Confining componentization to use of mod_include severely handicaps how smart our components can be. There's no complete programming language, access to database connections or caching. It's simplicity is its beauty and its curse; lightweight yes, but too much so.

A step up is of course PHP, it at least provides a programming framework and database connectivity.

If our content management system is to output ("bake") components that are to later build ("fry") the presentation, we at least must insist that they do what PHP does. Components that cannot calculate anything more substantial than time formats and pattern matches in environment variables (the limits of mod_include's capabilities) are going to be too stupid to do any heavy lifting with our content.