A quick presentation to bring some levity to the DrupalCamp 09 event in Lethbridge, Alberta.

1. <?PHP ECHO
"WHY I HATE "
.$INSERT[ARRAY_RAND($INSERT)].
" DRUPAL!"; ?>*
$insert = array(teaching, installing, upgrading, modding);
*with a nod to James Walker

2. DISCLAIMER
• theopinions reflected in this presentation do not necessarily
represent the opinions of DrupalCamp 09, the University of
Lethbridge, Trellon, Redwall, DevBox, or any of the individuals part
of those organizations, though I am pretty sure every one of them
have thought these very same things at 3 AM when the Ubercart
upgrade has screwed with the 200 products in your db, and they
didn’t bother to backup the db because, well, it’s Ubercart and
Ubercart is supposed to be awesome, and... well... dammit.

3. DRUPALLING MY WAY TO
INSANITY...
• Drupal makes me crazy...
Drupal saves my a$$...
Drupal confounds me...
Drupal makes me successful...
Drupal doesn't work...
Drupal does work...
• It's makin' me bi-polar!
• But wait! How did I get here?

4. WHY I CHOSE DRUPAL
• someone recommended it to me
• the guts made sense to me
• ruled out the others
• it was free (all of it, no hidden drug-dealer tactics)

5. "DROO-PAL, EET ROCKS!" -
ROBERT SCALES
• If this guy likes Drupal, it must be cool.

6. BY THE WAY...
• THAT guy created THIS company.

7. WHY I CHOSE DRUPAL
• someone recommended it to me
• the guts made sense to me
• ruled out the others
• it was free (all of it, no hidden drug-dealer tactics)

8. THE GUTS...
• the files and folders made sense...

9. THE GUTS...
•I could find modules and installing them was easy.

10. THE GUTS...
•I liked that the edit button was on the page I was about to edit.

11. WHY I CHOSE DRUPAL
• recommended
• the guts made sense to me
•I ruled out the others
• it was free (all of it, no hidden drug-dealer tactics)

12. THE OTHERS
(THIS ISN'T ALL OF THEM, I KNOW)
• WordPress?
not enough functional pieces that I want. You have to
break it to customize it. Seems kind of mean to mess
with...
• SharePoint?
Microsoft. 'nuff said.
• Joomla?
I actually used it for a while... then, I got handed 5
projects in a row where the original developer quit in

13. WHY I CHOSE DRUPAL
• recommended
• the guts made sense to me
• ruled out the others
• it was free (all of it, no hidden drug-dealer tactics)

14. C’MON, IT’S FREE...

15. "FREE"
• Other cool stuff is free...
• Firefox
• iTunes
• Linux
• wikipedia
• flickr
• facebook
• gMail

16. WHADDAYAMEAN IT ONLY
SORTA WORKS!

17. WELL, IT'S FREE, SUCKAH.
• modules sort of work... or...
• modules haven't been updated in... like... forever (looking for a
maintainer)... or...
• modules don't work with other modules... groan...
• modules used to work but now don't... not sure why...
• modules can only be installed on a full moon...
• and my all time favourite... <?php print $closure ?>

18. SO. WHAT'S THE PROBLEM?
Drupal is having a growth spurt and is now in the awkward
teenager phase.

20. SO, IF DRUPAL IS A GAWKY
TEEN, WHAT'S WORDPRESS?

22. WORDPRESS IS THE
CHEERLEADER.
• pretty
• good chance you can get a first date
• you better measure up (design-wise)
• nice personality, but not very smart
• you probably won't get everything you want

23. SO, IF WP IS THE CHEERLEADER,
WHAT'S JOOMLA?

25. JOOMLA! IS THE MAC GEEK.
• cool, hip type
• kinda has a superiority thing going on
• don't bother talking about any other system
• you can hang out, if you can afford it...

26. AND IF JOOMLA! IS THE MAC
GEEK, WHAT'S MAGENTO?

28. MAGENTO IS THE
SCIENTOLOGIST.
• you can hang out for free
• if you want to achieve enlightenment, it'll cost you
• once you hang out, don't bother trying to leave
• once you get it figured out, all the rules change

29. SO, WHO DO I WISH DRUPAL
WAS?

31. I WISH DRUPAL WAS THE HOT
LIBRARIAN.
• pretty... but not too pretty
• smart, but knows how to be helpful
• has tons of well-organized easy to find reference material
• makes those geeky glasses work!

