Content Management System (CMS)

By Mahesh Ugale

CMS, a newest and hottest technology in Web Hosting World

Content management is the organizing, categorizing, and structuring of information resources (text,

images, documents etc.) so that they can be stored, published, and edited with ease and flexibility. A

content management system (CMS) is used to collect, manage, and publish content, storing the content

either as components or whole documents, while maintaining dynamic links between components.

Content management is the organizing, categorizing, and structuring of information resources (text,

images, documents etc.) so that they can be stored, published, and edited with ease and flexibility. A

content management system (CMS) is used to collect, manage, and publish content, storing the content

either as components or whole documents, while maintaining dynamic links between components.

CMSs allow end-users (typically authors of some sort) to provide new content in the form of articles. The

articles are typically entered as plain text, perhaps with markup to indicate where other resources (such

as pictures) should be placed. The system then uses rules to style the article, which separates the display

from the content, which has a number of advantages when trying to get many articles to conform to a

consistent "look and feel". The system then adds the articles to a larger collection for publishing.

The systems also often include some sort of concept of the workflow for the target users, which defines

how the new content is to be routed around the system.

A good example of a CMS would be a system for managing a newspaper. In such a system the reporters

type articles into the system, which stores them in a database. Along with the article the system stores

attributes, including keywords, the date and time of filing, the reporter's name, etc. The system then

uses these attributes to find out, given its workflow rules, who should proofread the article, approve it

for publication, edit it, etc. Later the editors can choose which articles to include (or ignore) in an edition

of the newspaper, which is then laid out and printed automatically.

How Content Management System Work

1. A professional web developer designs a web page format - typically with a logo at the top, and

standard navigation options across the top, down the left hand side, and/or at the foot of the page.

2. This new format is used to create a master template.

3. All the web developers in the organization get to use special software that lets them add text and

images to web pages, automatically using the master template.

4. A professional web developer designs a web page format - typically with a logo at the top, and

standard navigation options across the top, down the left hand side, and/or at the foot of the page.

5. This new format is used to create a master template.

6. All the web developers in the organization get to use special software that lets them add text and

images to web pages, automatically using the master template.

7. Each completed page is submitted to an editor, who might make changes or send it back to the writer

for revision. When the page is OK, the editor clicks an on-screen PUBLISH button and uploads the page

to the web server, so that the world can read it.

8. Each page is usually saved on a text database. Most web pages have file names that end in .htm or

.html, but sometimes you will see pages ending in other file extensions, such as .php. These are often

generated by content management systems. However, some CMSs will generate plain .html pages,

which are more easily found by search engines.

9. The CMS also generates indexes, showing what files have been changed when, who updated which

file, and so on.

10. The more elaborate CMS perform a lot more functions (such as archives, built-in search engines,

permission control, and workflow management), but the above ones are basic.

11. Giving control back to content owners, allowing them to user their web browser to add and edit

content on the site with no special knowledge required.

12. Separating page content from format and design, creating a more consistent look and feel across the

site.

13. Faster publication of content and updates as well as immediate site-wide changes.

14. Automation of all navigation, internal links, and other site sections where rules can be imposed on

content, eliminating internal broken links or orphaned pages .

15. The ability to schedule the publication or expiration of a page and all links to that page.

16. Development of workflow and approval processes; turning management of your website into a

business process.

17. The ability to customize the level of design and formatting control given to site authors.

18. Development of user templates for content delivery using existing site design or in conjunction with

a site redesign.

19. Development of customized approval workflow.

20. Creation of user accounts and roles to fit your desired level of control and access.

21. Integration with existing applications and databases.

22. User training to assist content authors in becoming familiar with the system

Benefits of Content Management System

o Content Authoring: This allows your content contributors to create content and store it in the

repository. There are many tools and styles.

o Workflow Management: This allows you to monitor, adjust, and maintain the process through which

the creation and publishing tasks are done in your organization. Systems range from highly complex to

quite simple, but all give you a set of tools to manage the activities of authors and the progress of

content.

o Content Storage: This feature keeps the content sensibly organized and accessible. Most CMS use a

relational database; the point is to store the content in one place and in a consistent fashion.

Content Authoring: This allows your content contributors to create content and store it in the

repository. There are many tools and styles.

Workflow Management: This allows you to monitor, adjust, and maintain the process through which the

creation and publishing tasks are done in your organization. Systems range from highly complex to quite

simple, but all give you a set of tools to manage the activities of authors and the progress of content.

Content Storage: This feature keeps the content sensibly organized and accessible. Most CMS use a

relational database; the point is to store the content in one place and in a consistent fashion.

