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By KimMC on
I am a professional print publisher with some, but not a lot of experience in web development. My strong suits are graphic design, writing and other things related to print that cross over into the internet easily. I tend to like site builders, but I would also like to have a great site, with a lot of features and searchable capabilities. I don't mind learning... but... how hard is Drupal for those who don't have a lot of code and tech experience? What can I expect... do you think I can make the learning curve?
Comments
No coding ... but that doesn't mean it's easy
Drupal has a very difficult learning curve -- not because you need to learn to code, but because you need to learn to think about data and functionality and map that thinking to a very large universe of contributed tools. Once you master it, Drupal is an incredibly powerful system for very fast construction of very complex websites -- again, without necessarily having to write a line of code. But it takes awhile to get there.
Here's an example: Pull an XML feed conforming to no known or documented specification from a government source, store it in a database, create a page for every data record displaying the fielded data in a pleasing format with an embedded image, and create a slideshow out of those page records.
I did that in my spare time over a weekend using Drupal while also watching Netflix. I didn't write a line of code other than a tiny bit of CSS to tweak the displays. Without Drupal you're probably looking at a month of development. But I have the benefit of years of Drupal experience, so I know how to use the Feeds module, how to create my own content types, how to use the Views module, and why it's a bad idea to write code when you don't need to and a good idea to reuse other people's work.
So it's kind of like the tale of the painter. "How long did it take you to paint that painting?" "A few days ... and a lifetime."
Thanks
Wow that sounds totally intense. I was looking at the tutorials and it seems that there is a WYSIWYG type interface and that certainly helps a ton, as a visuals kind of person, I just can't deal code only interfaces. Drupal sounds like this might be worth the effort, but it might be time consuming as you said, and I am working with self created deadlines, but deadlines none the less. What I would want to do is create a large data base of local attractions, restaurants, shops and etc. I'd like each to come up on a list with a summary and pictures, and a link to a more in depth description and more pictures. I'd also like a news page, but don't want the news just disappearing without my control... I'd like to be able to keep articles until I want rid of them. If that makes sense. There would also be regular static pages like About us, Advertising rates and so forth. It's nothing so complex as what you are doing, but I think it might be a bit beyond word press, or a site builder.
I am considering the Zen
I am considering the Zen theme, as many developers say it is easier to learn with. I'd like to try it, just to see how it goes. Any advice on themes? Is Zen the easiest, or is there something even simpler?
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Personally I find zen to be difficult and cumbersome to work with. I've converted all my sites over to the drupal bootstrap theme. I find it a pleasure to work with, the drupal integration is awesome, and because it's not drupal specific, there's tons of info and tutorials out there on how to use it (the bootstrap part).
And what you describe is easily doable with drupal. For an experienced drupal site builder it's pretty much as yelvington described-- a weekend's work while watching tv, lol. However, it will be significantly longer for someone new due to the learning curve. If you plan on building more such sites it's well worth it. For just one site of your own, you might be better off with wordpress if it can do what you want it to do.
One other thing-- a note of caution regarding wysiwyg. While it's definitely useful for content creation with basic formatting (bold, italic, underline, numbered lists, headings, tables, etc), you won't be able to layout an entire website with it. That's not what's it meant to do and trying to use it that way will be disastrously frustrating. That's not a drupal thing-- that's just a fact of working with HTML.
Thank You WorldFallz
Thanks. I just had a rough night with zen, trying to create a subtheme... I could not get it to see the sub theme, even though I followed the directions on this site and used a YouTube video to clarify that. It would not show up in the themes menu as the video showed. I have no idea why. I think I will follow your advice and try bootstrap, mostly because I am frustrated with Zen right now. It is quite a learning curve, but I really hate word press. I've done a few, but I don't find them that much easier to use, I mean if you really are going to be picky about how it looks and what it does, and they always look awful in my opinion. I have a nice site builder on in motion hosting, but it... well you know they look kind of obviously built with a site builder. Mine is pretty, but it isn't robust enough to do what I want really. I used to consider myself a great web designer, back in the days of Front Page and Dream Weaver, but those are really slow loading and cumbersome on today's web. I've got a site that combines three or four different, and somewhat unrealated services, but the new service is going to house so much more information than the others that are already there. I think it is too much.
I did have one question. My Drupal keeps saying it is saved to a temporary file, I don't know why, I loaded it onto the service provider's server. Any idea why it would say that? I thought about trying to reinstall, but I don't know... Do you know of any site builder type product that shows a list of pages like an editable site directory... point and create or point and delete, plus a view that shows each page in a page view.
I found the Artist's Perfect Theme
I am so happy with Drupal, After struggling with several themes I found MAYO! So far and in one night from about 10PM til 6:45 AM I have all my Theme work done. Best of all, if I want to change it, I can do so with the push of a couple of buttons! It's so easy with MAYO. Now all I have to do is add content, and while I admit I don't know how to do that yet, I am very happy with all my design work so far. I got to pick colors by the HTML color code numbers and it displays them as soon as they are selected, so that you can see exactly what you have done immediately. I knit picked over the colors and the sizes of everything to my heart's content without even having to edit a line of code. It was beautiful!!! Thanks you guys, and pass the word if you find another artist who wants to use Drupal, but is not into tech stuff. I admit I am having trouble uploading a banner, but the plain color option with my logo cut might look better anyway. If I decide not to, then I'll try to upload my picture again toorrow, but at anyrate, I think Drupal is terrific again.
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Well done! And that's good to hear-- usually all we see in the forums is people complaining about how bad drupal sucks and how much greater wordpress is, lol. I've used MAYO before and it's a great theme for what it does. I just assumed since you mentioned trying zen, that you wanted a base theme.
As for creating content, just navigate to /content-- drupal provides 2 different page types you can use by default (article and basic page), but you can create as many different types as you need (/admin/structure/types).
I think so
I think you can do it