[Velocd]

Originally Posted by SmEdD

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This is what a generic portal might consist of.

A CMS system isn't a portal, although the best portals will contain CMS aspects.

A CMS is like vBulletin, a management system for content. A templating system, like vBulletin uses, is often regarded as the most valuable feature of a CMS.

CMS make content easier to manage for administrators who aren't fluent in programming. On the client side, they generally make the site more appealing.

The downside of CMS right now is there are so many of them, and they mostly all have the same features. A lot of talk amongst developers over at Sitepoint forums is to create robust XML structured CMS systems, to separate logic from presentation, etc. etc.