Content Mangament System Question

[LimitLess]

This is a pretty big question and it is hard for me to put it in "understandable" words, but I'll try my best.

I know a Content Management System (CMS) is used to update websites without the need of coding knowledge. I know it can also help speed up development time by giving an updater on a website the ability to simply type in his article without the need of formatting the HTML and such.

My question though: How does the CMS system operate exactly? And how can it affect an entire page?

Example:

Most websites have information on there homepage that is always changing dynamically. Take www.yahoo.com. On the homepage it is apparent that there are several sections that change dynamically while some other sections remain the same. How can a CMS know the difference, which slice to update? After all the entire page is not being changed, just a certain slice.

I hope people can understand what I mean.

Thanks,

[scrowler]

you need to use dynamic serverside scripting languages such as PHP, ASP/ASP.NET or Perl in conjunction with a database of some kind, such as MySQL or Oracle

[inkblot]

becasuer server side languages are parsed before sent to the client so it knows what to display before sending it to the browser.

[raquellbell]

You actually don't need a database for CMS you can use XML to update using a rich text box like the ones you enter information into here.