- Big Medium
Infobox Software
name = Big Medium
developer = Josh Clark
released =January 13 2003
latest_release_version = 2.0
latest_release_date = release date|2007|12|17
operating_system =Cross-platform
platform =Perl
language = English
status = Active
genre =Web content management system
license = ProprietaryEULA
website = [http://globalmoxie.com/projects/bigmedium/index.shtml globalmoxie.com]Big Medium is a browser-based web content management system (CMS) written in the
Perl programming language and developed byGlobal Moxie , theParis -based company of independent developer Josh Clark.Big Medium 1.0 was announced on
January 13 2003 . [cite web
url = http://gilbane.com/content_management_news.pl/2003/1/content_management_news.html
title = Global Moxie Announces Big Medium 1.0
accessdate = 2008-01-05
author = Gilbane Report] The latest release of Big Medium is version 2.0, released onDecember 17 2007 after more than a year of public beta-testing. [cite web
url = http://globalmoxie.com/projects/news/big-medium-20-your-new-website-editor-is-here.shtml
title = Big Medium 2.0: Your new website editor is here
accessdate = 2008-01-05
author = Global Moxie] It is paid software distributed under a proprietary license.The name "Big Medium" is a
double entendre , referring to both the Internet as a communication medium and to a medium as a psychic who helps ordinary people communicate with unseen worlds. [Clark, Josh: "The Complete Guide to Big Medium 2", 2.]Audience
Big Medium is billed as a CMS "aimed at web designers and their clients," [cite web
url = http://globalmoxie.com/projects/bigmedium/index.shtml
title = Big Medium: A content management system (CMS) for web designers
accessdate = 2008-01-05
author = Global Moxie] and unlike many general-purpose content management systems, it is intended to be easy to install and configure without the aid of a web developer. Big Medium's flexible design templates support a wide range of original designs and require no programming knowledge beyondHTML andCSS . Once these templates are configured, content editors can add and update pages with no specific technical knowledge. (Big Medium also comes with a modest library of design themes allowing non-designers to get started right away.)Big Medium targets traditional content sites such as news, marketing and magazine sites. It is pre-configured to provide features and data fields common to this type of site. While this simplifies the process of setting up Big Medium for a broad category of websites, this targeted pre-configuration makes the software relatively inflexible for managing other site types, including commerce or community sites. [cite web
url = http://globalmoxie.com/projects/bigmedium/cms-comparison-shopping.shtml
title = Is Big Medium Right for Me?
accessdate = 2008-01-05
author = Global Moxie] However, additional fields and content types can be added via custom plugin modules. [cite web
url = http://globalmoxie.com/help/faq/data/custom-data-fields.shtml
title = Can I add additional data fields to my Big Medium pages?
accessdate = 2008-01-05
author = Global Moxie]Features
* Simple, flexible templating for complete control over the design
*Search engine -friendly URLs
* Static pages
* Rich-text editing with WYSIWYG editor orMarkdown syntax
* WYSIWYG CSS style editor
* Version control for page edits
* Libraries for images, documents, media and authors promote easy reuse
* Auto-sizing of images and thumbnails
* Image galleries and slideshows
* Pullquotes
* Visitor comments, with anti-spam features including built-inAkismet support
* Tags and tag clouds
* Site search
* Extensible plugin support
* Integrated link management
* Manage multiple websites
* Multiple editor accounts with category-specific editing privileges
* Unlimited levels of nested sub-categories for pages
* Syndication viaRSS news feeds and JavaScript widgets
*Standards-compliant HTML andXHTML
* Lightweight publishing workflow
* Scheduled publication of pagesTechnical details
Big Medium installs on web servers running Windows NT, Windows 2003 or a
Unix-like operating system.Big Medium stores its data in flat files and folders, rather than a database. This has advantages (e.g., simplified installation and backups) but also means that it is best suited for small- and medium-sized sites with fewer than several thousand pages. Clark has suggested that future versions may offer the choice between flat-file storage and a relational database to better support very large sites. [cite web
url = http://globalmoxie.com/ask/default.php?bigmed.1.2927.3
title = Custom Fields etc.
accessdate = 2008-01-05
author = Josh Clark
quote = I'm also considering (optional) MySQL support (...)] Additional fields and content types can be added via custom plugin modules. [cite web
url = http://globalmoxie.com/help/faq/data/custom-data-fields.shtml
title = Can I add additional data fields to my Big Medium pages?
accessdate = 2008-01-05
author = Global Moxie]Big Medium generates public web pages as static pages, meaning that they are not built on the fly with every page request but just once when the page is edited. This approach scales well under very high traffic conditions but means that there are limited opportunities to personalize pages for individual users.
Big Medium supports plugins and can be extended via custom Perl code to add additional content types, data fields, content filters, display widgets, etc. This developer API was added in version 2.0, but the documentation for plugins is incomplete.
See also
*
Web content management system
*List of content management systems
*Comparison of content management systems References
External links
* [http://globalmoxie.com/projects/bigmedium/index.shtml Big Medium homepage - globalmoxie.com]
* " [http://globalmoxie.com/help/docs/big-medium-complete-guide.shtml The Complete Guide to Big Medium 2] "
* [http://www.gadgetopia.com/post/3606 Interview with Big Medium developer Josh Clark at Gadgetopia.com]
* [http://www.computerworld.com/developmenttopics/development/webdev/story/0,10801,86409,00.html Computerworld interview with Josh Clark]
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