introduce some changes that Hippo CMS users should take into account.

Hippo (site, news) says the focus of this version is on stability, usability and performance.

But, as usual, they aren't. This week they have announced a partnership with ParaScale, a cloud storage software provider, to offer Alfresco "Content as a Service".

Most of these reasons involve consumer-friendly features.

A handful of similar posts followed on the Joomla blog, and the response from the community went from seemingly mild to “overwhelming,” as their website states. The result? The brand spankin’ new Joomla Resource Directory (JRD), which was pre-launched in May and finally went live earlier this month.

Bringing their new offering to the table along with much enthusiasm, the team claims that there's no easier way to find developers, service providers, and other valuable resources.

"We think this will be a great way to connect end-users and service providers in the Joomla Community," said Wendy Robinson of the JRD Team."Most small businesses can't afford to advertise on the Joomla.org sites and this will provide them wide exposure. With close to a million visitors and 14 million page views a month, the JED has proven that there is wide interest in products related to Joomla."

So far it looks like the majority of Joomla fans are pleased with the new directory, if only, perhaps, because they now have something to tide them over until the much anticipated release of Joomla 1.6.

Interested? Head on over to www.resources.joomla.org.

The goal? To merge JBoss Portal, eXo's Portal and eXo's Java Client Repository (JCR) into a single project that strikes the right balance of robustness and usability.

Let's have a look at the difference between the two and talk about the latest Release Candidate for MODx Evolution.

Also added is a collection of new features that weren’t there before and a significant upgrade to the OpenCMS Content Relation Engine (CRE), adding some new features to something that was already quite nifty.

Developed by Alkacon Software with the help of the OpenCms community, the thing to take really note of in this release is the improvements to the CRE.

The latest version of DotNetNuke Professional hits the streets today. Get the scoop on what's new in the Web CMS.

Plone 4 will bring Plone up to date with current technologies, while making it easier to work with for integrators and end users. As this release is meant as an intermediate step toward the radically updated Plone 5, hold any changes that "significantly alter backwards compatibility, visuals or APIs" until then.

Turn in your PLIP submissions by 0700 UTC (3am EDT) on 20 June 2009. To do so, look over previous PLIPs as a guide to what format to use, create a ticket with the type PLIP, and then enter your proposal.

Include information such as:

• Why is the change important?
• How will this change be achieved?
• What downsides are there to this change being adopted?

When it's ready for consideration, set the milestone to 4.0. From there, you will receive feedback from the Framework Team. The team will then vote on submissions and set deadlines for when they must be ready. The code must be complete by the stated deadline to be included in the release.