[aklug] Re: Coding websites by text editor...

On Mon, Aug 16, 2010 at 06:30:06PM -0800, Damien Hull wrote:
> Now picture your self coding something like CNN.com by text editor.
> Not going to happen.

Long before you get to CNN's level, a website is basically a web
framework, built from templates, with content submitters submitting raw
paragraphs, with little to no markup. The framework is responsible for
indexing everything, and formatting it properly for presentation. Most,
if not all, of the content is shoved into a database.

The site designers are more than likely long gone; perhaps you keep one
on hand to generate some graphics every once in a while, but the site is
designed. The programmers have built the basic framework, they fix
bugs. It's essentially a deployed program, with various assets that may
need occasional updating, but the content is uploaded by people whose
primary job is generating content (reporters, photographers).

So in some sense, I suppose you can say they're using a CMS. But you
don't need to use a CMS for everything. All of my sites are generated
from templates; once I have the basic design down, I do very little
mucking with actual HTML unless I'm redesigning something. You could
also view my means of maintaining sites as using a CMS, though my CMS
tends to be a version control system (CVS, Mercurial).

I suppose the site designers could've used DreamWeaver, or some other
IDE to start. The programmers could've used whatever IDE is appropriate
for the language they're working in. The question is largely
irrelevant; everyone involved picks the tools they like best. This
could be vim for many of them, and it's perfectly viable for that sort
of work.

--
Michael Fowler
www.shoebox.net
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