Is Joomla or Drupal easier to manage? [closed]

Question

Is Joomla or Drupal easier to manage?
Better community than the other to receive help?
One made for corporations vs for private?

Seems like WordPress is very popular, too, but can it do the same things as the others?

Also, how long (in approximate hours) does it take to set one of these up?

Thanks!

Answer 1

• Both Joomla's and Drupal's admin sections aren't great, but Joomla will be much easier to manage, for both you and your end user. Drupal's admin just isn't intuitive by any sense of the word. They're trying to fix it for Drupal 7, but I have my doubts about its effectiveness. Wordpress is by far the easiest to manage.
• All of the communities are large and comparable. You shouldn't have a problem with any of them.
• Any of the 3 is suited for corporations or private use.
• Drupal is powerful, but by all accounts, if you're new to Drupal, it will take you a few months to get acclimated in order to build a site with it. Joomla has a learning curve as well, but it's less intimidating. If you're decent with PHP, you can probably go from no knowledge of Joomla to a finished site in a week. Wordpress can do most of what the others can do, but it's primarily a blog engine. There are enough add-ons to make it do almost anything, but it might not always be the best tool depending on the type of website you have.

If you want to test drive them without installing, check out Open Source CMS, which has testable demos for all three (Wordpress is under the blog category).

Answer 2

I agree mostly with all the above answered. Yet so, will add some bits:

• During some time, was said Drupal was sort of preferred by people wanting more control over html and css, and Joomla being easier for the non coder people. These things are often little more than rumors, but was said by many. As softwares evolve, these situations change drastically, tho. You'd better test both. (some friends of mine found Joomla easier, though)

• It was also said drupal URLs to be better for SEO. Again, it might all have changed.

• There are a lot of free plugins for Wordpress. I might prefer Blogger because I like to fine tune css and html to make custom looks, and not willing to pay for a blog. Still, a lot of people use successfully Wordpress as cms, with plugins(tons) and tricks, because they are not much coding savy, or because they just love Wordpress. Is an ok route.

• The 3 of them can be installed the easiest way, and also all other stuff needed (dependencies, etc) using bitnami stacks (sort of installers). http://bitnami.org

Answer 3

I found this useful...

http://www.theopensourcery.com/keepopen/2010/best-open-cms-wordpress-vs-joomla-vs-drupal/

HTH D.

Answer 4

In my opinion:

Joomla is an in-secure, not well-written PHP script. Good only for quick and dirty sites.

Drupal is a great tool for writing good quality code and extend your functionality without limits. its a quality PHP framework where a developer can make miracles and in the same time a advanced CMS.

WordPress is a good solution for people who will not write code - it will get the job done and in a lightweight fashion

Answer 5

I've been building and content-managing sites on both systems over a few years and I guess it depends on what do you call "manage".

First of all, they have different learning curves. From the first time you start reading on how to set up a site till you understand what to do and which modules would you need, Joomla is faster. But further modifications to the existing site once you already know the basics and content-management are faster with Drupal.

So for me it is: Drupal if I will ever be dealing with the site again. Joomla can only be considered if time and budget are limited and it is build, hand over to the client and never have to support it yourself.

Because setting up Joomla was fast for me but a complete disaster to modify, support and fill with content.

Answer 6

I use Joomla for simple sites with a minimum of custom things, easy layout and Drupal for more custom/complex sites. But you can also use Drupal for simple sites and Joomla for difficult sites, just depends of what you prefer. Just learn the basic of both and make your own decision. I also used wordpress once for a blog on a site, I love their custom theaming system, it is really easy.

Answer 7

You don't specify what kind of a project you're planning to launch using these CMSs.

In terms of management, Joomla is certainly easier. However, if your website would require lots of customisation, it may be better to start with Drupal right away as it is more powerful, but mind that the learning curve is the steepest.

Communities

Both of the CMSs do have huge communities, this is easily noticeable by the number of Drupal modules or Joomla extensions that are available. Drupal is more open and less centralized. While there is a central website for Drupal that has a lot of information and documentation, there are thousands of other sites. So, it is a good chance that if you do a search for a issue with Drupal, you will be directed to a third party website. Joomla has a central website that is wiki-based. It is often updated and has great information. So it is more of a one-stop shop for issues with Joomla than Drupal.

GPL Extensions

While the CMSs are open source, only Drupal’s extensions (sometimes called modules) are 100% GPL. This means all the extensions you can download and use for free. While Joomla does have free extensions, there are also numerous commercial ones.

Support of Extensions

Related to the above difference and one downside to the GPL and free extensions are the support for them may be non-existent or limited. So, if you have a problem with a module, you will have to find the solution yourself.

Since Joomla does have commercial extensions, you have the support for these extensions if you ever need it.

this is an excerpt from an article on Joomla and Drupal differences. You can continue reading here.

Disclaimer: I am a marketing manager at CMS2CMS.