Drupal® 7 Bible

Chapter 1. Introducing the Drupal Content Management System

IN THIS CHAPTER

• Discovering open-source content management

• Discovering Drupal

• The Drupal community

Drupal is a Web-oriented content management system (CMS) that grew out of a personal project started in 2000 at the University of Antwerp, Belgium, by a student named Dries Buytaert. The project founders designed the original software to allow a group of people to share their thoughts and files via electronic means. The first public Web site built with Drupal was Drop.org.

In 2001, the software behind the project was first released with the name Drupal. The word Drupal is pronounced "droo-puhl" and derives from the English pronunciation of the Dutch word druppel, which means drop.

Today thousands upon thousands of Web sites are built using Drupal; it is one of the most popular Web content management systems in the world. And it's this success story that probably led you to consider Drupal for your project.

This chapter introduces important Drupal concepts, provides you the vocabulary you need for moving forward, and explains how the Drupal community functions.

Discovering Open-Source Content Management

Engaging in open-source software projects is always an adventure. No two projects are alike, though many share characteristics. Importantly, you should remember that when it comes to open-source communities, you typically get out of them what you put in. And if you are to contribute, you must first understand the basic concepts.

What ...