I'm writing an article/Blog on our experiences with taking over failed/abandoned corporate Drupal sites. I've done a little research to discover that there's little written on the subject of taking over someone else's incomplete and sub standard work. There really should be, so that customers who find themselves in this predicament, have guidance from the Drupal community on what to do to make things right.
We have a show in Canada called: [[http://makeitright.ca/Holmes_Media/Holmes_On_Homes]Holmes on Homes] that deals with the poor workmanship of renovation home contractors that is a wonderful template for what we could do for Drupal customers. He metaphorically parachutes into failed reno projects in his brown overalls, showing off his huge biceps, with his crack team of experts and saves the day. The home owners go from nervous break down to euphoria in one half hour episode. If you get a chance to watch it, just imagine yourself as Mike Holmes in the role of Drupal Rescue super hero. I'm sure you could write an entire season worth of Drupal Rescue episodes using your own experiences. I make this comparison for the simple fact that this show has served to educate many Canadian home owners in a way that I'm sure a few articles could positively educate Drupal Corporate clients.
I see it as our group responsibility to educate Drupal clients with real world examples on the importance of going through the [[http://drupal.org/node/51169]Hiring a Developer] procedure guidance. People need to understand the down-side in taking short cuts.
Share your rescue stories, if you dare be recognized as a Drupal Consultant/Developer Do Gooder. :)
Comments
To be fair, I think that
To be fair, I think that sometimes you can pick up good ideas when you inherit a project. Why does it always seem to be the other way around.
I had (and I'm still working on) that project. There were a host of horrors, including:
I spent a lot of time sorting out the site, but in the end I should have just started over. Luckily the client was quite understanding of the situation.
http://cleaver.ca
Wow.
Wow.
technical difficulties
I also have had the pleasure (?) of having to work with an abandoned Drupal site with various, shall we say, technical difficulties. It turns out that it is too time-consuming, and financially draining to the owners, to repair what exists. I have had to make and offer the choice of starting from scratch in this situation - but it was a hard sell because the customer already paid for the existing "problem".
I did see and develop some new ways of accomplishing things when I analyzed what the previous developer (?) was trying to do.
Regardless, the owners will be left with a more functional/scalable site and become more empowered after some training.