The DNN Platform is a .net-based webapplication framework, or CMS (Content Management System) as somepeople prefer to call it. Like many of its peers (Joomla,Wordpress, Drupal) it, too, is free and Open Source. You do notneed to sign up or sign your business over to DNN Corp, the makersof this platform. You can just download it, install it and beginusing it. You can use it for yourself or for a client, non-profitor commercial. You can even charge your client money for it. You donot need to attribute to anyone. And you can change it in whicheverway you like.
In a nutshell a CMS differs from a “classic website” in that thelatter is a collection of html files on a web server, whereas a CMSis a program that runs on the server that creates web pages on thefly by looking up what it needs to make in a database. The CMS,thus, revolves around two key components: an application and adatabase. The application is what you’ll download. The database iswhat you’ll be filling as you add pages through the application’smanagement interface. Most modern websites are now based on one CMSor another. There are hundreds of CMSs out there, both commercialand free. By far the most popular of these is Wordpress. DNN is themost popular on the Microsoft Stack. What that is will be explainedbelow.

The application’s “management interface” was mentioned brieflyabove. This brings us to another major difference. With a classicfile-based website, the management requires you to change files onthe server, meaning administrators need a login on the server. Witha CMS, the application manages access and offers an interfacethrough the web to administrators. This means that the CMS isresponsible for account management and this is no longer necessaryon the server. As you can imagine this greatly simplifies matters.In fact, the only person needing access rights on the server is theone installing the DNN platform at the very beginning. After thatit is completely managed through the application.