modx CMS

• Overview
  • Features
  • General Requirements
  • 0.9.6.x Installation
  • 0.9.6.x Documentation
  • Revolution Documentation
  • Books, Tutorials & Training
  • Solutions
  • Screenshots
  • Made in MODx
  • User Profiles
  • FAQ
  • Get Help

Frequently Asked Questions

The MODx FAQ provide concise answers and pointers to things that come up frequently in the course of supporting the project.

Please start your search here and if you don't see what you're looking for please submit questions to our FAQ. Someone from the team should get back to you soon.

How do you properly capitalize "MODx"?

While the logo is all lowercase, the reality of starting sentences when referring to our humble software is mind-numbingly obtuse. When writing the word we decided to stick with the legacy usage of "MODx", despite some early usage in all-lowercase during the rebranding effort.

How do you pronounce MODx?

Please see this blog post. In short, it's intended to be a soft-o, as in "modular", plus the "x" as in "extendable". It was never intended to be pronounced with a long-o as in "mode", but if you insist we can live with that too (even though it's wrong). You can also see the MODx Wikipedia entry for the international phonetic pronunciation.

What do I need to run MODx?

MODx runs on a variety of machines and environments. You'll have best results by using a recent version of PHP, MySQL and Apache. For friendly URLs the fastest route to success is using the Apapche mod_rewrite module. For more information you can view our General Requirements page.

What's the fastest way to get familiar with MODx?

MODx has some amazing community members who've written some incredible tutorials and books on our humble Open Source CMS project. You might want to review some helpful resources to quickly familiarize yourself with the MODx way.

How much does MODx cost?

The MODx project does not charge any licensing fees for using our software. Licensed as a GNU GPL project, the only costs you'll directly incur are those you choose, such as servers, services and bandwidth.

How do I submit a fix for a bug in the code?

If a bug report for an issue does not already exist for the particular problem, please create a report in our bug tracker (Jira), and submit the patch report to our peer code review system (Crucible) for consideration. After the patch is reviewed by the core team, and assuming it adequately resolves the issue without side effects, it will be committed to the development branch for a future release.

How do I get source commit privileges?

First, start submitting patches for open bugs to our bug tracker (Jira), and submit the patch report to our peer code review system (Crucible) for consideration. After you've solved a few bugs, ping the core developers and request commit rights.

How good is MODx?

MODx is so good, Chuck Norris cowers in fear.

Do I have to know how to code in order to use MODx?

To run a site from day to day, definitely not. If you're familiar with Microsoft Word you typically can be productive in MODx in an hour or less for sites that have been set up for "normal" content editors and end users. To set up a site you should be familiar with the basic building blocks of the web: HTML, CSS and JS, and be proficient in building sites manually.

Can I use my favorite Javascript library with MODx?

Yes, MODx imposes no restrictions whatsoever on what comes out on the front end.

How big of a site can I build with MODx?

For the MODx Evolution/0.9.6.x branch of software, and depending on your server configuration, the caching system may run into size and performance limitations around 5,000 documents, but this is only a rough guideline. The Revolution branch has no limits.

Why multiple versions?

• 0.9.6.x – the original code base that started with it's first production/stable release as version 0.9.0 at the end of October 2005.
• Evolution – a cleaned up and refined distribution of 0.9.6.x with conventions and terminology more in line with our totally rewritten Revolution release.
• Revolution – a fully object oriented and completely new branch that's been in development for more than 2 years that addresses limitations found in the original code base such as having a truly recursive parser and eliminating the 5,000 document ceiling.

Can I upgrade from my exisitng 0.9.6.x/Evolution site to Revolution?

In most cases an upgrade will simply work. If you have proprietary code (snippets) you may need to make minor modifications to update to the new API.

Does MODx offer revisioning and rollbacks? Publishing workflow?

These features are not currently in the core release, but they are planned for a later releases of Revolution.

Why doesn't the MODx Manager validate?

You have to know the rules in order to break them, and we know the rules. In addition, lack of strict validation in the Manager has absolutely zero impact on usability or functionality, and in fact has just the opposite effect in this case.

Can MODx run multiple sites off of a single installation?

Yes. Though the technique is different on each version. For instructions for multiple sites in Evolution/0.9.6.x, see the instructions in the forums. For Revolution, see the wiki article for one method.

Does MODx support multiple languages?

Yes. The back-end manager is available in more than 20 different languages. For front-end sites with multiple languages, please see several solutions in our forums.