A simple way to see what CMS a website is like?

[kiddingguy]

Some websites look awesome, some don't.

Is there a way to quickly spot its CMS/build: Joomla, Wordpress, other CMS, customized CMS in a source code or whatever?

Maybe even who build the website?

[AnthonySterling]

Nope.

[the better twin]

F12 look at the code. if its WordPress there will be probably be reference to files in the wp-content folder.

Not sure about the others.

[AlexMagik]

look at the source of the page, see if any folder, like "wp-content" for wordpress, or others that are not the usual /images, etc. If there is a cms, you can probably find some kind of info in the source. Also you may want to look at the header of the page, if there is anything passing through like "Powered by: " or stuff like that.

[Fourjays Veteran]

You can look for a meta generator tag, as some CMS' announce themselves via it.

Apart from that, you can tell via other various signs if you learn what to look for. Wordpress sites will have directories prefixed with wp- as already mentioned. Joomla sites often have "com_option" or "option_com" or something like that in the URL. Drupal sites can often be easily spotted as they look like other Drupal sites (unless a very thorough job is done by the designer). You can also tell by some of the functionality which will be similar between Drupal sites.

If it is a homegrown CMS then you probably wouldn't be able to tell.

[Plarkster]

Try http://builtwith.com

[Site Lab]

Theres an addon for firefox. Tells you what CMS it uses, if it uses jquery/motools.etc. I wil find it for you now and post it here.

[TextOnAFlatScreen]

Try http://builtwith.com

That is flippin useful. A wonderful resource.

[+Eternal Tempest MVC]

My web hosting (A Small Orange) has a simple scripting system where I choose from a large variety of open source CMS, and I can click it will auto setup the files, set up the DB and admin account. Then I can sign in and play. I can go back to uninstall it, and it will clean everything up. For me, wordpress seemed like the best fit at the time.

 

In the past I've done http://dragonflycms.org/ - essentially the old php nuke, with the cpg gallery merged with the code re-written to fix a lot of the security issues with php nuke.

 

Most's CMS have the theme and the data / configuration separate and offer a lot of skins/themes you can install or make for the site.

 

Example - This is one of my sites, http://www.etanime.com/, using word press, with this free theme - http://www.bluelimemedia.com/themes/mon-cahier/

[Squuiid]

Try http://builtwith.com

Wow. Thank you for this!

[riahc3]

Hello,

Theres an addon for firefox. Tells you what CMS it uses, if it uses jquery/motools.etc. I wil find it for you now and post it here.

I know this is a OLD OLD OLD thread but Im intrested in this addon if it still exists and/or working :)

Might be this: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/wappalyzer/

Thank you

[riahc3]

   

[ACTIONpack]

CMS does not tell you how good the site design is. The CMS is only the back end getting stuff upload with text and images. A good designer is what important.

[roosevelt]

I have been using all kinds of CMS for both work and my own projects and have done both designing and programming. From my experinece when you are familiar with different CMS, you will notice they follow a specific framework or a design pattern. For example, if you look at Neowin Forum, you will see it is very similar to other websites using a Forum. And the formatting of how the threads are displayed will give you a pretty good clue whether it is using IPS or PHPBB or vBulletin. Looking at the source again or the URL structure can also give you a lot of clue :)