Lines of Code
ucms.php - Local Content Management
Using a content management system (cms) hosted on a live web server allows several people to update a site. It also allows submission of news items and other interactive functions to be automated in real time.
At the same time, it exposes the server to the risk of running several large and complex tools that need constant updates to avoid any new exploit that may be discovered.
A site that does not need several remote managers or interactive features is better built off line, tested and then uploaded to the web server.
Only the most basic tools are needed for this, a simple text editor and graphics program can be used to create a any web page.
As each page needs to contain links to other pages in a site, once the site becomes bigger than a handful of pages, maintaining links and other common features on each page every time one of them is altered or new pages added becomes a major pain.
This is where some kind of content management really helps, pages are stored without any notion of other pages within the site.
On a 'live' system, when a page is requested, it is put together and delivered to the web browser together with any links or references to the rest of the site (some content managers store a pre-built version of a page to save time, rebuilding the page when some part of it changes). The pages are generally stored in a database and 'interpreted' together with any template and menu system to create the page a visitor sees.
Sites that do not need to change in real time can be compiled offline by a cms like ucms.php and uploaded. This allows the site to be constructed of mainly harmless html code that is also search engine friendly. It also reduces greatly both the load on the server and the ammount to running code that needs to be maintained.
If an online cms needs modifying or extra modules installed, there is a risk that the changes may break the site, or introduce some exploitable weakness in security.
With an offline cms like the one presented here, it is possible to alter the way it works, and test the output without putting the live site at risk.