CMS Smackdown: Drupal, Joomla and…WordPress
I was stuck for a topic this week when I got an interesting question from a colleague of mine asking for an analysis of Content Management Systems, or CMSs.
CMSs, in theory, are framework applications that allow you to rapidly develop and deploy web sites that can be readily edited by a a non-programmer. While the setup for a CMS is not necessarily for the faint-of-heart, once it’s set up and configured with the functions appropriate for your site it should be easy for someone to log in and edit content of a page quickly, and with little programming knowledge necessary.
There are hundreds of CMSs out there, ranging from $0 to thousands in licensing fees, and it’s certainly beyond the scope of any one post to cover them all. Today I’m going to highlight 3 of the most popular open-source systems, and attempt to give you an idea of how you can incorporate them into your business model.
Master CMS: Joomla!
I’ve used Joomla! as a solution for a couple of clients now, and it is an impressive piece of software. There are many configuration and content options right out of the box, and just putting together a basic site can be quick…if you’re familiar with some of the jargon that the system uses. Designers also tend to like the structure of templates for the system, allowing them to easily develop and deploy ideas for the community and show off their work.
There is no doubt that Joomla! also has a pretty active developer community, with literally hundreds of extensions available for use. The VirtueMart shopping cart system, for example, is one of the most recognizable and widely used solutions for online stores. There are also some great photo management extensions, ways to get your ads and affiliates online, and even a “prayer center” extension, allowing you to manage prayers with others in your online community. Who would have thought?
My biggest problem with Joomla! is that it almost does too much out of the box, and though its help and support system are fabulous, the non-programmer will have difficulty the first several days learning about how to navigate the system and understanding the differences between Modules and Components, menu configuration and overall management of static pages. Blogging also seems to be almost an afterthought (which is fine, since that’s not Joomla!’s strength), and any built-in Search Engine Optimization (SEO), while improved in the latest versions of the software, isn’t quite where it should be yet.
So, in sum, Joomla! pros:
- Powerful CMS with an extensive developer community, providing commercial-quality extensions that you can use for your implementation.
- More rapid deployment than development of a completely custom system
- Designer-friendly, with many free or low-cost themes available that could be modified to reflect the look and feel of your business
Joomla! cons:
- System jargon can be difficult to grasp for non-technical users
- SEO lacks some polish; could be addressed in the next revision
- Blogging seems almost tacked on, and not completely integrated with the system
Programmer’s Delight: Drupal
I confess as I write this, I don’t have much experience with Drupal, but I’ve read a lot about it as I considered it for a few projects that we took on last year. As extensive as the Joomla! community is, Drupal seems to have an even more passionate community. The framework of the application lends itself well to these developers and hence not only is the core of the application pretty solid, but it seems to get better with every update.
Search engine optimization seems to be very well implemented as well, and it’s especially popular as a solution for community-based web sites. Some high-profile sites, such as AOL corporate, Popular Science, the New York Observer and MTV UK, have all leveraged Drupal’s core for their own site. There’s even a local site, www.redbank.com, that makes use of Drupal’s community features and custom programming to make a site that lends itself to social media.
All of this means, however, that Drupal is not something that you’d be able to configure on your own as a business owner, and even with training it might be intimidating to the non-technical user to update a site. I would liken it more to an enterprise-class solution, and for most small businesses I believe it would be overkill. The Drupal community also maintains a philosophy that new releases do not necessarily have to be backwards-compatible with previous releases; that is, some features of a Drupal site can be re-written at any time if the developers feel its necessary to keep the core package up to date with advancing technologies. This makes it easier to incorporate bleeding edge technology into new sites, but by default could make it more of a process to upgrade existing sites (and you’ll likely need the help of a consultant).
Finally, because this package is more developer-centric, fewer actual designers have tried their hand at developing free themes in the Drupal community. You will likely not find a free theme for your site, and you’ll have to hire a designer and developer to deploy a site that ties in with your company image.
Drupal pros:
- Extensive, passionate developer community
- SEO is well-implemented
- Popular among high-profile web sites
- Upgrades do not consider backwards compatibility, so code is theoretically cleaner and better optimized
Drupal cons:
- Requires knowledgeable developers to understand the implementation and deploy it to even the simplest of sites
- Upgrades are not guaranteed to be backwards-compatible, meaning that they theoretically could be more involved and require more help to execute
- Not as designer-friendly as other solutions; most likely businesses will require a separate designer and developer to deploy a site using Drupal.