Publication Management: This allows you to organize your content with metadata and formatting. CMS

have different ways of approaching this, but the better ones allow you to define and manage your

metadata and your templates.

Publishing: Publishing allows you to merge the content data and the content formatting and move it

from the repository to your publication. Different methods exist, but they all allow you to push the

content out to some publicly accessible place without the help of your tech team.

Content portability: Since the CMS stores content as data, that data can be inserted into any appropriate

output format or template. If you want your article to appear with a blue background in your Members

section, but with a yellow background in your General Information section, you don't need to write your

article twice. Instead, you write it once and assign it to the blue template and the yellow template.

Design flexibility: Similarly, since the CMS stores the templates separate from the content data, if you

want to make a design change, however small (such as changing the font color on a particular type of

page) or sweeping (such as changing the font color, type, and size throughout your site), you only need

to change the template; the CMS handles the rest.

Single Storage in a Single Place: In a CMS, all the content data is stored in one place, in a consistent way

and perhaps most importantly, only once.

If you've ever suffered because you have nine different versions of an article and you can't figure out

which one to use, you'll be happier with a CMS. The system maintains one copy of the content,

regardless of how you plan to use it.

If, for example, you have a press release that's displayed in your Press Release section, your News

Section, and your Archives section, and a mistake is discovered, the process for fixing it will be easier.

Without a CMS, you would probably have to fix the mistake in three files; with a CMS, you would fix it in

one file (because there's only one data file anyway), and the change appears in all three locations.

Because your content is stored consistently in one system, it's much easier to create relationships

(usually hyperlinks) between content pieces and maintain them. For example, if you have several pieces

that link to each other, and you move one, the CMS will make the necessary changes to keep the links

working.

It's also simpler to create a new piece of content by aggregating other pieces. For example, let's say you

have a collection of Internet tips, each stored as a separate Piece of content, but all united by the same

metadata. A CMS makes it easy to present all those pieces together by creating a template that shows

all content that had the metadata, in this case, "type: tip" and "subject: internet". It's also much easier

to survey what you have

Finally, should you decide to take all your content and migrate it to some new format, the process

should be much easier.

This entire means more time and money saved: you don't duplicate work, you don't lose content, and

you spend less time managing content.

Workflow Management: Any good CMS will have some sort of workflow management scheme. This

usually involves defining certain roles -- such as author, editor, and publisher -- and giving each of those

roles some abilities and responsibilities.

Likewise, content can exist in a number of states, such as draft, final, published, or archive, and each

state has certain characteristics.

Combine the roles and the states, wrap some logic around it, and you have a workflow system. The

author is assigned to create the draft, the editor is notified that the draft is ready to be edited, etc.

Workflow management facilitates better communication, progress tracking, and more efficient content

transitions. Even a basic system will notify the appropriate role that a piece of content has reached a

state where it needs attention. More advanced systems allow all sorts of triggers and controls to be put

into place. None of these features are going to do the work of managing your processes; rather, they

give you better visibility into the process and better tools to do the work.

The major gain here is control, which saves time and money by speeding communication and preventing

mistakes. The workflow system handles much of the communication, tracking, and measuring so your

authors, editors, and publishers can concentrate on writing, reviewing, and publishing, instead of

walking around checking on things, looking for lost drafts, and trying to figure out where all the time has

gone.

Automated Publishing: When it comes to freeing technical resources from publishing tasks, almost any

CMS shines. The CMS allows non-technical people to schedule, trigger, and otherwise manage the

process of moving the content to the production environment.

If your valuable technical people are constantly distracted by pushing out small text changes, regularly

releasing new articles, or fixing layout issues, the CMS will change their worlds. With a CMS in place,

these tasks become things that publishers and editors can do, usually with a powerful set of tools

available within the CMS. The technical people maintain the CMS, but it's at much higher level, and their

time is greatly freed to handle more technical issues throughout your organization.

Usually, the actual time required to publish your content is reduced. More importantly, the time it does

take is spent by the most appropriate people (authors, editors, publishers), and not by people who are

probably supposed to be working on a new Web site feature or tuning up the network.

Hopefully, you have a more specific idea of what a CMS does, and how a CMS might save your

organization time, effort, and therefore money. On top of that, a CMS will enable you to better manage

your content, therefore making it more usable for you and your constituency

envisage CMS is a fully feature packed CMS, designed to be a true WYSIWYG website editor.

The content management software is accessed via any browser, wherever you are in the world, allowing

you to manage your website with no technical knowledge of HTML or any other languages.

For more info visit : www.envisagecms.co.uk