June 27, 2017

So you are thinking about your new website, but not sure where to start ? Let’s start at the very beginning. The very first thing you should know is that there are mostly only 2 different types of websites today, namely static websites and content management systems. A static website is the most basic website you can create and is relatively easy to build and deploy. After writing a couple of html web pages, you can easily deploy them onto a web server to be served to the rest of the world. You do not require any database or underlying platform for a static site to work.

The words “content management system” implies a system that you can use to manage content, specifically on your website, but how does wordpress fit into all of this and how is wordpress different from any other content management system out there ? Wordpress is a name that is heard more often than not in the past decade and has grown to become one of the most popular content management systems (cms) in the market today.

The wordpress platform allows you to choose from a variety of themes and styles to personalise your website and has a large amount of community plugins to extend your website functionality. It also provides mobile layouts and views out of the box. Wordpress makes it easy for anyone to deploy their website really fast without worrying too much about all of the technical details.

A little bit of history

Wordpress was initially written and released in 2003 as a blogging platform. Because of this, it continues to be one of the best blogging platforms today and has since evolved into a full featured and stable platform that anyone can use.

All of the standard features you’d expect from a blog such as categories, posts, archives and comments are all part of the wordpress platform. While being great at blogs, wordpress is also robust and flexible enough to enable developers and creators to build any type of website they can think of.

The platform also provides you with all the tools needed to effortlessly publish pages and articles on your website without being overly complicated. If you need to list events or even sell products, wordpress has a solution for you.

If you would have asked anyone 10 years ago what platform is the best to build a new website on, they would have almost instantly named one of the most popular cms platforms such as drupal, wordpress or joomla. One of the main reasons for this is because it is easy to deploy and easy for users to change their own content.

Today, things are a little more complicated and each technology plays an important part.

Moving forward

Deciding on a wordpress website can be accomplished by asking yourself some of the following questions. Do I need to change and manage content on my website myself ? Also, how often does content changes occur on my website. If you anticipate many content changes on a weekly or monthly basis, then a cms platform such as wordpress is probably the best. However, if you have minimal changes, it would be best to consider a static website. A static site requires an understanding of html and css to write and make content changes, however, this is a great option since you do not need all the overhead that is required to run a wordpress site.

If you do not have any idea what html and css is, or do not have someone that can help you with that, wordpress removes the need for that. Wordpress helps you to easily add content and customize your website.

Although wordpress is easy and pleasant to use, it still has its drawbacks. In order for wordpress to provide all of its functionality, it requires a separate database to store all of it’s configuration and content in. The database uses it’s own set of tools and software to run and all of this software needs to be maintained and updated regularly to prevent any security vulnerabilities that might occur. Wordpress is usually hosted at a higher cost than a normal static website, because the underlying hardware and software needs to be updated and maintained to ensure that there are no security vulnerabilities.

So to summarise, each platform or technology has its strengths and weaknesses. Wordpress has a lot of features, functionality and ease of use, while other options such as static html sites are available with less overhead and are usually a little cheaper to maintain. At the end of the day, the choice is yours.

Usefull links

To get started with your new wordpress website or for more information, have a look at Wordpress.

If you require hosting solutions or have questions, feel free to send us an email at [email protected].

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