Among the many vital calls that webmasters have to make is which road to take when they decide on what system to build their CMS website on - a .NET CMS or a PHP solution. Each has it's pros and restrictions. Choosing a CMS is completely dependant upon your budget, technical skills, and your overall company website requirements.

PHP seems to be the most popular and cheaper open source programming language used to build CMS sites which rely on dynamic and user generated content. The platform is free of charge as are almost all of its add-ons. Since it's open source, it has decent web support, code pieces and plenty of online assistance at assorted online PHP forums. Its even got Zend optimizer which compiles the code and makes code a lot faster, thus making it almost identical to other compiled platforms. It is fairly easy to get a programmer but if you have budget limits, there are lots of PHP resources and tutorials available online.

.NET is actually a more robust system that supports numerous programming languages like C, ASP.NET, VB.NET, for example. Unlike the PHP system, .NET comes with a cost, but that price buys you wonderful support from Microsoft. It provides excellent help documentation, and plenty of professional on and offline support ( though this also carries a price) to sort out any issues. Also, since it is a complete framework in itself, it is used for lots more high end programs and applications above and beyond the 'simple' site. This is why a .NET CMS should be your choice if you're looking into content management systems and are determined to have some major stability included in your website.

It's vital to note a commercial .NET CMS is developed for business users with security in mind. They have a tendency to be more stable, in my experience, and are definitely worth the price. A business CMS has to be in a position to handle a massive mix of users and functionality.

Read more about .NET CMS For Stability.

So, in summing up, if you don't have any money to spend and your duty is to build a small website or some other simple web based application, then a low cost PHP solution might be a wiser pick. On the other hand, if you have a budget and your needs are larger than a small content management system, a .NET CMS is the smarter pick. It will come with a better support system and lots more stability.

About the author

Chris Taylor is a .NET CMS advocate involved in web development, website design, web2.0, enterprise content management, web development, E-Commerce Solutions and web cms.