Before I was overcome with a hell-bent desire to actually learn how to program, ExpressionEngine (EE) let me build relatively powerful custom database-driven ap

Before I was overcome with a hell-bent desire to actually learn how to program, ExpressionEngine (EE) let me build relatively powerful custom database-driven applications without using any code except its template tags in addition to the obligatory HTML/CSS/Javascript. If that's the definition of what a CMS is supposed to do, then I think EE nails it. I haven't used it since 2005, but it looks like they've been steadily improving (their dev team was really responsive) and I believe EE was used to run Change.gov. It has a powerful templating engine. My inner designer is obsessive about fine-grained control over the end result of any project I do, and I don't remember a time when EE prevented me from achieving the design I wanted. I also liked its custom fields and 'weblogs'. EE 'weblogs' can be thought of as custom database tables, which are easily created and modified by the EE graphical interface. You can then create as many custom fields as you want, and relationships between fields, and then insert your data however you want into your website using simple template tags. So, for example, I made a personal website in which I could keep track of books I'd read, the authors, quotes that I liked, and my book reviews. Each kind of item was stored in its own table and I could insert all the relevant information for any book into a blog post by using a custom tag.