This article/essay is an introduction written for a total beginner that has no experience with CMS systems at all. You should have some skills in web sites, however, to fully understand this article.
It is recommended to read the article from top to bottom.
What is Mambo?
Mambo is a content management system. It stores all the website information (content) in a database. Mambo then controls which information is put on which page based on the users page selection. Mambo manages the text, images, links, documents and interaction - the main elements of every website. This means that instead of using an application like Dreamweaver, FrontPage or a similar visual website management tool, you use Mambo to maintain and update a site. Mambo utilizes a browser based system to do this - the administration is a securely accessed back end of the website. You log in, and use the browser to add content, publish articles, approve submissions and perform countless other functions involved in maintaining an active growing website. This means that a good web site can be created without needing to get too much into details of technology, all through the window of a browser.
History of the Mambo open source CMS
How does Mambo work?
Mambo is based on three elements: a webserver, a scripting language and a database. The webserver is connected to the internet and makes the site available there, the script language is used to define the processes needed to serve web pages, and the database stores the content.
The mechanism works by a user requesting a Mambo page by entering a URL. The browser then connects to the webserver. The URL contains the parameters of the content - what section, which article and so on. In fact, all requests to a Mambo site are initially handled by a very small number of scripts, and the design is moving towards this being a single script. Based on the parameters, Mambo's initial script calls many other alternative scripts.
Mambo uses the popular web oriented programming language PHP. This is supplemented by use of JavaScript, which runs in the browser and is therefore much more responsive than a request to the web server. The preferred database at present is MySQL although Mambo is moving towards embracing a choice of popular database systems.
The database is used to obtain semi-permanent information including the content. An important pluggable aspect of Mambo is the template - scripts that define the style of presentation to the user. So the final step is to merge the content and the template, to return pages to the browser. These consist of the standard web content of HTML and CSS.
Those terms..
Mambo has many special words and phrases that a beginner might not understand. They are used very often and may not be self-explanatory, so knowing what these words mean can be very useful for a beginner.
Components
Components are additions to Mambo's core functions. Mambo can publish text, upload images, manage users, etc., but Components provide additional functionality that can perform specialized tasks. Examples include: download managers, forums, commerce, galleries, guestbooks, wikis, newsletters - the list is constantly growing.
All additions to Mambo are installed with a installer in Mambo. From version 4.6 onwards, there is a universal installer that will handle any type of plugin. Components and other plugins are normally supplied as a single archive file that contains all necessary elements. The installer extracts them and puts them in the appropriate places.
Modules
Modules are plugins that provide the sideblocks in Mambo. Among these are the main menu module, login, poll, syndicate - all the stuff around the content. Mambo has predefined positions for these Modules. The most common are the left and right positions. The designer of a template (see below) can place these positions wherever he/she wants, so there is no rule that says the left position will be on the left of the template. But templates are often set up so that this corresponds to the actual layout.
There are also more Module positions. There are top positions, which are usually over both left and right modules, and also content. This position is good for newsflashes etc. There are many more positions to choose from, and one can create as many as one likes - you can have 30 different positions if you want to.
Templates
The Templates are the same concept as a skin or theme. The Templates are predefined looks, which make Mambo look a certain way. The Templates do not control the behavior, though, as in other systems that use Templates - it is a look-only definition.
Explained very simply, a Template is a HTML/CSS document that has code in it which makes it compatible with Mambo. For example, it contains code for loading the modules to a pre-defined position in the template, code for loading the main body (main content) and so on. To get the desired appearance, most templates also use a range of images (backgrounds, borders etc.)
Mambots
The Mambots are plugin scripts that work inside Mambo, without any direct interaction with the user. They can powerfully extend Mambo and also make it easier for plugins to link to each other or to the core of Mambo. For example, a gallery component can have a companion mambot that includes descriptions of the pictures in site searches.
There are many forms of Mambots. One widely used type is the content Mambots. They are used like this: you insert
into some content, and the Mambot replaces this tag with the functions of the Mambot. This can be embedding Flash, linking to other content, inserting images etc.
See Also: Glossary
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