32. ENOUGH ANALOGIES...
WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?
• Solve the identity crisis. Platform or Product?
• Fix the WYSIWYG editor.
• Organize the modules library.
• Make installation profiles that don't have a list of caveats a mile
long.
• Don't worry about one template to rule them all
• Make the admin interfaces smarter.

33. IDENTITY CRISIS
• Platform vs. Product
• Platform is for developers.
• Platform is very agile
• Platform can lead to innovation
• Platform will scare off the masses
• Product is for everyone else.
• Product is easy to use
• Product is good for rapid solutions
• Product will attract the masses

34. IDENTITY CRISIS
• buuuhhhhht... can we have our platform and be a product too?

35. FIX THE WYSIWYG EDITOR.
WHY?
• Have you ever tried to train a client to use TinyMCE? FCK?
• "I can upload my picture in WordPress..."
• "It isn't as easy to use as WordPress..."
• Amusingly, WordPress uses the same WYSIWYG stuff, so what
are they doing right?

36. ORGANIZE THE MODULES
LIBRARY.
• Can you find anything in there?
• When you do, do you know if it's any good or not?
• Are you prepared to throw away a few good hours of your life
trying in vain to integrate the Block Testimonial Rotator and
Lightbox?
•Irely on others in the community to have the kindness to talk
about their favs in order to figure out what I should be using...

37. ORGANIZE THE MODULES
LIBRARY.
• What we should know about a module:
• how many have used it
• what did they rate it
• what level of user is it good for (designer, developer, etc.)
• what other modules conflict with it
• all
this information is visible right under the name of the module. I
don't care what time the nightly build was posted.

38. THERE'S TREASURE IN THEM
THAR PILES OF STUFF!
• There’s gold in them there piles of modules!

39. INSTALLATION PROFILES...
• Are supposed to make it easier to get started by integrating all
the pieces of the puzzle you are trying to solve.
• "Note: This install profile is not compatible with the latest version of the required
modules and will require some Drupal development skills to get running
smoothly. There are general plans to update the install profile and port the
functionality to Drupal 6.x, but that process is currently on the back burner. If you
are interested in doing development on the profile (possibly with
compensation), contact me through this website with your interest."
• "WARNING: this profile contains potentially dangerous user settings,
permissions, do not use it on a live site.
• "Required Modules: CAPTCHA, Content Construction Kit (CCK), Content
Templates, Image, Innovation News, Pathauto, Token, Views, XML to KML"

40. TEMPLATES... EVERYONE
WANTS THEIR OWN.
• Some template strategies:
• Make a set of drag and drop objects for Dreamweaver or other
tools that designers like.
• Make a template "analyzer" that will look at a designer's attempt
and forecast possible problems. (You have no $right, your site is
a slot machine.)
• Get rid of $closure! If it is needed on every page, why in
heaven's name, is it available to designers to forget???
• Make a template engine that allows designers to be designers,
not developers.

41. HOW DO WE MAKE THE
ADMIN INTERFACE MORE
"INTUITIVE?"
• Get involved with D7UX because it sure ain't gonna fix itself.
• Study other control panels and IDE. Steal the good ideas.
• Combine related tasks. i.e. "turn on SEF" instead of "fix .htaccess,
enable Clean URLs, turn on Path module, turn on Pathauto
module”
• Speak up! Even if you aren't a developer, you need to speak up
about your frustrations.
• Making something smarter means getting rid of the unnecessary
switches and dials.

42. OTHERWISE...

43. THIS... WILL CONTINUE TO
LOOK LIKE...

44. THIS.

45. AND WHAT WE REALLY
WANT IS...

47. ... AND FOR MY STRAIGHT
FEMALE AND GAY MALE
COLLEAGUES...
because I can’t have you thinking I am a sexist pig...

48. THIS WAS THE CLOSEST THING TO A
HOT MALE LIBRARIAN
I COULD FIND

49. OWEN BRIERLEY
owen@gurudigitalarts.com
owen@gystworks.com
http://twitter.com/gurudigi