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Professional Growth

content management system

As I get further into web development I've started thinking and worrying about handing the keys over to clients. I haven't really looked into what a CMS is, but is that what I think it is. Where can I read about this, what's a good source for it?

4 Answers

Wordpress is a CMS and there is a treehouse track specifically for it. You might start there. What are your concerns with "handing the keys over to clients"?

No, it's not about the template. A content management system -as the phrase suggests- is a system that allows you to manage your content. Meaning that the client will be able to update his/her website, add new pages, edit, etc. without needing to find a web designer to do that for them. It's not like having a static html site for example, where the site's content is "inside the code". A developer can build a custom CMS for his/her clients' websites. (You need back-end development skills for this) Or you can build your site on an existing open-source CMS. The most commonly known are WordPress, Drupal, and Joomla --with WP being the most popular.

That answered my question. So essentially a CMS works like a template and certain things can be changed? Like Word Press?

That's probably not a bad way of thinking about it. You can use a CMS for things like blogs or websites that have constantly changing content. The nice thing is that they usually come with things like content editors and user management systems so you don't have to build these on your own.

Music to my ears. Thanks!