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Content Lifecycle & Publishing

SkyCMS provides a structured content lifecycle from draft creation through publication, with versioning, scheduling, URL management, and multiple publishing modes to fit different team workflows.

Audiences: Editors, Authors, Administrators, Developers

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1. Article Lifecycle

Documentation: Article Lifecycle Reference (Editors) · Creating Articles · Updating & Deleting Articles · Article Lifecycle (Developers)

Every piece of content in SkyCMS follows a defined lifecycle with clear state transitions.

Content States

State Visibility Description
Draft Private Work in progress, only visible to editors in the dashboard
Scheduled Private Queued for future publication at a specific date/time
Published Public Live and accessible to site visitors
Unpublished Private Removed from public view but retained with full history
Trashed Private Soft-deleted, recoverable from the trash bin

State Transitions

Create → Draft → Save/Revise → Preview → Publish (or Schedule)
                                            ↓
                                        Published → Update/Republish
                                            ↓
                                    Unpublish / Trash / Archive
                                            ↓
                                  Restore from Trash (optional)
                                            ↓
                                  Permanent Delete (irreversible)

2. Versioning

Documentation: Version History Guide · Article Lifecycle Reference

SkyCMS maintains a full version history for every article, layout, and template.

Version Management

  • Every save creates a new version record
  • Version history view with list of all saved versions
  • Each version records: author, timestamp, version number
  • Browse and inspect any previous version

Version Comparison

  • Side-by-side diff view comparing any two versions
  • Visual highlighting of additions, deletions, and changes
  • Compare current draft against any historical version

Restore

  • Restore any previous version to become the current draft
  • Restore does not delete other versions — it creates a new version from the restored content
  • Restore articles from the trash bin back to draft state

3. Publishing

Documentation: Publishing Workflow · Article Lifecycle Reference

Direct Publishing

  • One-click publish from the editor
  • Immediate availability on the live site
  • Publish status and timestamp displayed in the editor toolbar
  • "Last published" timestamp always visible

Unpublishing

  • Remove content from public view without deleting it
  • Content remains in the editor for future re-publication
  • Version history preserved

Preview

  • Preview content before publishing
  • See the page as visitors will see it, with the current layout and template applied

4. Scheduled Publishing

Documentation: Page Scheduling

Automate content publication at a future date and time.

Scheduling Features

  • Set a specific publish date and time per article
  • Timezone-aware scheduling
  • Per-version scheduling — schedule a specific version to go live

Scheduler Dashboard

  • View all upcoming scheduled jobs
  • Inspect execution history (past publish events)
  • Identify and retry failed jobs
  • Cancel or reschedule pending publications

Recurring Publishing

  • Support for scheduled recurring publication workflows

5. Publishing Modes

Documentation: Publishing Modes Guide · Publishing Workflow

SkyCMS supports multiple publishing strategies to fit different team sizes and deployment architectures.

Direct Publishing Mode

  • Edit and publish immediately
  • No review gate — best for small teams or individual publishers
  • Simplest workflow

Staged Publishing Mode

  • Publish to a staging environment first
  • Review and test before promoting to production
  • Rollback capability if issues are found
  • Approval workflow before go-live

Static Site Generation

  • Generate static HTML files from CMS content
  • Deploy to JAMstack / edge hosting (Cloudflare, Azure Static, S3)
  • Maximum performance: pre-rendered pages served from CDN
  • Secure: no server-side runtime exposed to visitors
  • Publish individual pages or bulk-publish all pages

Git-Based Publishing

  • Commit content to a Git repository
  • CI/CD pipeline integration for automated deployment
  • Familiar developer workflow with pull requests and reviews

6. URL & Path Management

Documentation: URL & Redirect Management Guide

Page URLs

  • Each article has a URL path (slug) derived from its title
  • Title uniqueness validation (check before save)
  • URL-friendly slug generation

URL Redirects

  • Create, edit, and delete redirect rules (from-URL → to-URL)
  • Manage redirects from the editor dashboard
  • Useful for URL migrations, renamed pages, and vanity URLs

Reserved Paths

  • Define URL paths reserved by the system or custom routes
  • Create, edit, and delete reserved paths
  • Prevents content from being created at system-critical URLs
  • Paginated management with filtering

7. Content Export & Import

Documentation: Content Export & Import Guide · DocsPublisher Quick Start

Page Export

  • Export individual articles as JSON or HTML
  • Includes content, metadata, and version information

Page Import

  • Import HTML pages into SkyCMS via the File Manager
  • Map imported content to layouts and templates

Docs Import API

  • HTTP API for automated content import (PUT /_api/import/docs/{sourceKey})
  • Idempotent upsert — create or update based on source key
  • Delete via DELETE /_api/import/docs/{sourceKey}
  • Rate-limited for abuse prevention
  • Used by the DocsPublisher tool for Markdown → CMS sync

8. CDN Integration

Documentation: CDN Overview · Azure Front Door · Cloudflare CDN · CloudFront · Sucuri · CDN Configuration Reference

Cache Management

  • Refresh / purge CDN cache from the editor dashboard
  • CDN purge on publish (failures don't block publishing)
  • Per-tenant CDN isolation

Supported CDN Providers

  • Azure CDN / Azure Front Door
  • Cloudflare
  • AWS CloudFront
  • Sucuri

9. Preload & Performance

Documentation: Preload & Caching Guide

Content Preloading

  • Preload view for warming content caches
  • Ensure pages are ready for visitors after publish

Caching Layers

  • In-memory caching for frequently accessed content
  • Distributed Cosmos DB caching for multi-instance deployments
  • Static file caching for generated pages
  • Cache key prefixing for multi-tenant isolation

10. Publishing Progress

Documentation: Publishing Progress Guide

Real-Time Progress Tracking

  • SignalR-powered progress reporting during bulk publish operations
  • Live progress updates streamed to the editor UI
  • Connection/disconnection handling for reliable progress display
  • Available to Editors and Administrators