Abstract: Embodiments of the invention provide a high-performance content management system with a log-based data storage. To speed data operations, updates and deletes are appended to log-based data files. Seek operations are not needed as old data is not overwritten or removed at the time of write operations. Instead, the log-based data files are periodically optimized by processes that compact data entries and remove data files containing old data. In addition, an associated index with entries accessible in constant time is used to facilitate the process of locating data entries within the data files. Embodiments of the log-based data storage are implemented in a standard file format for ease of development and maintenance and can be compressed to further improve performance. In one embodiment, the log-based data storage corresponds to a node-based logical data tree that can be adapted to house a variety of data, including data from relational databases.