Drupal.com Usage and Availability
Until recently, I hadn't noticed how similar Drupal is to Wordpress. Aside from being a PHP/MySQL application, Wordpress and Drupal share similar paths to theme and extend the application. While it seems that Wordpress is a much more mature product, Drupal ultimately seems to be more extensible from the non-developers perspective.
Where Drupal falls behind Wordpress is usability in general. To begin with, Drupal.com could potentially act as Wordpress.com, allowing new users the ability to log in and create their own Drupal.com website. As with Wordpress, this site would be free, with a myriad of "nickle and dime" features to help raise money for the project.
There is a lot Drupal.com could learn from Wordpress.com, such as:
-
Dashboard screen connecting directly to the user community. Additional feeds could also report updates to the user's Drupal sites, along with feeds from Drupal.org.
-
A navigation bar which is all the rage amongst social websites including Wordpress.com, Blogger.com, and Ning.com. This would allow visitors to automatically join Drupal.com while giving site owners control over their sites.
-
AJAX is critical to Drupal, and would provide a wonderful element of simplicity for site creation on Drupal.com. Imagine drag-and-dropping sidebar elements, page layouts, and modules for a site.
If anyone is interested in conceptualizing Drupal.com, feel free to send me a line. I'd be more than happy to help out through wireframing and documentation!
While it seems that
Hm - how do you come to that conclusion?
There are already several usability features powered by Javascript/AJAX in Drupal core. More patches that provide clean and nicely degrading javascript/ajax-powered usability enhancements are not unlikely to be accepted for Drupal 6, at least IMHO. It just needs someone to write them. Anyway, that doesn't have too much to do with a drupal.com site. There's a javascript group.
Concerning a drupal.com site. First of all, who should run and manage the site? Secondly, who provides the initial funds (the drupal association is far too young to have the free funds to sponsor such a venture)?
I don't think anyone in the drupal community currently has the will and money to give away drupal sites for free on a large basis. Feel free to convince me of the opposite, though!
AJAX is Critical...
I certainly hope not. AJAX is great for "enhancing" user experience, and implementing useful and graceful AJAX functionality is an admirable goal. The day that is becomes "critical" is one I hope never arrives, as for some users, "JavaScript and Critical" in the same sentence spells disaster.
10 "Must Read" articles on AJAX and Accessibility - http://soap.stanford.edu/show.php?contentid=65
JF
John Foliot
Academic Technology Consultant
Stanford Online Accessibility Program
http://soap.stanford.edu
Stanford University
560 Escondido Mall
Meyer Library 181
Stanford, CA 94305-3093
Tel: 650-862-4603
Using Wordpress.com as an Example.
(My point would best be illustrated through wireframes. Lacking those I'll use Wordpress as an example.)
Wordpress currently has two distinct identities:
Wordpress.org serves its community in much the same way Drupal.org does by focusing on the code downloads and discussion groups, documentation, etc.
Wordpress.com provides the ability to register and create websites for free, while allowing users to pay for "upgrades" which offer more storage, etc.
The second example is true of many sites on the net, such as Blogger and Ning.com, and illustrates the basic outline of what I'm referring to as Drupal.com. My original post contained a small sampling of the features which I see on these sites.
I see this as more "mature" (possibly a poor choice of words) simply because the "dot Com" approach enables Drupal to appeal to a wider audience than php Developers familiar with the Drupal API.
While I am personally capable of registering a domain name, managing a shared server, installing software remotely, and doing everything necessary to get a site up and running, I'm in the minority. Even an experienced designer such as myself doesn't get very far when customizing Drupal.
Drupal.com would sidestep that long list of requirement by making everything automatic, and receive funding through multiple sources such as advertising and paid services -- again, ONLY on Drupal.com.
To be honest, if Drupal.com essentially boils down to a few new modules and an AdSense account, I'm not sure why Drupal.org WOULDN'T want to do it.
I own drupal.com and I don't
I own drupal.com and I don't know yet how I will use it. I could use it to build a hosted service, but I could also use it to setup a service directory. Or something completely different. Remains to be decided.
Maybe some wireframes?
I believe the dot COM carries with it a strong sense of commercialism which would be perfect for a "hosted" service -- although "hosted" sounds more like a hosting company than a "Do-It-Yourself" Online Drupal Site Creator.
While I've yet to see the numbers for myself, I could imagine that charging for extras would appeal to many who would rather pay $5/mo for extra storage vs. $15 for an entire website -- and that's on the cheap end!
Keep in mind that the smaller businesses and local organizations have recently managed to get their websites online, and only the lucky ones have some semblance of user feedback thanks to phpBB and the like. A hosted service such as this would fill an enormous gap present on the web -- one that isn't covered by online blogs.
I feel there's a lot to this idea that simply saying "Go look at this site" doesn't quite get the point across. I should probably post some wireframes onto Flickr to help illustrate the concept.