Unlikely CMS: WordPress
WordPress started as a blogging platform, and many know it even today for that strength. It’s been popularized by increasing support on almost all hosting sites, making its installation literally a snap with point-and-click. I have found, however, that many people who develop and deploy web sites are now touting the application for its ability to be a CMS, and it really isn’t that far of a stretch to believe it.
The back-end interface makes attempts to lay out information in a way that people will understand, most specifically around blog posts and pages of a site. Posts are called posts and pages are called…well…pages. Bits of code that extend WordPress’s functionality are called Plugins, and bits of code that change the look of your site are called Themes. You get the idea.
There is also an active developer and designer community for WordPress as well, with nearly 1000 free themes to choose from on the WordPress web site, and over 5500 plugins. At its core, WordPress is pretty spartan and wouldn’t be able to even come close to the kind of functionality that Joomla! and Drupal provide right out of the box, but there are so many extensions available (about 1000 more than either Joomla! or Drupal) that you could probably bend WordPress to your will and effectively compete with a site developed on either of the other two platforms. Also, as of the latest version of WordPress, Plugin and Theme installation can be done right from within the application, so you don’t technically need to even know much about the structure or configuration of your server.
That said, WordPress is almost too easy. WordPress lets you know when updates are available for the system, and gives you the ability to install updates right from within the application. There’s no way to turn this alert off if you don’t want to upgrade, so you’re almost compelled to do it in order to get rid of the message. Though I’ve found almost every update has been pretty stable, having a plan to test an update probably makes sense, or at least a plan to back out a change should it wreak havoc on your system.
It’s also important to remember that WordPress is a blogging platform first, so it does that really well. WordPress is rapidly approaching the maturity of Drupal and Joomla! when it comes to developing community sites, but it probably isn’t quite at the same level yet.
WordPress pros:
- Of the 3 CMSs overviewed here, it is the easiest for the non-technical user to understand and navigate
- Extensive developer and designer community, with many free plugins and themes to choose from
- Often, one-click upgrades are the norm for both plugins and for the core application
WordPress cons:
- Because the application core and plugins are so easy install, it’s easy to be tempted to upgrade without testing first — this could cause huge problems if you’re not careful
- Not yet as mature as a community platform as Drupal and Joomla!
- Base install is pretty spartan, requiring plugins to increase functionality
Conclusion
In my opinion, WordPress by far is the most friendly framework for building and maintaining a web site. Concepts are easy to understand for most users (though “widgets” might need some explaining), and it’s pretty easily extendible. It’s ideal for the business owner who can’t afford an IT team and wants to be hands on with updates of their own web site. You are probably going to need the help of a developer when setting it up if you’re not tech-savvy, but at the very least you should be able to maintain the system on your own with a little training (and perhaps a little research in their excellent documentation).
That said, if you’re a little more tech-savvy, you might want to give Joomla! a try. Like its counterparts, it’s extremely extendible, and the learning curve, though higher than WordPress, is not insurmountable if you have a little technical knowledge. Drupal is also still a good option, and thanks to its strong developer connection it’s probably the most flexible solution. Drupal, however, is probably the most difficult of the three to implement, and unless you’re planning on doing all the work yourself, definitely the most costly.
What about you? Do you have a preference for one of the above frameworks? What are some of the advantages or disadvantages that I don’t mention here, but you think are important to know? Sound off below and be sure to participate in the survey!
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Comments
Interesting stuff, thanks for sharing! It’s a topic of great interest to me right now, as I have a couple of small clients who desperately need a bare-bones content management system.
Glad you guys liked it. Yeah, I think WordPress is a good CMS for small businesses that don’t need a ton of functionality on their sites (which is, let’s face it, a large majority of companies).
Good post Mariano. I’ve had experience with all three of these CMS’s and by far the easiest one is WordPress, Drupal and Joomla both leave me wondering why they made half of the design/functional decisions they did for their admin panels.
I agree with you on Joomla almost doing too much out of the box, we were considering it as a replacement to an older (commercial CMS we had been using), but trying to figure out how everything worked and how we could extend it proved to be a pain. I ended up building a brand new CMS for our client projects, (so I chose other in the poll as I’m biased) though we use wordpress for our site and blog since I haven’t built a blog module for it yet. If given only a choice between these three, wordpress wins hands down.
Keep up the good posts, I enjoy reading them.
I’d like to point out that there is a difference between being easy for a user to use and being easy for a developer to set up. I think that Wordpress is the easiest for a developer or designer to set up a simple site, but offers no advantage to users in how easy it is for them to use.
