During the international Joomla Event JandBeyond in Germany three weeks ago I had the pleasure to present a talk on how to choose a Joomla Extension. I am happy to share the slides here with you now.
In short, my overall conclusion is: 'Less is More'. We see broken sites every day and have to tell clients every day that the fact you could install an extension doesn't mean you should!
- There is a cost to free software: integration, maintenance and support
- With the ever growing importance of Going Mobile, the vast majority of extensions does not play well with the small screen sizes
- Extensions add up to a certain level of security risks.
- Code conflicts doesn't contribute to User Experience
- Never use a live website to test extensions, setup a seperate site for development and testing!
- Extensions that aren't used will be forgotten easily.
- The fact that the software is 'open sourced' doesn't mean the source is reliable. Only use proven technology from reliable sources on business critical applications!
