I’ve read through hours of drupal handbooks, forum posts and articles. I’ve also spent time on other cms’s and a bit of time with other php frameworks.
Drupal seems to offer alot for the developer who wants to churn out quality web applications as easily and reliably as possible.
Despite the ease of using other php based MVC frameworks, some easier to learn than drupal, most are lacking in larger granularity site management building blocks which are integral to serious web development projects.
To name a few:
- user management,
- password/authentication management,
- access control,
- site templating,
- site/menu/article/page/module management,
- log/audit trail management,
- indexing/searching/categorizing,
- content management,
- multi-language support
- development utilities
For example, many MVC frameworks offer sessions, forms, encryption and security management classes, but drupal offers all of those classes already assembled for you (integrated, tested, debugged, and soaked) into a full-blown user and password/authentication management subsystem with access control, and gives you api's into them. Same with site management and content management subsystems.
I see drupal as a "more powerful than most" php development framework.
So, the question just ..begs.. for the asking:
- What projects should a developer NOT use drupal for? (there has to be something, nothing is perfect) ?