Content Management
BareBones CMS™
I have designed and built a content management system (CMS) to specifically cater to the needs of small websites for small business - I call it the BareBones CMS™.
Using a CMS will greatly increase your ability to respond to your customers needs, to market changes, and your own inspirations.
The BareBones CMS™ is a deliberately simple system that allows you to manage content, such as the ability to:
- create, edit and delete pages
- organise and/or re-order the relationship of pages
- manage text-based content:
- heading styles
- paragraph styles
- lists
- tabular data
- manage common image-based content:
- photos
- photo galleries
- illustrations
- charts/graphs
- manage common document-based content:
- PDF files
- Word files
- Excel files
- manage multimedia-based content
- pixel-based animations (such as gif animations)
- vector-based animations (such as Macromedia Flash shockwave files)
- video
- change formatting using specific customised settings:
- alignment of text and images
- choosing pre-existing custom design styles for text and aspects of layout.
Self-managing your website content
Not too long ago, the only way a website owner could professionally manage or update their content was to either learn the technical coding skills themselves, or by employing a designer/developer (usually at hourly rates) to do the work.
This situation was usually not a practical option for either party. Maintenance invariably took a long time for the designer/developer to get onto, and the costs to the owner were often high and repeated.
Web developers saw the need to make a website content management system (CMS). These CMS would allow website owners the freedom to manage the website content by themselves, without the need for highly technical training, or high dependence upon the designer/developer.
However, a common criticism of many CMS is that they are too complex for the average needs. Personally, I too could not find a system that I felt comfortable promoting to my clients, so I set about making my own—the BareBones CMS—which aims to fulfil the most common authoring requirements of a small website.