[CentOS-devel] forums + portal for {lang}.centos.org sites

David Newkerk centosml at davidnewkerk.com
Wed Oct 1 00:03:52 UTC 2008


I have updated my suggested list of modules for CentOS.org to include
a tag stating whether a given module is supported by Acquia (Acquia,
co-founded by Drupal's original creator Dries Buytaert, is a
commercially supported package of Drupal 6 core + a selection of
modules to form an easy/seamless, pre-configuerd experience for
users).
To learn about what this means, see:
http://acquia.com/products-services/acquia-drupal-modules
http://acquia.com/products-services/acquia-frequently-asked-questions#fork
http://www.linux.com/feed/149212

The modules are the precise same releases as available on drupal.org
(and Acquia Drupal is precisely the same as Drupal 6.x released on
drupal.org... still 100% GPL), however a selection of contributed
modules have been chosen to be part of the commercially-supported
Acquia Drupal release/service - they remain contributed and completely
independent modules, but receive the full benefits of Acquia's support
(patches, upgraded features, etc), as they are pouring resources into
the improvement of these modules specifically. Though you can put
significant confidence in the modules I am carefully listing overall,
you can put complete confidence in the modules marked as supported by
Acquia.

Here is my module recommendation page for CentOS.org:
http://www.davidnewkerk.com/module-recipes/r-centos

The majority of the modules I've recommended in this list are
supported by Acquia (and are also almost exclusively "top tier"
modules that are broadly used by a significant percentage of the
Drupal community, as well as by a variety of variety of notable
sites/companies/organizations that run Drupal). Several others such as
Views and Nodequeue are additionally supported by other notable
sources (such as Sony, which the creator of those modules, Earl Miles,
works for and develops his modules full time). Many are maintained by
Drupal core contributors and/or well-established Drupal development
companies. CentOS.org would need "only" the modules I have listed,
give or take a few (dependent on the actual requirements of the site,
or possibly introducing new functionality that hasn't yet been
discussed). In the current Drupal environment, CCK and Views
eliminates the need for a wide variety of other modules, being able to
reproduce an extremely versatile array of functionality with only
those two modules and a small selection of well-supported Field and
Display format plug-in modules (such as ImageField, etc). From the
Case Studies I previously mentioned, you can see many of the same
modules coming up again and again: http://drupal.org/success-stories

It's important to note that "no" CMS (even a high priced commercial
one) will give you freedom from security flaws (we all know that,
regarding "certain" operating systems that will not be named haha).
The best recourse is with a system that works hard to discover
security flaws and deliver solutions for them effectively and rapidly
to users (which I believe Drupal does an excellent job of). Also, with
any CMS where community members are permitted to freely share their
own modules and themes to be made available to the rest of the
community, extra judgment is necessary to determine the quality and
safety of a module for your site, especially if you do not yet possess
the experience in the community/software to successfully separate the
"chaff from the grain" as it were. This applies equally to Drupal,
Joomla, and any other CMS which operates its community contributions
in this way (which to its credit, encourages amazing innovation,
sharing of knowledge and resources, etc). On the plus side for Drupal
as compared to most other CMSes, there is an active Security team
going through contributed modules seeking out security flaws, and due
to their centralized repository, all Drupal modules are "known of and
always accessible" and consequently able to be assessed - this can
only be done as rapidly as volunteer man-power can accommodate, due to
the huge quantity of available modules.

I hope this info proves helpful in your decision. Please don't
hesitate to ask me any questions, as I'll be happy to help clarify
anything.

- David


On Tue, Sep 30, 2008 at 2:52 PM, David Newkerk
<centosml at davidnewkerk.com> wrote:
> Stephane has kindly recommended I simply refer to my already-posted
> info, and continue from here on in the mailing list. Please read these
> posts, as I have tried to offer insight into the mindset behind
> Drupal's way of releasing modules, as well as covered security/update
> topics. As a recap to better organize links to the info posted thus
> far:
>
> Drupal answers for CentOS forum user requests, theme, multi-site:
> http://dag.wieers.com/blog/drupal-for-centos-portal-and-forums#comment-973
>
> Drupal forum performance test results:
> http://dag.wieers.com/blog/drupal-for-centos-portal-and-forums#comment-978
>
> Sample of CentOS.org implementation using Drupal:
> http://dag.wieers.com/blog/drupal-for-centos-portal-and-forums#comment-988
>
> From within the above link (Sample of CentOS.org implementation using
> Drupal), these are important to point to:
>
> IA and implementation of CentOS.org with Drupal:
> http://www.davidnewkerk.com/book/52
>
> Recipe of modules to build the CentOS.org website using Drupal (minus
> core forum, and including background info on each of the module
> Maintainers, so you can see that the modules, when wisely selected,
> are reliable):
> http://www.davidnewkerk.com/module-recipes/r-centos
>
> I'm available to help if a custom demo of Drupal is desired. If you'd
> like I will set up a copy on my local server tailored for your needs,
> and send you a tar.gz of the files and a database dump, so you can set
> it up on your server. If you want to grant any access I will be happy
> to set it up that way.
>
> Also, I'd like to see if I can help fill in the requirements more
> completely in a few areas, such as the Y/N in requirement D, and the
> empty column for requirement a. If anyone could clarify these 2 areas,
> I will research how best to fulfill them with Drupal.
>
> I'm sure whichever CMS you choose will serve you well. It's my goal to
> present Drupal as a viable option to allow you to make an educated
> decision and help you bypass any learning curve if you select Drupal
> (as Drupal is more complex and powerful than most CMSes and can thus
> take more time to understand without a guide).
>
> Thanks!
>
> - David
>
>
> On Tue, Sep 30, 2008 at 2:11 PM, David Newkerk
> <centosml at davidnewkerk.com> wrote:
>> Hello all -
>>
>> My name is David Newkerk, and have posted under the user name Keyz on
>> Dag's blog post regarding Drupal. Dag requested that I post directly
>> to the mailing list instead so that the info I am compiling can be
>> more readily seen by everyone. Apologies if I have posted incorrectly
>> with this first reply, as I'm not yet accustomed to using the mailing
>> list. I will post several longer replies once I'm sure I've posted
>> correctly.
>>
>> Thanks!
>>
>> - David
>>
>



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