Summary of Interview Responses
Last modified: February 19, 2008 - 03:55
This is a summary of 5 interviews conducted with Drupal administrators. The results of these interviews will lead to a survey to be posted on Drupal.org and will run for 45 days.
| Interview Question |
Drupal task |
| How would you describe yourself as a Drupal administrator? |
Beginner/Intermediate works on small sites Beginner very inexperienced but a fast learner Newbie. Wet-behind-the-ears, enquiring certainly not an expert Know well how works in the inside, which makes admin tasks easier to grok Make way through confusing tasks with the handbook Experienced Comfortable Second nature Fluent Can rapidly configure Quite experienced Work with code side of things Understand what's going on behind the scenes |
| How frequently do you administer you your Drupal site? |
Daily At least several times a week, if including recurring admin tasks (viewing logs, etc...). maybe once a fortnight - less since the administrator switched to Drupal, actually. not frequently an average of twice a week. I administer my site frequently if not daily. once a month. |
| How long do you administer your Drupal site in a single sitting approximately? |
30 minutes to an hour about 30 minutes to an hour could be 30 minutes 2-3 hours ( A few hours) 4-5 hours somedays I could sit for half a day, All day long |
| How does Drupal help you accomplish your goals as a web site administrator |
Add features rapidly Speed of meeting customers functional requirements Lots of functionality that you can install Speeds up the process Spend more time on custom theming and features See what content users have posted Collaboration on content creation Users can create content it lets me publish news stories and re-edit them It makes managing content fairly simple. I document a lot of processes Web based work is faster Teach customers to use it Know customers will be happy with it Reuse same codebase Pass duties on to successors once built Lower learning curve Creation content is in one easy to understand place Easy to admin, web interface. Very little technical knowledge required. Monitor logs/stats Monitor and fix problems Logging Exciting dynamics of community fun to install and play around with modules Module capabilities configure modules Easier to modify clean code gives me a set of tools allowing me to create the kind of web sites I want fairly easily (integration of blogs, forums, menus , etc.) Create tools to help myself and my co-workers out so the easy to build modules and the resource of modules is extremely helpful. |
| Why do you use Drupal? | Functionality Implements features that wouldn't have been possible How the pieces are come together, and accomplish a larger task Node system Deploy a new website in a few minutes with multi-site Using a mature CMS is a no-brainer, today, especially if you want to createinteractives/community web sites. like how bareboned it is and i can build a site pretty streamlined by using the base plus my desire of modules nice looking presentation and doesn't require any effort on my part to maintain and manage. Ease of implementation. Don't have to roll your own as much Code let's you do what you need Community is impressive and active on IRC, Forums, Groups site Drupal people are helpful and smart Evangelization. It's good to develop for. I use drupal cause I am fascinated by it. I opened it up and was floored by its architecture. Meets requirements not just technical solutions Community is working in a similar space Users can create a community navigation system Community catetegorization helps users find what they need Great for solving problems It lets visitors become contributors with their own account - that's a good idea for those who want people to participate but not anonymously Because the main site administrator chose to roll it out. |
| How does Drupal help your users? |
Implement features fast Deliver functionality to users really quickly Add audio and playlists, easy integration of Flickr Can restrict and unrestrict access to modules and content quickly Benefit from the larger Drupal community Integration with CRM is big for political, membership, non-profits Get engaged on a higher level, membership, motivate, and mobilize a community. Provide community growth lets them respond to stories and create their own blogs making it easy for me to do my job and configure an easy to navigate site. Web based content update....Low technical requirement to add content. Customers demand it, it's beyond technical audiences Cost savings |
| What some common Drupal administration tasks? |
Check logs, look for spikes, errors, strange stuff Look for signs of trouble Monitor watchdog check logs. check user activity Give users permissions Add users user administration set-up modules and configure them test and troubleshoot Add block to highlight new features Ban users Moderate comments Delete spam Dealing with spam :) (trackback, comments, forum posts...) Update code Test code Lot of module installing and testing, configuring Install or update modules Process of using modules, find, install, test, review issues, contact author, learn it's not working Enabling / disabling modules. Editing menus. Configuring modules. improve menus, Track fixes for modules Patch Drupal testing/providing patches to fix problems or missing features ... Deal with user feedback on tests and make fixes to it reply where needed, Modify permissions Modify themes Little bit of theming manage themes. spend some time improving the themes, add theme template file to customize module output Learning about Drupal through Drupal.org, Planet Understand vocabulary planning for features I would like to introduce, checking modules out Let it run itself create content.. customize/create modules.. backups.. create content > story, enabling full html on those posts create and organize content to introduce the site... |
