# CMS

> Software that lets people publish and edit a website's content without writing code.

- Level: Basic
- Topics: Software
- URL: https://tidbit.legios.com.ar/cms/
- In Spanish: [CMS](https://tidbit.legios.com.ar/es/cms/)

A **CMS** (content management system) is software for creating, editing and publishing the content of a website through forms, without touching HTML. An editor logs in, writes a title, pastes some text, uploads a photo and clicks "Publish"; the CMS stores it in a database and fills in the site's design template to produce the finished page.

The point is a clean split of jobs. Developers and designers build the templates and features once; writers, marketers and shop owners then add pages, news and products every day on their own. A CMS usually adds users and roles (who can write, who can approve), drafts, scheduled posts and a history of changes.

**WordPress** is the best-known example, open source and used by a very large share of the web; Drupal and Joomla are other long-standing ones, and services like Wix or Squarespace bundle a CMS with hosting. A newer style, the **headless CMS**, only stores and serves the content through an API, and leaves the look to separate apps, so the same article can appear on a website, a phone app and a smart screen.

## An analogy

A newspaper's layout system. Reporters type their stories into fixed boxes for headline, body and photo; the page designers already decided how a front page looks, so each story lands in the right place automatically.

## Keep in mind

- Lets non-programmers create and edit web content through forms.
- Separates content (stored in a database) from design (templates).
- Adds roles, drafts, scheduling and change history.
- A headless CMS serves content through an API to any app or site.

## Go deeper

- [CMS (MDN glossary)](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Glossary/CMS)
- [Content management system on Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Content_management_system)
- [About WordPress (wordpress.org)](https://wordpress.org/about/)

## Related terms

- [HTML](https://tidbit.legios.com.ar/html/): The text format that describes what is on a web page: headings, paragraphs, links.
- [Database](https://tidbit.legios.com.ar/database/): An organized store of data that programs can search and update safely.
- [Open source](https://tidbit.legios.com.ar/open-source/): Software whose code anyone can read, use, change and share.
- [API](https://tidbit.legios.com.ar/api/): The menu of things one program lets another program ask for.