drupal

After a encountering a puzzling problem with slow page load times on 2 Drupal 4.7 sites, we upgraded to Drupal 5. The only remaining problem I can find is a css problem with the DiggThis Module. QuickTags crapped out too.

Amazingly, the template didn't break. Not too bad, anyway.

One problem we did encounter was drupal was reporting the taxonomy module to be "missing". Untrue - looking at the server folders. Found several posts referring to php versions & possible incompatibilities - but that didn't make sense as there are other 5.x sites (fresh install) on the same server.

Someone asked which 3rd Party Drupal Modules we use on our sites.

Not all of these are in use on every site but here is the list & what they do.

Adsense:
Incorporates Google adsense as a block or within nodes.

CommentMail:
Sends an email to selected users when a comment is added. The email contains links to easily moderate comments to posts.

DiggThis:
Adds a "digg" button to enabled node types for easy submission of pages to Digg.com by users.
Note: This only works in "full view" per the comments in the module code. It doesn't work on node teasers which are enabled by default in Drupal.

Event:
adds an events calendar for enabled node types.

Flexinode:
Allows for the creation of custom content types.
Note: This module does not play well with CCK which is similar in functionality.

Gsitemap:
automatically submits a sitemap to google when content is changed, added, or on cron run.

Nodewords:
Adds metatag control to nodes & pages including taxonomy pages.

Pathauto:
Automatically creates url aliases according to rules you define. Beware, it is very easy to accidently give a new path to your existing pages which have traffic or pagerank... resulting in a 404 error. Ask me how I know this. Not the module's fault, it works as advertised.

quicktags:
javascript widget to add simple & common html tags to content text areas. There are a few similar modules which offer extended funtionality (tinymce, htmlarea, & the aptly named FCKeditor... which I have never been able to get working). Quicktags is sufficient for simpler blog-type sites.

RobotsTXT:
adds an individual robots.txt for a single or multisite environment.

Sitemenu:
adds a "site map" link to the navigation menu or (optionally) a block with expanded categories to the sidebar. When enabled as a block it creates TWO titles... One for the menu name & one for the taxonomy (root category) name. One solution is to use css display:none to make this go away if you think it looks funny.

Technorati:
Enables Technorati tags for selected content types, and pings Technorati when new content is created.

Theme Editor:
I think I used this once. I tend to edit html & css for themes in Notepad.

Image & Image assist:
Allow easier management of images in posts.

I don't think there is a best Open Source CMS... there is only a best CMS for a given application. Each of the major Content Management Systems offers features which may be make it the best fit for a given site & its required functionality.

With all of that said, we use Drupal for most of our sites which require a CMS for article or blog content. In some cases there is a custom script or module added for special functionality.

Personally, I have used Wordpress, Joomla , & Drupal, with live sites running on each. But I still prefer Drupal.

While Joomla & Wordpress are certainly capable Content Management Systems or blogging platforms, neither really feels comfortable for me.

Last time I checked, Joomla did not fully support advanced sef urls (i.e. domain.com/keywords_here). To add this functionality, you had to use a 3rd party plug in which costs $100 per license. It does, however look very pretty on a base install & has a pretty control panel.

The same can't be said about Drupal... though I have not given Drupal 5.x a test drive as yet. As for 4.x, she is one ugly bear until you start tinkering under the hood.

While the default installation could be described as unimpressive, it can easily be modified by editing the theme files or by using one of the many open source themes available for Drupal.

Be forewarned, Drupal is not really geared for beginners. There are permission settings for everything you can imagine, so it will take a while to learn your way around & get the settings the way you want. Having control is a good thing, though. In the case of Drupal, knowing some php, html, & css will likely make your experience a happier one. Unlike some Content Management Systems, there is no need to learn any proprietary scripting language outside of the above.

Joomla, Wordpress, & Drupal all have modules or plugins which can add functionality to the core. The Drupal 4.x core has been a stable platform. The same can't be said of all of the 3rd party modules we have tried. Php sure does make a lot of noise when it breaks. Many thanks to the Open Source community for the modules which do work as advertised.

If you choose to install additional modules, try to stay with those that have a large following. Modules are often maintained by third parties & are designed to work with a given version number of the CMS. If you wish to upgrade the CMS version, the older modules may not work. The modules with a large following are more likely to be updated to work with the most current version of the CMS. In example, we have some sites which we can't update to the new version of Drupal due to a dependence on a module which has not been updated to work with the most recent release. Gotcha.

Yes, this site is Proudly Powered by Drupal.

Content management can be a breeze by adding a couple of useful modules. For example, this site uses PathAuto & SiteMenu to automatically name each node (page) & post it to the navigation menu sorted by tags. Drupal calls the tagging system "taxonomy" and it supports, hierarchal structures as well as free tagging. Cool stuff.