Last updated March 8, 2012. Created by baff on April 28, 2011.
Edited by shamio, skottler. Log in to edit this page.
It is always good to think it over before installing a module; too many modules can slow down your site and are tricky when updating especially on shared servers as their maximum allowed hardware resource usage is much lower than VPS and dedicated servers. Additionally, modules that are poorly maintained and contain bugs can be detrimental to the security and stability of your site.
It is important to investigate the most well-maintained contributed modules, such as Views, Rules, Panels, and others before installing a large number of different modules on your site. The functionality of these modules can often mitigate the need to install slews of other modules on your Drupal site.
So please post your solutions which avoid modules.
Comments
How many is too many?
This is a good, common-sense advice, I believe. However, how many modules are too many, i.e. are we talking tens, hundreds...?
I appreciate there isn't a standard for this as each website will be different, but what is an average, or expected number of modules?
Thanks
fadrupal
P.S. I see this applies to Drupal 6.x - I take it this is applicable to all versions, including 7.x and the upcoming 8.x .
subjective
The advice to use as few modules as possible is sound advice. Some modules/themes cause more of a degradation in performance than others. It does apply to all versions, however many of the contributed modules that were necessary to download in D6 were moved into core eliminating the need to download them separately (image, much of CCK etc.). Rest assured, if it is in core, performance has at least been considered. While it is impossible to specify an acceptable number (some shared hosting runs drupal core poorly...while others my run a site with many modules quite well), it seems you want an estimated number. In my opinion the number of contrib modules for most of the smaller sites I have built average in the 20's. I would say hundreds would be excessive.
Lansing Web Design with Drupal
Thanks
Thanks stieglitz