Considering Drupal for a local government website...

I am considering Drupal to power the local government website that I work for as the primary developer. We are currently undergoing review of several CMS for use in our website redesign and deployment. We are considering Drupal as a contender for this coveted position. =o

What follows is the email that I have been sending to all vendors with some of our concerns, features, and needs. It is a bit of a read, but I would appreciate any feedback to help us decide. Links to specific modules that solve our feature requests would be great as well. I have programmed in Java, C++, and VB, and I know that I will have to learn PHP which I am not afraid to do. For anyone that takes the time to wade through this - thank you! =)

Any recommendations about version to run or anything else would be appreciated.

A big reason why I am considering Drupal is the OpenID, and the Semantic Web offerings to come in Version 7. =)

We have about 15k unique visitors per month with about 100k page views per month spread over about 16k pages/items (includes PDFs and images) and about 3GB in current site's content.

Here is some pertinent information for our evaluation:

Accessibility and Usability

I am a member of the Web Standards Group (www.WebStandardsGroup.org) and the Guild of Accessible Web Designers (wwwGAWDS.org). I am also a Certified Usability Analyst from the Human Factors Institute (www.humanfactors.com). I follow these issues quite closely (Accessibility, Usability, and Web Standards), especially since we are a government website. Accessibility and Usability are very important for our Joe Public users, especially for the elderly or those who have a disability such as partial blindness, mobility impairment, or a cognitive disability.

I require clean code that has a Separation of Layers,is Semantically Correct, and Validates.

Separation of Layers

• Layer 1: Structure/Content is together in the XTHML 1.0 (preferably Strict) Compliant
• Layer 2: Presentation is separated completely into external CSS Files
• Layer 3: Behavior is contained in external Javascript files using unobtrusive programming techniques

These layers help to prevent the mixing and bleeding of one layer into the other and isolates them into individual 'silos' for ease of maintenance and to reduce download times (via caching), as well as reduce over all site size and page weight (by reducing code duplication on a page by page basis).

In-line CSS and Javascript is to be avoided as it conflicts with the above benefits of Layer Separation.

All of theses layers are idealistic and I do realize that we will have to compromise some when moving to a CMS.

Semantic Correctness

Semantic Correctness mean using the right tag for the right reasons (according to W3C specifications). Doing so increases the ability to maintain and trouble shoot problems that arise, increases stability in cross platform and cross browser rendering, as well as increases accessibility. Using tags incorrectly can hinder accessibility, because screen readers or text only browsers can misinterpret the code as well as make it harder to navigate.

Table based layouts are bad. CSS layouts are good.

Validation

Simply meaning that the code (specifically the XHTML and CSS) validates to the W3C specification Doing so increases the ability to maintain and trouble shoot problems that arise, increases stability in cross platform and cross browser rendering, as well as increases accessibility.

Requested Features

• Multisite licensing
• RSS Feeds, Calendars, Content Tagging, Static Pages, Site Search
• Multiple levels of content creators/editors/administrators, File/Page or Field or Content level permissions,
• Work Flow
• Extreme access to generated CSS/HTML, Site/Content Themes via Templating OR SSI's
• Java for backend is preferable as that is what I know.
• Intuitive content editing UI as we will have many non-technical users editing or adding content
• Preferably with the ability to limit what CSS or HTML they can use.
• Easy AJAX integration
• Subscription support
• User Logins and customized content
• Bread crumbs
• Custom URLS
• Integrations with Windows and Novel Domains
• Simple BLog creation (for internal and external use)
• Expiring Content
• Multilingual content
• Newsletters/Mailing Lists/polls
• Streaming media such as podcasts or video
• Platform Independent
• Open ID integration
• Integration with Windows and Novel Domains

If you have made it this far thank you. I do appreciate it.

=)