Category: Drupal

Drupal or WordPress?

There are hundreds of articles debating about Drupal Vs WordPress as a content management system (CMS) for web sites. People want to use tools to solve problems without spending time to learn it. Most of the comparison articles you find in internet world are developer’s perspective. Developers can convince a user based on his/her ability.

We as a web solution provider worked with both platforms for our end clients. Lately after the recession, the clients are not interested in spending huge sum of money on development or hiring developer to develop costumed web application. They wanted to build solution for themselves, if required hire a developer for minimum setup. With this perspective I have compared the tools.

 

  1. COST

Both the tools are open source and free, and can be installed on LAMP environment which is more or less cost effective compared to Windows platform. Initial cost for both the tools is same.

When it comes to customization, the cost involved in setting up a simple web application Word press wins.  A fresher with six month experience can easily build a decent web application in word press compared to a Drupal developer with same amount of experience. This is with respect to small to medium scale website.

  1. TIME

Time required to publish a web application hardly takes few hours in today’s world.  To launch a marketing web site for a company we in KNS took about 24 hours in Word press compared to 40 to 60 hours in Drupal, of course it varies with the experience of the person working on the project. We can launch the same web site with same duration if our developers are experience in Drupal which in turn points to COST.

 

  1. SECURITY

After the launch with hardly few months, we got a mail from a client claiming that, there was security breach in one of his Word press site. This is the at most concern for all word press application. We did spend time on researching the hack and resolving it, but the client has to close his website for couple of days.

Since the community is vast for word press, the developers get enough tips and tricks to avoid it. But as a whole, Drupal wins in this part of the feature.

  1. SETUP

I had a client, She was not technically sound but her learning curve was short. We were discussing about her business and we wanted leverage her business in social networking media, so I asked to start a blog, developed a sample site in Drupal and asked her to use it. After few days, she mailed me saying not interested. While chatting with her in another context she helped me to understand that the tool which I gave her was bit difficult to setup and learn.  I asked her to install word press, with some help she could start using it on her own.

Similar kind of experience can be recorded more than on occasion.  Both have excellent front end accessibility but backend, Word press wins.

  1. UPGRADE & MAINTENANCE

Unless you are highly trained developer, you cannot upgrade or maintain a Drupal website. The module/plugins which are supported in Drupal 6 are not supported in Drupal 7, same with the themes in Drupal. From the clients perspective he is not satisfied with the time line mentioned by the developer or the cost involved in upgrading the application.

 

Bottom Line:

If you want to start a small organization without any web development budget or in house technical skills, start with Word Press. It’s easy and most importantly simple to move to Drupal later.

If you have a web development budget planned for the year and if you can hire an experience Drupal developer or if you have in house experience Drupal developer, you can go for Drupal 7.

There is no particular conclusion on which tool is better, at end of day it boils down to the cost. One can choose which is better based on how heavy his/her pocket is.

This has been said, we can accomplish the same quality in using both the tools. Cost and time are deciding factors.

WordPress Multisite Vs Drupal Multisite

WordPress and Drupal are two of the popular content management systems available for web development. Here is an analysis on mutlisite features of WordPress and Drupal.

WordPress:

  1. Multi-site feature built into it’s core
  2. Users can register for their own site and be up and running with their own theme, plug-ins and more in only a few minutes
  3. Sites built aren’t too complex in their data
  4. Multi-site can allow a single WordPress installation manage 1,000s of sites or more with the same 1-click updates and other features that make WordPress so attractive for any smaller site or blog.
  5. Administrator WordPress multi-site can allow for the control and moderation of many sites from a single point
  6.  The built-in user registration system allows for completely hands-off scalability and site creation but doesn’t really allow much control for individuality within individual sites.  Example all themes and plug-ins that a site owner can use must first be installed by an administrator and cannot be edited or modified in any way by the owner of an individual site
  7. If your sites are related such as sites of faculty members in a university department or something similar then we can use WordPress multisite feature. Check http://WordPress.org/showcase/flavor/WordPress-ms/ for a show case of sites developed using multi–site feature. 

Drupal:

  1. Multisites are completely different sites, using different databases, but sharing the source code. Then you can’t share content or configuration.
  2. Users can’t just register for a site and be up and running in a few seconds. Instead an administrator must manually set up the site and may in fact go as far as allowing custom themes, modules, and more. 
  3. You have a need for multiple complex sites or a small amount of very different sites than Drupal’s multi-site is preferred
  4. Each site in a Drupal multi-site is a completely separate site

 

Purpose:

The key thing to remember is that the WordPress and Drupal multisite features have different purposes. The main purpose of WordPress Multiuser is to establish a network of interconnected blogs with features like following and reblogging. Drupal multisite, on the other hand, is to make maintenance of many sites simple. There is no interconnectedness built in.

Technical:

The database structure for network in WordPress is single database with different prefixed tables. Drupal gives you two options, single database with different prefixed tables or seperate database for each site.

Conclusion:

Both WordPress and Drupal can be excellent choices depending on what you want to do. If you’re going for a blog or smaller site, then WordPress is probably better choice. If however you need complex data or workflows or you are going to taking in data from your users, then Drupal might be better.

 

 

KNS Tech bets big on Drupal applications

“ I never let my schooling interfere with my education”. Thus, Mark Twain famously quoted. In a profound manner, it underlines the fact that useful knowledge can be gained and shared outside a formal, stereotypical and closed system . Open source softwares are probably the best champions of such a school of thought.

KNS Technologies were privileged to host Drupal Training Day at our offices recently. As a member of Drupal Association, we had the responsibility to energize, enhance collaboration and grow the Drupal community, here in Bangalore.

Under the auspices of Drupal Groups, the event was held on December 14, 2012 and brought together various software firms that develop and thrive on applications in Open source frameworks. The program was a hit right from the word go. Jacob Singh, Regional Director-India at Acquia, set the ball rolling with an insightful presentation on the unique learning process that is encouraged at Acquia for interns and young Drupal team members. The synchronization of training process with the aptitude of trainees and organizational imperatives was interestingly demonstrated. The nuances and ease of developing themes using Omega /Responsive web design were handled brilliantly in a separate session. Building semantics in Drupal using RDF was another area that was focused upon as it opened new vistas in web development.

For our Drupal developers, this turned out to be a good opportunity to share notes and renew commitment to contribute as active members of this very exciting Community, while parallely honing their skills. Our clients can continue to expect top notch Drupal development and capture superior value.

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