Content Management Systems

Drupal

Content

Introduction

Setting up Drupal

Structure

Features

Core functions

Comparison of Joomla and Drupal

Total Cost of ownership of Open source CMS

Additional Resources

Introduction

Drupal is full featured Content Management System. Many refer to it as CMF, Content Management Framework.

Started in 1999 by Dries Buytaert to provide a discussion forum among students.Wanted to name is dorp.org (means village in dutch) but a typo error made it drop.org. In 2001, he decided to release the software under name Drupal.(druppel in dutch means drop). Current version is 6.0 (released on Feb 13 2008).

• It has 600+ modules, 250 + themes and supports more than 40 language localization

Setting up

There are 2 options1)Subscribe to web hosting service: Drupal installation

takes couple of minutes and site is ready to design

2)Install and configure Drupal on a web server. Step by step instructions are given here

http://www.thesitewizard.com/gettingstarted/how-to-setup-drupal.shtml

System Requirement: Linux/Windows, Apache/IIS, PHP, MySQL/PostgreSQL

Structure

Modules are freely

available add ons used for adding /extending  functionality e.g.Calendar, todolist, project

Core -optional

Core required

Contributed Modules

Core required- layout

Features

➲ Discussion Forum➲ Blog➲ Collaborative writing such as articles, books etc.➲ Comments➲ Polling➲ Guest book➲ Tests/Quizzes➲ Search Engine optimization (SEO)➲ Wiki➲ Photo Gallery➲ IRC chat➲ E-commerce➲ E-publish for newspapers, magazines, newsletters➲ Many, many more...

Typical applications

Typical Drupal applications

Content Management (stories, blogs, forums, downloads, images). Administrator defined access control. Entire site search available.

Weblogs (supports blogger API, provide RSS feed, can ping weblog directories)

Discussion based community (admin can control content and approval)

Collaboration (wiki like collaboration book module include versioning control of documentation)

Drupal- layout

Available to all logged in users, contains nodes for each type of content. Page, story, blog entry

etc.

Available to administer only

User Management

Permissions: Defines who can access what. Access rules: Set up user name and email address access rules

can be managed here.E.g. User name should be at least 8 characters long.

Roles : Define new roles, can edit permissions for 1 role at a time.

Users: register, login, log out, maintain user profiles, etc. User settings: How user can be created, sample email

notifications such as account activation, account blocked etc.

Content Management

Possible items under this category are: Comments Content Content Type Forum Post settings RSS publishing Taxonomy Books Categories News AggregatorItems marked in blue are available only when

corresponding core module is selected.

Site Building

Blocks: Boxes of content which can be rendered at certain regions on the web page.

Possible regionsLeft sidebarRight sidebarContent HeaderFooter

Menus: Module selection adds menu items. Custom menu items can be added.Modules: All available modules are listed and if installed contributed modules will also appear here.Themes : Theme of a website can be changed. Many available themes to chose from.

Drupal core features

Some popular core modules are:

Aggregator

Blog

Discussion forum

Polls

Content Translation

Taxonomy

Extending functionality

To add a contributed module: download desired module from drupal.org to local drive. Upload files to the web sever. List of features will appear in administer->site building->modules.

To add a new theme, download themes from any site offering drupal themes(e.g. drupal.org,Drupalgarden.com) and copy it in www\themes folder. This theme will appear in the Administer->site building -> themes area.

Setting up Aggregator

Goto Administer->Site Building-> Modules, select AggregatorTo add feed items, go to Administer-> Content Management->News aggregatorList: Lists feed items and categories defined. Details such as last update time of each feed and number of items. Update items refreshes news items in that feed. Edit Items, details such as name, site url or update frequency can be modified here.Add categoryAdd FeedFeed items and categories appear as separate items under Blocks. Appearance of each feed and each category can be controlled such as in which block (left panel, right panel etc) and relative place in that block.

Setting up Blog

Administer->Site Building-> Modulesselect BlogBlock: Recent blog posts (list of recent blog posts appear in the selected block)Content Management->content type-> blog entry (set properties of blog posts)Multi user blogs: Blogs can be owned by many people on the same site. Blog Api: post blog from blogging tools

Sample web sites-Forbes

Sample web site – Warner records

Sample web site – Hillary Clinton

Drupal Learning curveFrom Buytaert.net

Most popular CMS

JoomlaDrupalXOOPsTypo3Word press

Problem areas

Document ManagementTemplate/Theme creationEvent calendar

Comparison of Joomla and Drupal

Joomla Drupal

Ease of use Easy Easy

User Permissions Admin oriented great

External Integration Average great

Community feature Good Good

Event Calendar Good Poor

Template/Theme Good Difficult

Document Management Good Not enough

Content Management No cross categorization great

Internationalization Not easy excellent

SSL compatible poor yes

Comparison -Cont.

Joomla Drupal

SEO poor Yes

Shopping cart yes yes

Multisite Management No yes

Documentation average Good

Learning Curve shallow average

What does it really cost? from Cignex.com

Lets look at CMS life cycle (from cignex.com)

TCO of open source CMS from cignex.com

So which one is better?

Joomla excel in functions while Drupal excels in architecture.

From a developer's point of view, having good architecture is important and features can be built easily.

If for you architecture is more important than function you're likely going to want to choose Drupal. However, if you need to make a quick sell where function, third party integration, and eye candy is important right out the box...Joomla still has the advantage.

Additional Resources

"Using open source software to design, develop and deploy a collaborative web site" http://www.ibm.com/developerworks/ibm/library/i-osource1/

Various screencasts of Drupal 6.0 features http://www.masteringdrupal.com

Important Drupal moduleshttp://www.lullabot.com/audiocast/drupal_podcast_no_40_top_40_projects

Joomla - Drupal Comparisonhttp://www.alledia.com/blog/general-cms-issues/joomla-and-drupal-%11-which-one-is-right-for-you?/

Compare any number of CMS http://www.cmsmatrix.org