Agree, most of the already made have tons of feature that you never use, lack of those you need and usually are very complicated to setup and maintain. As deadmoon, I coded my own CMS
my own framework, libraries and cms the cms's above are a load of BLOAT (just take a look at the source code) i codded my own php5 solution
drupal. It's quick, great modules, phptemplate ensures making new themes is easy and theming particular content types, too.
Drupal is my choice... very easily extended and near complete controll over everything... I wouldn't go for it if you are a beginner though ... gdev
Writing your own CMS is a great way to learn a lot about PHP (or whatever language you write it in). The only problem I see with it is that it's all well and good to say 'all the others are bloated', but that's because of what they offer. The system you write is most likely a lot more restricted than the others so when you start to add more functionality, you end up emulating these other systems... Now, I'm not saying that's a bad thing or that you are actually bound to end up doing that... it's just that a lot of people start out with good intentions and end up with a lot of work Bloat is a subjective description, I believe. The above mentioned systems run pretty smoothly with a fair load on a relatively cheap server. The way I see it is this: I could either write my own system and ensure it runs as well as possible, or I could use that time to do more paid work and then pay a sliver of that extra income and up my hosting. To me, it's an opportunity cost thing. Add to that the fact that by using Joomla, for example, I essentially have a small army of core developers working for me, with dozens of people writing plugins to try and preempt my future requirements. I like that!
http://www.xaraya.com Not simple to learn by any means, but incredibly powerful once you get to know it. The support IRC is a must visit if you're making your own themes like me.
One problem with Joomla is, when you install the mods, components and so on, it's use apache as default users, and it sucks when you want to edit the code using dreamweaver or any editor straight out of the box, then come joomla explorer, but also sucks, yes you can edit the file, but only within, not with any editor connected to it, so you cannot see the real format code inside, just plain text editor with joomla explorer, worst when you want to backup all the files, within ftp, you will get permission error, unless you have root in your hand, so i make my to subdreamer, no more headache, pull out some bucks and you will get a life ..
voted for joomla, i find it more generically useful.. drupal has a very interesting taxonomy feature though..