The disadvantages of Content Management Systems
Of course, every web design company that owns or resells a CMS system will tout its numerous advantages but most will fail to inform their customers of the disadvantages that CMS or content management systems have.
There are 2 types of content management systems available. Dynamic websites allow users to instantaneously update web content and batch publishing where web content is updated on the user's local computer and the website is then updated at a nominated time, usually late at night. For the purpose of this article, the disadvantages of dynamic website content management systems will be discussed.
How does a Content Management System work?
A Content Management System works by storing pictures and text into a database. When a webpage is requested, the CMS system accesses the database and renders the webpage. Because the data is separated from the code, changes to the data can be made using a web interface that requires no knowledge of HTML or ftp.
For a content management system to work, software like asp, php or cgi must be installed on the server and the software written to fit the configuration of the server.
Content Management systems are resource hungry
The disadvantage of content management systems are that they are resource hungry. The servers they run on need to be maintained by technicians, and content management requires more memory, CPU power and software maintenance. Small setting changes in the server can cause the entire content management system to fail and as a consequence the website will not be viewable or return errors.
Badly coded CMS, or CMS systems that have been developed on Access instead of SQL will slow down with increasing numbers of users. Even well coded dynamic websites will take up more server cpu and memory than the exact same website produced with HTML code.
Content Management hosting is expensive
If you want reliable hosting for a content management system, then expect to pay money to get it.
Without technical support, proper management of shared hosting resources and server maintenance, you can expect to have problems. The added complication of resource hungry content management systems and the need to have qualified technicians maintain and upgrade software and hardware, means that hosting for content management systems is expensive.
Content Management systems need to be upgraded to changes in software
Like cars, content management systems depreciate. There is no guarantees that the content management system purchased today will work in 5 or 10 years time without a developer spending time on upgrades to make it compatible to software changes. New versions of Windows, server software and office software will impact on the functionality of the content manaement system.
Many CMS systems do not index properly on search engines
The benefit of publishing a website is to get the added benefit of search engine visibility but unfortunately a major disadvantage of many content management systems is that they do not index properly on search engines. Read Dynamic webpages that are indexed by Google for more information
Buy or rent a CMS
If you buy a content management system, you are responsible for the costs of these upgrades. It is only if you rent a content management system from an application service provider, that the responsibility for upgrades and trouble shooting is no longer a cost that has to be budgeted for. The issue with renting an application, is that you are unable to customize the site and this negates the benefit of having a CMS that fits your needs.
Conclusion
If you are updating your website regularly; on a daily or weekly basis, then a content management system is a logical choice. (Ensure that you do some reallocation of staff duties to allow time for staff to update the website because although it may only take a couple of minutes to publish a webpage, someone still has to write, proof read, type set and reduce the size of images and that takes time. Failure to reallocate human resources will often mean that many companies buy a CMS system but rarely use it)
If you are not going to update your website regularly, then a static HTML website is easier to maintain and cheaper to host. HTML websites are not as resource hungry and can be moved relatively easily, if you want to change hosting companies. It is also easier to find someone that can program in HTML than it is to find a developer to fix a CMS system should things go wrong.