Dolphin or Joomla? Need advice, please :)

Hi all, this is my first post here.

We're trying to decide whether we should use BoonEx Dolphin or Joomla to build an upcoming social network website. The main issue is that although my partner in this is a very experienced website developer, he won't have a lot of time to help out. Therefore, the bulk of the work involved in creating and administering the site will fall on my shoulders. I do have a lot of experience with business software and some scripting (batch files, macros, basic html), but I am a total noob when it comes to PHP and website development. Given enough time I can figure out just about any software I've had to use, but in this case we want to be up and running soonest, so my learning curve needs to be as easy as possible.

I like the fact that Joomla is totally open source and has a large, active community, but the two examples I've found of people using it for social networking sites are a little intimidating. I was left with the impression that the webmasters are experts at Joomla, PHP and website development in general.

BoonEx Dolphin presents itself as being a "social network in a can", so to speak, and the branding issue isn't a concern since it's pretty cheap to have it removed. However, I've heard some complaints as to its reliability and support, although I've so far read nothing definitive enough to steer me away from it.

Bottom line: At this point I'm intimidated by Joomla and impressed by how BoonEx presents itself on its website. However, I'm experienced enough to know that you can't just go by a company's advertising.

So, does anyone here have some experience with either or both Dolphin or Joomla? Can anyone give me some hard info - beyond vagaries like "their support sucks, dood!" - on the the good, bad and ugly of these two packages?

My apologies for such a long-winded post, and thank you in advance for any insight, suggestions and help you can provide.

Cheers

 

Go with Joomla, it has a wider base and if you have problems more people are familiar with it and could help.

 

I suggest that you look in the CM forum

http://forums.digitalpoint.com/forumdisplay.php?f=51

You will find threads like this one

http://forums.digitalpoint.com/showthread.php?t=515666

 

@TechnoGeek: Very helpful. Thanks

 

You are welcome. Just add some green (reputation) ;-)

 

Joomla I suggest

 

Looks like we're going with Joomla. Thanks, everyone

 

Joomla is the best choice

 

Joomla might have a little more of a learning curve, yet you will be happy when you start learning some of it.. Because it has a huge user base and development community with nice helpful people and forums abound. On top of that thousands and thousands of plugins, themes, modules, mambots and components, which allow many great things to be done..

Have a lot of fun!
Boulder

 

Welcome to Joomla. Be sure to choose a good host even if you need to pay a bit more.