5 ms·

I really can't understand why an organisation would choose wordpress. What are the benefits over an enterprise CMS like Drupal 10?

by lwhi 3y ago

gustavorg 3y ago
No idea, but after 27 years of web developments (yes I started around 1996) I would choose Wordpress every day and twice on Sundays. I have used Drupal, Joomla and Codeigniter extensively, and yet my answer today is, Wordpress.
- lwhi 3y ago
  I've never really delved into wordpress deeply; but it feels like the ecosystem is fragmented, lacks any standards and is littered with proprietary plugins that are no longer supported by the authors; and create conflicts with other plug-ins on the installation. Am I incorrect?
  - doublerabbit 3y ago
    Nope. That is why Wordpress wins.
    - lwhi 3y ago
      This isn't a very convincing argument.
      - doublerabbit 3y ago
        Because of the fractured plugins that exist for WordPress is what makes WordPress the strongest contender than any other CMS. Even though they may be security ridden, bug ridden, exploitable leading to an increase of DDoS, Crypto mining, and malware spreading and exploitation there is no other CMS out there that has the sheer amount of plugins that WordPress has. Wordpress as well has a large pool of developers, designers who you can hire commission for cheap to create your brand compared to any other. Better?
thevagrant 3y ago
Exactly. Many places I've seen pick wordpress only to realise it isn't working. they go to another agency who recommends them a new website in.. wordpress.
- the-dude 3y ago
  So why exactly isn't it working?
  - thevagrant 3y ago
    They often get handed a website in wordpress with a bunch of random plug-ins that break during future updates (or require ongoing license payments they didn't anticipate) The plug-ins being a mixture of free and proprietary that can't be easily extended to add features
    - the-dude 3y ago
      So how is Drupal different?
      - lwhi 3y ago
        Drupal is only open source. Theres a specific versioned API. Less of a wild west by the sound of it.
    - rmccue 3y ago
      > The plug-ins being a mixture of free and proprietary that can't be easily extended to add features This is not true - while there are paid (“premium”) plugins in the WordPress ecosystem, they are all open source, as they are classified as derivative works of WordPress and hence the GPL virally applies. There are in fact some plugin resellers who sell bundles of premium plugins under the GPL - it’s frowned upon by the community, but it’s certainly legal. (At least for the copyright; trademarks are a separate story.) Typically, with paid plugins you’re paying for access to the download system (making updates easy), and for support. See also, https://wordpress.org/news/2009/07/themes-are-gpl-too/ https://wordpress.org/news/2009/07/themes-are-gpl-too/
snowwrestler 3y ago
The biggest advantage to Wordpress, from an enterprise perspective, is the huge ecosystem. Tons of other people use it, which means tons of other people are beta-testing it for you. The WP community runs a competent security program that issues patched regularly. And tons of people know it inside and out. That makes it easier to hire strong staff, get competitive rates and performance from vendors, and find expert help for hosting, devops, performance tuning, security, etc. Drupal had all this as well but, sadly, it’s all shrinking. In retrospect D7 was the high point and although they tried to “get off the island” with the massive changes in D8, all they really did was drive away a bunch of believers, while mostly failing to attract new fans. There’s a level of information architecture complexity where Wordpress starts to suck and Drupal is great. Thanks to changes in WP and Drupal over the past decade, that level has moved way up. Wordpress can do a lot of stuff that D7 could, and D10 can do a lot of even more powerful stuff that few websites actually need.
- lwhi 3y ago
  Why are so many WordPress sites I've seen in such a mess though? Proprietary plugins, open source plugins, half broken themes, conflicts, security holes .. These things seem par for the course? -- Drupal has a huge ecosystem too, and it's truly open source and built on a solid extensible framework (Symfony). D10 is a completely different beast to D7 .. and actual uses good development practices. Is WordPress closer technically to the bad days of D7?
  - snowwrestler 3y ago
    Because most people don’t know how to host and maintain web software. Hence the growth of fully hosted platforms like Squarespace, Wix, Webflow, Shopify, Etsy, etc. That’s not really relevant to how enterprises decide on web content management software, though.
  - rmccue 3y ago
    The WordPress ecosystem spans the gamut from my-first-site through to massive enterprises, so you’d have to expect that many sites you see are in the long-tail. At the higher end, it’s no different to any professional software ecosystem. There’s also varied ecosystems within WordPress, as it’s large enough to support many. For example, the DAM integration cited in the article isn’t something you’ll find on many sites, since it’s an enterprise use case; we don’t even list it on the official plugin directory at all. Plugins and libraries used on enterprise sites are basically a separate ecosystem unto themselves. (I manage the team that maintains said DAM plugin.)

