Backend and frontend - what is it? Easily explained

Frontend and backend - two terms that appear again and again, especially in connection with homepages. What that actually is can best be explained using content management systems (CMS) such as Wordpress and Typo3.

Frontend: the view in the foreground

The word frontend already indicates what it is. It is what the user sees. With a CMS-based homepage, what the visitor sees on the Internet is the surface.

• Front ends are not only available on websites that are programmed as CMS. Every software has a frontend. It is the part of the software that the user sees and uses to enter things.
• For a homepage that was programmed with CMS, the frontend contains all visible content. This also includes the design and layout of the website, pictures, texts - everything the user can see.

Backend: this takes place in the background

The frontend is the surface of a software. Without a backend there would also be no front end, even if the back end is invisible to the user.

• The functions of the program are programmed and defined in the backend. The frontend is also designed in this part of the software.
• If we again take a CMS as an example, the backend consists of programming the website including defining the design. All content such as texts or images that will later be seen in the frontend are created and imported in the backend. Databases are also part of the backend.

You can imagine the frontend and backend as a theater stage: the frontend is the stage on which the play is played. The backend is everything that happens behind it - the technology, the mask, putting on the costumes, the elaboration of the texts.

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