Drupal or Wordpress CMS as a social network?
I am creating a webcomic community that will be able to sync my existing site with this site.
However, I am discussing whether I should be using a CMS for: Drupal or Wordpress.
I've heard great things about Drupal where it really is for social media. I actually had to play around for a bit at the end of Drupal, and I thought it was quite difficult, but I'm not going to fully understand how Drupal works.
As far as Wordpress is concerned, I am very familiar with the Framework. I have the option to extend it to do what I want, but I hesitate because I think the framework is not built for communities (I think it might slow down in the future).
I also have an unrelated question: Should I work with Python CMS? I've heard very good things about Python and how much better it compares to PHP.
Your advice is welcome.
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Difficult decision. Normally I would say "definitely Drupal" without hesitation as Drupal was built as a system for community sites from the beginning, whereas Wordpress still shows its legacy as a blogging solution, at least what I hear quite often ... But then I have been working with Drupal all the time recently and I haven't looked at Wordpress for a long time.
However, Drupal has grown into a rather complex system over the years, so a learning curve is enough for beginners. Considering that you are already familiar with Wordpress, it may be more efficient for you if you can do whatever you need to do.
So I would recommend Drupal, but you should probably get some opinions from people familiar with Wordpress on the possibility of turning it into a community site first.
Regarding the Python vs PHP CMS question, I would say that the quality of a CMS depends on the ability of its developers, the maturity of the system, the surrounding "ecosystem", etc., and not the specific language used to create it. (And discussions about the quality of one installed language versus another? Okay - just in the wrong place;)
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I make websites with both Drupal and Django - sometimes with Pinax (Python). So let me try to establish the differences between Python and PHP and different CMSs.
Python - PHP
- Pros for Python.
- You tend to write more readable code that makes it easier to maintain. This is of great importance if you are going to make a lot of custom codes, now or in the future. However, if you are not going to do such custom functions, it doesn't matter.
- Python and Django are built in OO for easy code reuse and built on DRY princip.
- I find python to be more intuitive for programming. In many cases, it has less weird / obscure syntax than PHP.
- Cons for Python.
- PHP is easier to host. More providers will let you run PHP, and you can generally find PHP hosters a little cheaper than python hostels. If you have your own server, it doesn't matter.
It's actually easier in many ways to code python, but this is something that can be overcome simply by using more time with PHP. Also, if you don't know python, it means you have to spend some time learning this and what you can do with python. On the other hand, it is a little harder to find cheap hosting for Python projects.
Django / Pinax vs. Drupal vs. Wordpress.
It's always hard to tell which CMS? CMF to use. The choice of these depends on several factors.
- How many custom codes are you going to make?
- How many settings do you need?
- How do you need fine-grained control over the system?
The strength of Wordpress is its ease of use and how you can customize a lot of things quickly and easily. You may be able to get the site the way you want in just a few hours. However, the problem with wordpress is when you want to create custom functionality. It doesn't have a strong API like Drupal and you might have trouble changing the output to give you exactly what you want.
Drupal is a powerful API, the ability to customize and overwrite anything. In addition to all this, it also has many modules that give you the ability in many cases to create your very / your entire site in a very short time. The problem with Drupal is that it is not easy to use. You must take the time to learn the system and the API before you can use it. Drupal AI is also difficult for newbies to navigate, and it takes a while before you know where the different things are. Drupal is a big machine, though, and it can get a little slow if you don't install something like Varnish in front of it.
Django is designed for rapid development. So once you get to grips with it, which isn't that hard, you can quickly build apps to suit your needs. You have complete control over the URLs. The problem with django is that it is not easy to find the various applications that have been made and find out which are good ones. The templating system makes it easy to create the markup the way you want, but you can't change the functionality of the apps in the same way you can with Drupal. It should be noted that Pinax does not have version 1.0 yet, and Drupal has a code freeze for version 7.0.
Overall, with all of these tools, the biggest problem is how to use them. If you know Wordpress well and just want to create this site, you can just use it and be done with it. If you want to take it further, I would assume that you are using Django or Drupal. These two have great development potential.
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If you are open to Python and building a social / community site, I would take a look at the Pinax for Django web framework. It provides many common social site features such as user accounts, blogs, tagging, friend invites, etc.
Here's an example of a social site built using Pinax.
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There's a WordPress extension called BuddyPress which will give you a social network ready. If that suits you, it might be easier than installing Drupal. However, if that doesn't suit you, I think Drupal is better suited for extensibility in the long run.
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I would do this with Drupal as a proven social media platform and I have the option to be updated to do anything from the wide range of modules offered (read on cck and views - they basically allow you to add your own custom page type (cck ) and views allow you to display data in different ways and based on various other parameters.)
I am running my own social networking site in Drupal - Tunstall Communities - Bankeyfields .
Heres a social networking / news site using Wordpress which they have now decided to switch to Drupal as they want more social networking features.
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