I really can't understand why an organisation would choose wordpress. What are the benefits over an enterprise CMS like Drupal 10?

by lwhi 3y ago

I really can't understand why an organisation would choose wordpress. What are the benefits over an enterprise CMS like Drupal 10?

gustavorg 3y ago

No idea, but after 27 years of web developments (yes I started around 1996) I would choose Wordpress every day and twice on Sundays. I have used Drupal, Joomla and Codeigniter extensively, and yet my answer today is, Wordpress.

lwhi 3y ago
I've never really delved into wordpress deeply; but it feels like the ecosystem is fragmented, lacks any standards and is littered with proprietary plugins that are no longer supported by the authors; and create conflicts with other plug-ins on the installation. Am I incorrect?
- doublerabbit 3y ago
  Nope. That is why Wordpress wins.
  - lwhi 3y ago
    This isn't a very convincing argument.
    - doublerabbit 3y ago
      Because of the fractured plugins that exist for WordPress is what makes WordPress the strongest contender than any other CMS. Even though they may be security ridden, bug ridden, exploitable leading to an increase of DDoS, Crypto mining, and malware spreading and exploitation there is no other CMS out there that has the sheer amount of plugins that WordPress has. Wordpress as well has a large pool of developers, designers who you can hire commission for cheap to create your brand compared to any other. Better?

thevagrant 3y ago

Exactly. Many places I've seen pick wordpress only to realise it isn't working. they go to another agency who recommends them a new website in.. wordpress.

the-dude 3y ago
So why exactly isn't it working?
- thevagrant 3y ago
  They often get handed a website in wordpress with a bunch of random plug-ins that break during future updates (or require ongoing license payments they didn't anticipate) The plug-ins being a mixture of free and proprietary that can't be easily extended to add features
  - the-dude 3y ago
    So how is Drupal different?
    - lwhi 3y ago
      Drupal is only open source. Theres a specific versioned API. Less of a wild west by the sound of it.
  - rmccue 3y ago
    > The plug-ins being a mixture of free and proprietary that can't be easily extended to add features This is not true - while there are paid (“premium”) plugins in the WordPress ecosystem, they are all open source, as they are classified as derivative works of WordPress and hence the GPL virally applies. There are in fact some plugin resellers who sell bundles of premium plugins under the GPL - it’s frowned upon by the community, but it’s certainly legal. (At least for the copyright; trademarks are a separate story.) Typically, with paid plugins you’re paying for access to the download system (making updates easy), and for support. See also, https://wordpress.org/news/2009/07/themes-are-gpl-too/ https://wordpress.org/news/2009/07/themes-are-gpl-too/

snowwrestler 3y ago

The biggest advantage to Wordpress, from an enterprise perspective, is the huge ecosystem. Tons of other people use it, which means tons of other people are beta-testing it for you. The WP community runs a competent security program that issues patched regularly. And tons of people know it inside and out. That makes it easier to hire strong staff, get competitive rates and performance from vendors, and find expert help for hosting, devops, performance tuning, security, etc. Drupal had all this as well but, sadly, it’s all shrinking. In retrospect D7 was the high point and although they tried to “get off the island” with the massive changes in D8, all they really did was drive away a bunch of believers, while mostly failing to attract new fans. There’s a level of information architecture complexity where Wordpress starts to suck and Drupal is great. Thanks to changes in WP and Drupal over the past decade, that level has moved way up. Wordpress can do a lot of stuff that D7 could, and D10 can do a lot of even more powerful stuff that few websites actually need.

lwhi 3y ago
Why are so many WordPress sites I've seen in such a mess though? Proprietary plugins, open source plugins, half broken themes, conflicts, security holes .. These things seem par for the course? -- Drupal has a huge ecosystem too, and it's truly open source and built on a solid extensible framework (Symfony). D10 is a completely different beast to D7 .. and actual uses good development practices. Is WordPress closer technically to the bad days of D7?
- snowwrestler 3y ago
  Because most people don’t know how to host and maintain web software. Hence the growth of fully hosted platforms like Squarespace, Wix, Webflow, Shopify, Etsy, etc. That’s not really relevant to how enterprises decide on web content management software, though.
- rmccue 3y ago
  The WordPress ecosystem spans the gamut from my-first-site through to massive enterprises, so you’d have to expect that many sites you see are in the long-tail. At the higher end, it’s no different to any professional software ecosystem. There’s also varied ecosystems within WordPress, as it’s large enough to support many. For example, the DAM integration cited in the article isn’t something you’ll find on many sites, since it’s an enterprise use case; we don’t even list it on the official plugin directory at all. Plugins and libraries used on enterprise sites are basically a separate ecosystem unto themselves. (I manage the team that maintains said DAM plugin.)