Saturday, July 5, 2008

Drupal or Joomla - What is the answer to this question ?


This is my first post from Learn Adda follower i.e. which one is better out of Drupal and Joomla.Both are known for their features.Then if you have to learn or start  learning a CMS from where to start. 
Before going further ,why not know what others say those have used both Joomla and Drupal both.As they are only , who can tell the true comparison between both.
I will not vote for any one.But , I would say choosing the right CMS will depend on your website requirement which you want to make.Still for information have a look at the comparison between the two. 

Joomla versus Drupal

Joomla and Drupal have many things in common. Both are market leaders amongst all the open-source CMS solutions available. Both these open-source CMS's are PHP-based, using MySQL database with GPL license (open source). The question as to which is better is best answered by analyzing which one suits the site requirements better.


Drupal is often described by the Drupal community as a Content Management Framework as opposed to a CMS. Drupal’s power comes from its more abstracted approach to handling web content and functionality. 
Joomla on the other hand is pitched as being a one-stop solution for everything from simple websites to complex corporate applications. It’s easy to install, simple to manage, and reliable.




·         Target Audience
Drupal is for web sites that are "highly dynamic" in nature, "community-driven," with lots of interaction. Whereas Joomla is better-suited for websites that are more static in nature.


·         Support for Multiple Websites
As indicated by MysteryNet, the sub-domains in the website will be migrated in later phases. So while evaluating both the technologies, we considered this as an important factor. Drupal supports multiple site instances (and sub-domains) with one instance, but Joomla can only support one site per instance. The solution for sub-domains with Joomla is to maintain separate instances of Joomla (for each sub-domain) under the main Joomla directory on the hosting server. But this solution has been known to create problems in some cases.


·         SEO friendliness
Drupal 6.x and Joomla! 1.5.x both support Search Engine friendly URLs.  Drupal provides Pathauto(extended functionality) for search friendly URLs support, while Joomla includes this as part of the core functionality. Similarly editing met-tags is also provided with Joomla core as opposed to Drupal, where you would be required to install modules such as, ‘Meta Tags’.


·         Understanding the System
The Joomla interface is easy to understand for non-geeks and newbies. But the flexibility Drupal provides comes at an added cost as it makes it much tougher to understand how the system works. The learning curve for understanding and operating the system is much steeper in Drupal as compared to Joomla.


·         Usability
Joomla wins hands down when it comes to a clean user & site administration interface. The Joomla administration navigation is elegant and much simpler than Drupal. This is the prime reason for the focus on usability during the ongoing development of Drupal 7.


·         Ability to change look and feel (Phase III)
With Joomla you can come up with a new template for your website very quickly. It also allows you to use multiple templates for the same website. Drupal template building is more time-taking and complex as it supports no out-of-the-box bundles, modules, blocks etc. to give a headstart to the template designer.


·         Content Hierarchy
Drupal provides a flexible content structure, which is also extensible. Joomla supports only three levels, section/category/article, however flexible category structure support is planned for Joomla 1.6.


·         Developing Modules (extending core CMS)
The Flexibility & Power of Drupal gives it a huge advantage over Joomla. You simply can’t get that flexibility with Joomla. Joomla developers design around their own paradigm with little flexibility. You can get up and running much quicker with Joomla, but you will hit the wall sooner or later.





Comparative Analysis of Drupal and Joomla




Drupal
Joomla


Installation process
Complex
Easy and quick


Program Documentation
It contains good program documentation
Offers limited program documentation


Design
Complex
Simple


Development Usability
Complex
Easy


Learning curve
Steep
Easy


Search engine friendly URLs
Drupal has Pathauto:This module is very robust, user friendly, feature rich and powerful.
Joomla has OpenSEF : This has some nice features, but not as powerfull or even user friendly as Pathauto.


Modules & Extensions
Installing modules needs a simple process
Administration panel also provides a friendly interface to remove or configure modules.


User Management
-          The user interface is easy to access and navigate
-          Well suited for beginners to advanced users.
-          better candidate when comparing user management tools
-          Interface is simple, easy, and more elegant, however, the tools offered are limited.
-          more desirable for beginners
-          does not offer enough tools to edit the groups and permissions


Multimedia Management
-          Requires some knowledge of HTML in order to embed an image.


-          Proved to have a better developed multimedia integration tool
-          Has a better image integration




Content Management
Provides the user more control and expects a stronger creation of content.


Content creation is a little easier
due to the nicer interface


Searching
Search functions are alike.


Search functions are alike. Exception: added feature of a filter/search located in the administrative section. This helps to find articles and modules quickly within a huge list.


Versioning and Audit trail
Excellent
Lacks


Site Management
-          Has free add on for Workflow management
-          Has inbuilt Translation manager
-          Has more granular privilege management
-          Doesn’t have add-on for Workflow management
-          Has free add-on for Translation Manager.


Multi site feature
-          Real multi-site-feature (only one installation for several sites)
-          Only one site per installation


System Requirements
-          Work with MySQL and Postgres
-          Doesn’t support SSL logins and SSL pages
-          Work with only MySQL
-          Supports SSL logins and SSL pages






So guys hope have come to know major difference between the both.