What is a CMS?
CMS stands for Content Management System: a web application for creating and managing websites. You can check it on Wikipedia:CMS
Why use a CMS?
Here is a simple comparison between CMS and Custom Websites:
Ease of Use: CMS make it easier for people with little or no technical skills to create and edit web pages. While with custom websites, they will need to know HTML, CSS and sometimes Javascript and some programming languages such as PHP or ASP.
Extensibility: adding new functionality to your website is easier and faster by using CMS modules and plugins, while it has to be coded from scratch with custom websites, most of the times.
Flexibility: Custom websites might have more flexibility and you can modify the code without worrying about the CMS limitations. Although with open source CMS, such as Joomla or Drupal, you can workaround these limitations most of the times.
Changing Design: in a good CMS, content is separate from design, and I can change the design with a click of a button. This is much harder with a custom website, even if the custom site is completly CSS based.
Time: custom websites take more time to build than a CMS.
For example, adding a membership section to the Women in Technology Lebanon website is a matter of minutes, or couple of hours if some advanced configuration and customization should be made. While adding a membership section on a custom built website, will require that you know html, css, and be able to create and configure a database.
I strongly believe and recommend that every website should use a CMS, even for tech savvy people.
What do you think?
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5 comments:
July 30, 2009 at 9:59 AM
Hi,
I have worked as a web developer for more than 18 months, and I used to use Drupal. And OF COURSE, CMSs are a much better option for web development, nobody can argue that.
My only concern is that we have to keep the program sustainability in mind, and I mean the sustainability of all aspects of the program including the websites we develop. The reason why I used static HTML for the WIT/ Jordan site was to keep the pages simple for anybody to edit if we hand the site to other entities in the future. Or even if in the futire another IT Coordinator is hired and has no web background. A very simple example of what might go wrong, is having error #28 on MySQL (which indicates that no space is left on device). How could someone with no MySQL or web background handle that? Unless it becomes a standard to hire IT Coordinators with such backgrounds which I think might not be very convenient.
Many thanks and regards,
Lubna Al-Shami
It Coordinator of WIT Jordan
July 30, 2009 at 8:02 PM
Hi Moustafa,
Thank you for the post! I am not a techie but have some very basic knowledge of updating websites through DreamWeaver. And I agree, changing design and customizing our (non CMS-based) website is very time-consuming. Your post is tempting me to learn more about CMS-based websites - esp. if we want to create a new website sometime.
Thanks,
Shradha
June 21, 2012 at 9:37 AM
I totally agree. Every new site should use a CMS instead of static pages. Of course, if you develop a static site, you might get depressed and need some anti-depressant medications to help you out.
June 21, 2012 at 9:42 AM
Also, if you need help putting that new CMS into action, visit Metrex, a great company for developing small business websites on open source CMS platforms.
September 25, 2012 at 12:52 PM
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