
How to Survive Gentrification of the Drupal Community - detaro
http://www.darrenmothersele.com/blog/2015/11/16/surviving-open-source-gentrification/
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ams6110
I think conversely that Drupal 8 is the swan song. Too late to the party.
Everyone who was really unhappy with the spaghetti bowl of code in prior
drupal versions has already moved on. Those who have not, are not interested
in rebuilding their sites on a new platform. They just want Drupal 6 to keep
working.

Drupal 8 is not a gentrified neighborhood, it's more like the ghost cities in
China: clean, modern, well-designed -- and empty.

~~~
daxfohl
What have they moved on to? I'm investigating CMS's for a client (an task I
have entirely no experience with). Is Joomla any better? Or is the whole
concept of CMS dying?

~~~
snowwrestler
They haven't moved on.

You're not going to get an accurate picture of the CMS market here on HN. Most
folks here are developers...PHP CMS's are not what they are interested in. The
prevailing opinion on HN is something like "CMS's suck, you should build it
yourself with node/React" or whatever.

If you need to build a content website, and the information architecture is
complex, Drupal is a very strong choice. I haven't use D8 yet, and I would not
recommend building a high-profile project on it yet, unless you really want to
be an early adopter. But D7 works well and will be supported for a long time
yet to come.

If your info architecture is fairly simple, take a look at Wordpress. You'll
have an easier time finding low-cost vendors than with Drupal. Drupal is
powerful but expensive.

~~~
daxfohl
Very believable. I'd have probably responded with the "prevailing opinion" to
myself if I hadn't been the one that asked the question. :)

~~~
snowwrestler
Ha! :) IMO the true advantages of a popular, open-source CMS are not in the
code, which I think most developers will agree tends to be idiosyncratic at
best. The advantages tend to be business-type advantages, like:

\- It's easy to find case studies to help explain and plan your project.

\- It's easy to find vendors who can build or support the technology. That
makes it easier to run competitive RFPs, and fire/replace vendors without
having to rebuild from scratch.

\- You benefit from a security program that has a lot of inputs--a lot of bad
guys trying to get in, and a lot of good guys trying to keep them out. The
code is battle-tested and frequently patched.

\- You benefit from a community module system that has a lot of inputs.
Chances are if you want to do something, there is a module to do it, or at
least get close.

\- You can more easily empower "tech savvy" employees to do pseudo-development
tasks like build filtered lists and manage content workflows. It's easier and
cheaper to scale tech-savvy employees than full developers.

\- There are enterprise-savvy support options available.

\- It's easy to find hosting.

Developers, particularly those who want to innovate and build new tools and
products, tend not to value these sorts of things as much.

~~~
exelius
This isn't restricted to an open-source CMS; any popular CMS gives you this.
SharePoint is the gold standard in DIY CMS platforms, and everything you
mention above is doubly true of SharePoint. It's certainly easier to find a
SharePoint developer than a Drupal developer.

I mean, there are downsides to SharePoint: it's commercial software and
there's more friction than with Drupal. But I'm not even sure how relevant
that is anymore in today's IaaS hosted world -- I can go on Azure and deploy a
Sharepoint server in 5 minutes from an image and the licensing costs are baked
in.

But you're right about developers not valuing these -- CMSes are for
established businesses that need a technology platform to manage their
messaging across multiple channels. If you consider yourself a product hacker,
then something like a CMS isn't likely to be interesting to you.