| What are some infrequent Drupal tasks? |
code new features add new modules. ban users, remove spam posts, moderate comments delete unpublished content monitoring comments. modify existing content, making posts sticky or not sticky re-editing a headline modify navigation system as well work directly on database Non-GUI administrative tasks send newsletters, he copy and paste from a node and copied to form. Send a test. and then test it. tasks limited by technical capabilities Planning content positioning Blocks are pretty much a one time setup.. Build view of the content of the section Design and theme main page for a section Managing users. i dont build a lot of content types yet.. I manage logs but not really since i expect to screw up.. change theme. |
| When you administer your site you find it easy to? |
install working modules install add new functions via simple modules have automated tasks with cron editing user information post content I love the ability to version content.. edit nodes change themes theming: it is easy with phptemplate to change the layout of the template, and add some php where needed. find it easy to create sections and promotional areas of the site Interface is now intuitive general configuration settings options are familiar to me, ie. titling your site, setting date output options; this is reasonably easy to grasp Creating menus, blocks, promotting nodes, etc... are frequent tasks that are easy to perform... interface is not intuitive |
| When you administer your site you find it hard to? |
Discover where administration settings are discover how to moderate feed items community sites require half a dozen stops to make sure there's nothing I need to fix or take care of. concepts need to be expressed more simply images could be used in the handbook documentation, and examples understand the concepts, read the glossary without pictures upgrading automatically Have to download modules separately learn what modules are available for upgrade on a site add new modules.... they don't always work well together. moderate aggregator feed items Work with regions across themes Create new content types I never got the (content) diff to work but its cool to me Import content hard to work with large groups of anything. nodes, comments, users, etc. categorizing large amounts of content Approving/Deleting/Moving/Categorizing things in groups Filtering on content types is limited awareness of incoming trackbacks, incoming comments, new nodes posted, new users, error conditions with modules, etc -structure the site user permission. Drupal's permission are great and generally more performant than that of other CMS, yet I find I'd like more fine-tuning. allow users to edit one menu but not others, etc... menus editing the weight of menu items can be difficult bec ause you cannot edit all the menus items at the same time (like you can adjust the weight of all the blocks on the same page...) Assigning permissions on admin/access can be a pain if you have many modules, many roles with long names... preview/submit option... and when you preview, you should just see it all straight away, not have it repeated |
| What other important tasks did we not cover? |
Discovering the state of the site from the logs versus events looking at categories of logs to see what's happening Robust and detailed logging How to connect module X and module Y together fix visual clashing of modules create role for testers to try out Trying functionality out with users and iterating improvements work in the theme and the templates to make things 'make sense' in the structure of the site. make sections look 'distinct' hiding certain links on the nodes overriding module's browser design site on paper or whiteboard first User was having difficulty logging in and logging out. Recreating a user is a terrible things to do. Manage to delete a bunch of content. Managing users how they related to content it's a bit of a mine field. Ability to manage permissions for a community Identify popular content Better menu editing interface bulk editing or cloning menus adding/removing "menu" options Settings are in obscure places Browse and install modules via GUI Drupal community(versions, upgrades) information in administration Integrate with other systems like vbulletin Administer users, moderate content directly on page Session management is too long to be secure from public computers need the moderation module to accept comments by anonymous users, that I publish or delete after verification. referrer spam, and registration spam... admin is not asked to make a decision to authorize or not an account if the email registered is bogus... comment moderation create a site that aggregates news from various sources, displays it in various categories, allows registered users to respond to and rate items, as well as post their own stories alongside I mean the configuration of drupal itself. The stuff in settings.php performance is something i am not worried about for now cause since everything is internal.. but thats going to be a major task for me to explore enable/add a content type I don't currently have or use, grow bored with the theme, |