About the CMS
What is a CMS?
A Content Management System (CMS) is a collection of procedures used to manage work flow in a collaborative environment. These procedures can be manual or computer-based. The procedures are designed to:
- Allow for large number of people to contribute to and share stored data
- Control access to data, based on user roles. User roles are used to define each use as to what information they can view or edit
- Aid in easy storage and retrieval of data
- Reduce repetitive duplicate input
- Improve the ease of report writing
- Improve communication between users
In a CMS, data can be defined as almost anything - documents, movies, pictures, phone numbers, scientific data, etc. CMSs are frequently used for storing, controlling, revising, and publishing documentation. Content that is controlled is industry-specific. (Entertainment content differs from the design of a fighter jet). There are various terms for systems (related processes) that do this. Examples include: Web Content Management, Digital Asset Management, Digital Records Management, Electronic Content Management (and others). Synchronization of intermediate steps, and collation into a final product are common goals of each.
Why Use a CMS?
CMS have a plethora of great features that you can utilize to streamline your website content editing process. Below is a simple list of some of these great features.
- Content only exists in one place so there is no need to worry about overwriting someone elses changes.
- There are an infinite number of history states, so if you have made a change viewable to the public by mistake, you can go to the last page in the history and restore that version.
- You can login to your website from anywhere in the world and edit your site without any special software on your computer.
- You can limit content by implimenting workflows.
- You can create private areas of your website without any programming knowledge.
- You can easily add images or files to your site and keep them in one organized spot.