By PeterLucas on
For the last few years I have been using Nucleus CMS. I switched to Drupal because Nucleus lacks some functionality I need for a new website (social networking type stuff).
Drupal and Nucleus are both PHP on MySQL. Drupal is promising and forward looking, but still has lots of frustrating unresolved issues. Nucleus is much more stable and transparant.
Couldn't Drupal and Nucleus work together? Exchange code? Even merge and build the ultimate PHP/MySQL CMS for "web 2.0"?
I think the main coders for both are based in Belgium and the Netherlands...
Comments
Hmmm...
I looked at Nucleus briefly, and it looks like a very blog-centric system. At an architectural level, Nucleus and Drupal are very different because of this, so unless there's a particular 'killer feature' that Nucleus implements (say, live rendering of comments into Flash, or something like that) it's likely that trying to incorporate Nucleus code would cause MORE problems for Drupal -- and vice-versa.
In what way is Nucleus more stable/transparent? Are there particular 'killer' problems with Drupal that Nucleus doesn't suffer from?
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Jeff Eaton | Click Here To Find Out Why Drupal "Sucks"
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Eaton — Partner at Autogram
Again, it's not about features
Yes, Nucleus is very blog-centric. That's why I switched to Drupal. As I said in another thread, it's not about features. Nucleus just seems a lot cleaner and transparant. They have a plugin system similar to Drupal's modules. Maybe I should just learn to write the plugins I need for Nucleus.
I've come across a series of unresolved issues in Drupal the last two weeks:
- Deleting users leaves ghost posts in the database, showing up as n/a in the site. There seems to be no easy central management of posts and comments - pretty essential for a serious CMS.
- There are few themes and they're not very good. The stylesheets are a lot longer than in Nucleus and there are much more of them. It's a real puzzle to figure out what does what. Simpler is always better.
- CivicSpace adds a lot of confusion. The user base seems split between the two and it's hard to believe it's not a fork or won't be in the near future.
- Event, EventFinder, Sign Up, RSVP and contact management are handled by different immature modules that don't work very well together. There are different versions and patches floating around in different places.
- Default settings are ugly, requiring the user to customize just about everything. Pages often look more like administration pages than "user facing webpages". See for example the group homepages in the Organic Groups module.
- Administration is weird, with everything stuck in the same sideline menu. That could have been organized much more logically, grouped by function instead of "code part", using an entire page with options instead of cluttering the menu. For example, the Settings for Modules are seperate from the menu item Modules.
- ...?
On issues I've raised developers have responded dismissive or not at all. Or they advise me to go to CivicSpace, learn to write code or something off topic like that. I found lots of threads where people bring up legitimate issues that just fizzle out without a solution.These kind of things raise doubts how structurally sound Drupal is and if developers care about the things I look for in a CMS.
Good points.
Regarding the style sheets, simpler is better, but only if it still does what you want it to do. Drupal themes aren't too difficult to make from scratch, as long as you know precisely what situations they'll be used in. The wide variety of addon modules, and the wide variety of situations a theme will have to deal with, means that a lot of CSS work is necessary to produce consistent results.
For one of my own sites, where I know precisely what content will be displayed and how, I use a drupal css style sheet that's hardly a page long.
Regarding the administration interface, I think you're right -- streamlined management pages for nodes and comments are necessary. Drupal's present tools for that are passable on smaller sites but difficult to use for larger ones.
Regarding the general workflow of the admin menu, you might check out the 'control panel' module that's recently been developed. It adds a new administration interface that might be closer to what you're expecting.
I think, though, that we have a different idea of what constitutes 'structurally sound.' Most of the core developers here tend to believe that having a robust, reliable core means looking VERY carefully at every suggestion and every proposed change, and only committing to the ones that can be demonstrated to have a have a positive effect for the majority of Drupal users. There are always disagreements about what qualifies, of course.
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Jeff Eaton | Click Here To Find Out Why Drupal "Sucks"
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Eaton — Partner at Autogram
Cute
The Windows XP type icons are very cute and it could potentially make the interface a lot cleaner, but the icons are still linked to the text menu items.
I manually disabled all the Adminstration text menu items to clean up the menu (took me another ten minutes), but all icons disappeared as well. This module is pretty useless.
I don't need pictures. I need a more logically organized interface.
CuteI manually disabled all
Now that is the most interesting discovery I have seen since coming to the forum. Wow!
I have been reading the docs for weeks and never thought that things would disappear if the menu were disabled. i wonder what else is called after the menu has been rendered?
Why don't you disable the
Why don't you disable the built in navigation menu and create your own new one? I only use the Navigation default on other sites for UID1.
-sp
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Test site, always start with a test site.
Drupal Best Practices Guide -|- Black Mountain
-Steven Peck
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Test site, always start with a test site.
Drupal Best Practices Guide
I disagree
Don't delete users, block them. That's a feature, not a bug.
There are plenty of 'simple' themes.... at this point all the way going from almost bare & mere CSS color changes required....
Complex themes are there for a reason: to allow options.
If you don't want options, don't use them.
As a CS user _and_ a Drupal user, I disagree. CS is a repackaging of Drupal. The fork is mostly over, in fact, as most of the changes are folded back in, and the rest due for a 4.7 version when it's time.
I typically grab CS's latest version, and then add whatever Drupal modules I want. No problems at all, let me repeat that: I have never ever had _any_ problems as a result of that. CS 0.8.2 is Drupal 4.6 more or less, with a nice install script, and lots of installed default packages.
Yes, there are options.... many options. Not everyone needs the same thing. Some of us want different things... some want RSVPing , some don't. Some want simple contact management, some want CivicCRM which is improving often with an entire full spectrum CRM approach.
Try CS for a prettier out of the box. And if you don't like to 'customize', maybe you can do a 'default' and repackage the settings for others to use.
Admin menus make sense to those of us who understand that loading time, sectionalized menus, and the ability to put admin area under different permissions without problems are all important.
All of your complaints ring hollow me. I'm sure they are important to you.... so instead of complaining why 'Drupal' (which is just a bunch of fellow user/coders types) did it wrong... grab your editor... make improvements and submit them. If they are accepted, great. If they are rejected, well, there are plenty of 'repackaged' Drupal versions out there.... DrupalEd, etc.... join one, or start a new one.
"Drusimpal" perhaps?
Need Drupal friendly hosting? Many of us use Site5 with good results
BS
Absolute BS. I want to be able to control what's in my database from the CMS. If I can't do that, what's the point of a CMS?
As for your other patronizing points, sure I could make my own CMS if I learned how to write code. Why would I need Drupal then to begin with?
You're setting the bar very low for Drupal.
Re: Again, it's not about features
PeterLucas: Event, EventFinder, Sign Up, RSVP and contact management are handled by different immature modules that don't work very well together. There are different versions and patches floating around in different places.
Yeah, there's room for considerable improvement in how signing up for events is handled. It's really frustrating at the moment. About the best Module (for my uses at least) is RSVP and yet it still needs integration with CiviCRM -- plus the ability to directly register.
LEO