What is Drupal?
Drupal is a Content Management Software.
What is “Content Management Software?”
Content management software is an application that has been designed so that you can organize your content such as blogs, articles, news, RSS feeds, photos, galleries, etcetera easily without having to be bothered about the code and technical nuances.
Why do I need to organize content?
Well, if you want to develop a website where you are sharing information in different formats, and you also want to keep it simple, you need a CMS. Especially, if you want to give your visitors the privilege to add content on your website, then, you definitely need a CMS.
Why would I want to allow my visitors to add content?
Well, this has been the best thing that ever happened to the Internet. Until the Web 2.0 lightning was struck, most of the websites on the internet were either static web pages or interactive pages where visitors could make some choices. All the content was designed, developed, written by the web administrators of that site. However, as the internet grew from an entertainment resource to an information reservoir, it became important that content was generated more organically by many people at the same time. Wikipedia is one great example where articles are written, edited, and maintained by numerous authors.
So, if you want to implement something like this, then, you need a CMS.
Is Drupal the only CMS?
Naa. Drupal is not the only CMS. There are numerous out there.
Then, why should I use Drupal?
It is very easy to use and you do not need to know any coding or scripting languages to be able to build your website. It takes just an hour to set up your website with Drupal. This hour includes, downloading the package, unzipping it, uploading it to your web server, creating MySQL database, configuring the database and then Installing Drupal. Bingo! You are all set with your CMS where you can create pages online.
What else can Drupal do “instantly”?
Well, it instantly gives you what are called “modules” and “themes”. Modules are code packages, which perform specific functions. For example, the “user” module, allows you to instantly have the following features:
- User login
- User profile
- User picture upload
- New user registration
- Email verification
- User roles
- User permissions
- Etcetera
This is just an example. There are thousands of contributed modules that are readily available for you to download, install, configure and start using. Isn’t that great!
Then, you have themes. They allow you to change the look and feel of your site in a snap without having to bang your head off the walls for Photoshop or Flash. Again, there are hundreds of contributed themes.
What type of sites can I create using Drupal?
Well, that depends on your creativity. There are so many modules out there that you just need to figure out how you can use those modules. Drupal can be used to build a site for Blogging, Social Networking, Communities based website, Image galleries, video streaming, chatting, Wiki kind of sites, simple corporate websites – you name it!
How much does Drupal cost?
That’s the beauty of it. Drupal is free! And it is open source. That means you get the complete code so that you can customize it, improve it, and do whatever you want to do (to make it better, of course).