By arjunrn on

Hi Folks,

I'm a grad student in a Comp.Sci.Eng department and my Professor wants to upgrade our very basic laboratory website. I've been looking at several CMS systems and have narrowed choice down to Tiki and Drupal. I need some advice on Drupal capabilities and features ?

This is what we want:-

1 - Some links/content for unauthenticated users/general public

2 - The above + some extra links for internal users such as wiki, calendar, file galleries etc.

3 - Each internal user should have their own homepage which they can customise to their tastes (with restrictions).

4- A main feature that we're looking for is a way to store a list of all the Lab's publications. Then each internal user can list their own publications on their personal page using some type of query system. Is there any way to do this in Drupal ?
(This requirement is very important)

5- A WYSIWYG facility for the internal users would be good. This is so they can easily customise their personal pages.

We're also very concerned about security since we will have a public facing website and yet we want to keep a lot of stuff internal only. How does Drupal compare to other CMS systems in terms of security. ?

Hoping for an unbiased opinion and advice :)
Thanks in advance.
Arjun

⋅ Categories: Drupal 4.7.x

Comments

rory--’s picture

rory-- commented

1) Yes, just restrict access for unregistered users.

2) Yes, just do the opposite of #1. ^_^

3) I'd advise using the Bio module for a node type, or use CCK.module to make a custom one for them. Not a problem.

4) Yes, just make a custom node type and make a View (views.module) to sort them by user.

5) Drupal has 3 to pick from. ^_^

arjunrn’s picture

arjunrn commented

Thanks Ronox,

Can you explain a bit further about the Bio Module. I looked it up and am not sure what you mean ?

regards
Arjun

rory--’s picture

rory-- commented

Well, bio restricts users to only one node of it. So they can't go overboard with it or anything.

There's a CSS.module, not sure what's up with that. I think it can let users style pages, though.

iandickson’s picture

iandickson commented

This is not an equal effort wish list.

1,2,4 are trivial and basically work out of the box.

Security is good so long as your server security is good and you can keep the right files private, but that's an environment issue, not a drupal one.

Flash Harry stuff - can be easy to difficult (and def will be the biggeest drain re support) depending what exactly you want. Set up a sandbox and try things out.

But to be honest in the context of your site, I'd say to faculty members "you want to be flash, set up your own page on a blog site and link to it from your bio here". OTOH they are Comp.Sci -so set it up so that they can all have their own Drupal sites with shared sign on and let them get on with it.

While they are at it maybe they can help with some development :-)

Ian Dickson - community specialist.
www.emint.org - Association of Online Community Professionals