ohh it's the little stuff that makes this software shit!

sorry for the harsh tone, but if you were me (4 days no sleep, stuck on small theme/core problems) you'd sympathize!

simply, i love drupal, well i used to when i didn't know as much about theming, now that i've become more involved and hands on i realize wow this software really lacks some grass roots efficiency! Devel with theme helper module is a god sent, but unfortunately when you realize of all the elements and all the the things you can do with those element, you're expectations goes up as well, the moral of this post, "don't forget"

1st issue: can somebody explain why comments have subjects? show me any major that requires subjects for comments, if you don't know the title of the post or article you're commenting for then i don't even want you to comment to begin with,...

2nd issue: as if the requirement for subjects isn't bad enough, if me the "ADMIN" disable the subject field, this software generates one for me automatically!!! there is a reason why i disabled it, this is where stupidity comes into play, even worse is the user experience all of a sudden gets screwed up, because the auto generated titles simply takes the first 64 characters of the comment content and turns it into the subject, so when somebody tries to read the comment would read the subject line but then has to re-read the first few words in the comment body again, THIS IS A DISRUPTION TO THE READ FLOW AND IT'S A COSTLY FLAW ... there is simply no affordable way to get around this, i've tried to turn the subject line into comment number like (#1, #2,...) like any normal site but nooooo drupal doesn't like it so i can't do it

3rd issue: while i love the fact that most elements on the site are customizable however, the little ones that are not happen to play a bit of a big role, unless you'd like to go the default way... what am i talking about? theme_links() and phptemplate_node_submitted() and phptemplate_comment_submitted, the options for editing and customizing these is very very limited, if i try to change the way theme_links() works one element, it would apply it to all the other ones as well and phptemplate api reference is no where near satisfactory, i wish i could do more.

4th issue: so far there is no 4th issue yet, lets all pray together, but i know so many others have all sorts of different problems, just have a deeper look at the forum and people's questions, it's not that programmers and designers are stupid cuz they can't figure some things out, but it's because the people up there who are making decisions for drupal tend to assume their way is the best way and everybody should agree with them.

"best way" is arbitrary to the case at hand by the people with authority to make those decisions, the "right way" is in the eye of the beholder, so let us, (designers, developers, project managers, businessmen, dreamers,...) decide the right way for each of our unique projects and needs...