In fact, there was a SXSW competition between the three and the user rated WP as the most confusing. I love Wordpress, but Joomla has admin permissions that make it much easier for a user to administer. They don’t even have to login to the backend to change the majority of content– just go to the page they want to change and click on a pencil icon. As a system for a developer to learn though, I think both Joomla and Drupal are much more time intensive. They both offer and require more out of developers.
John
An excellent point John. I had completely forgotten to consider the fact that you can modify Joomla! (and Drupal, I imagine) so that the business owner can actually log in and modify content without ever even seeing the back end.
As you mention, however, the WordPress back-end would probably be the easiest of the 3 systems for an average business owner to pick up, and I imagine the easiest for them to extend if they wanted to do so without the help of a developer. For example, WordPress 2.8 allows download and installation of new themes and plugins from the Wordpress.org site without the use of any third-party utility; it can all be done from the back-end. Business users can introduce functionality at their own pace, not necessarily just content.
Great points, I look forward to hearing more from you!
I think the dark horse that you are all forgetting is Expression Engine. It’s a bit more time intensive to setup, however, it’s hands down one of the best CMS I’ve ever used.
It requires you to be experienced and has a little learning curve, but as a paid CMS, you get EXCELLENT support and your ability to control the content down to the most minute detail makes it my all-time favorite.
Trying to get your developer off of WP and interested in EE is the hardest part of using EE 
Looks like a good solution Sam, but it’s not open source. We focused only on open source solutions this time around…is there any interest out there in looking at more complex CMS solutions? I’d be happy to do research and come up with an article for it.
Excellent summation. I just started doing websites a month ago and started with a blog for one friend – Wordpress – and a green themed general site – Joomla! – so I have a good sense of the rampup of each compared to each other. Wordpress – very fast on the conceptual rampup but since it’s so easy, it’s easy to overlook the ways to extend it. Joomla – I still struggle with some of the concepts (modules, components, sections…) but have still been able to develop a site offering diverse capabilities quickly. Both will get you there. It’s just a question of how fearful you are of jumping in and whether you want your challenges in week 1 or week 4.
My rating:
1. WordPress – Although I’m biased (as I am a professional developer for WordPress) there is a reason for the bias. To me, WordPress has been much easier to develop for than Joomla! and Drupal (I have experience with both). The WP community is huge and extremely helpful. And I definitely disagree that something being easy to install is a con . Sure, you could completely break your site… but you should also be backing up your site before doing anything major.
2. Joomla! – I’ve used Joomla in the past and felt that it was extremely difficult to develop for. Perhaps it was because I am use to WordPress but the structure just didn’t make any sense to me. I also found that it was pretty difficult to find free information on developing for Joomla!. Not to mention any half way decent Joomla! plugin was not free. One of the great things about WordPress is the mindset that you can get really well developed plugins for free. Most of the WordPress developers I know make their living building sites and put out plugins to help the community.
3. Drupal – I have much less experience with Drupal… but I think the recent Drupalcon 2009 video “Why I Hate Drupal” http://dc2009.drupalcon.org/session/why-i-hate-drupal can attest to the fact that Drupal isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be. Perhaps instead of Developer’s Delight, it should be labeled Developer’s Despair .
As I said, I’m biased for WordPress… but all three are probably the top three free CMS solutions out there. I have developed some pretty high-end sites using WordPress. I think it has the most potential, the greatest amount of support, and a great development community.
Thanks for sharing,
Lew
P.S. As of this comment, WordPress is winning your survey 
.
@Lew,
Hey, you’ve got no argument from me. I actually am a HUGE WordPress fan. In fact, this article is targeted specifically to business owners who either want to build the site themselves or at least have a better understanding of what they’re getting into. I think in many cases, it is a perfect solution for the small business user.
As for your point on Plugins, it’s true, many WordPress plugins do a fantastic job extending the base functionality of the core. I do suggest to my business owners, however, that they do donate to the developers to encourage further development (and I generally donate to plugin developers for projects in which I’m using their plugins).
Great communities for all three, and certainly an ever-evolving topic.
Thanks for your feedback!
[...] I was doing work for my recent CMS Smackdown article on Drupal, Joomla and Wordpress, I uncovered, quite by accident, a new CMS that has recently arrived on the Open Source scene. [...]
Having wordpress around makes my internet business more manageable. The easy navigation on the dashboard is great. I find wordpress as one of the business solutions for my internet business.
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Great article and I agree with a lot of the points you are making. I have a feeling Wordpress is going to start moving more towards a CMS with a blog plugin at some point in the future, similar to what Drupal kind of does. Keep up the great articles.