There are two other Joomla based CCKs available, K2 and mooTheme's Zoo. They are slightly different in that K2 adds additional fields to a Joomla article while Zoo creates a new article "type" that does not include all the standard article fields. They have cut the mandatory field set down to 5. This new record "type" is very similar to the Drupal CCK.
We have opted for the K2 variety of additional fields to a standard article for reasons that will become obvious.
Where all the CCK offerings (including Drupal) fall down is the separation of data from presentation. K2 are rightly proud of their CCK API, however, you need to be able to program both sides of the API to get a result, something which should only be necessary in quite complex cases. To give it credit, Zoo allows you to format the display of the data in the backend menu setup.
The Jentla CCK separates the data description, data display creation and selection of data for use into three clearly defined roles.
In any significant organisation, the three roles of defining data descriptions, creating content using those data descriptions, the look and feel of the web pages holding the data and selection of the data are separated. Turf wars are held over these fiercely guarded roles. It makes clear sense for an expert in information management to define the way data is described for an organization but it also makes sense to allow another group to make flexible choices about the way in which selections of information are presented. Separating the roles ensures both groups can play complimentary roles.
Taking our event example again, the website administrator would create the data description of event description, promotional photos, review links, venue details etc. There may be one or more content contributor defining the look and feel for the data and the selection of the data for use on that content article. Adding the data for use in the display can be done via the front end as shown below or via the admin side of the site. The publisher may impose an approval workflow on the content creator prior to publication as well.
Jentla CCK will have a dynamic display creation process too. More on that in another post.
No other CCK separates the data definition from the creation of how it is going to look on the site. This is because the other CCK implementations come from a mindset where the sole developer does everything on a site, from defining the data to designing the display, to entering the data.
Jentla's CCK is an enterprise extension with the architecture any enterprise or system's architect would expect.
