[imc-cms] INDYMEDIA CMS DEVELOPERS SURVEY

[mak comcast]

INDYMEDIA CMS DEVELOPERS SURVEY
Please fill in as many questions as you can. When you are completed,
you should email your responses to imc-cms at lists.indymedia.org
 
1) Survey Part 1 - Personal Details
   a) Your name?
Michael A Kominsky

   b) Your geographic location?
Bellingham WA US

VERY beta site:

http://www.whatcomindymedia.org


   c) How long have you worked with Drupal and what work do you do
      with the project?
< 1 year

   d) Do you work on any other CMS projects?
No

2) Survey Part 2 - CMS Basics
   a) What programming language is Drupal written in?
php, js

   b) What is the backend database used by Drupal?
Mysql

   c) Are there other servers required (application server, Tomcat,
      etc)?
N/A

   d) How do you describe the overall software design of Drupal?
inherently powerful due to robust open-source peer dev network

   e) Can you give details about real-world scaleability
      considerations for Drupal?
intrinsic interoperability with other IMCs


3) Survey Part 3 - CMS Functionality
   a) A core feature of our software is the ability for anonymous
      users to post media to appear on the site. Is this easily
      added to a site using Drupal?
yes

   b) Can you describe the site search functionality available?
module driven...powerful

   c) How is RSS/XML/RDF support included?
module

   d) We would like to have one server per site which allows many
      instances of actual websites, each with different admin logins
      and different websites altogether. Is this easy to set up with
      Drupal?
yes

   e) Can you describe the multimedia support in the software? We
      allow users to upload and manipulate online all types of media -
      mpeg, mp3, ogg, jpg, pdf, etc.
at present, this is the weakness component for Drupal for an IMC.  Current video and image upload/create/edit modules are rather unwieldy to install and use. 

   f) Internationalization is very important to us. Many of our sites
      support 2-3 or more languages. Can you describe how this is
      accomplished in Drupal?
subfolders

   g) What types of anti-abuse or anti-spam measures are in the code?
somewhat limited at the moment but a relatively easy fix

   h) Is there a calendar included in the codebase? 
yes, module

   i) How do you describe how a user would edit a given piece of content
      on the website, or briefly describe the model used in this part
      of the functionality?
text easily edited. Rich media not easily.

   j) How do you describe any type of user moderation system that
      is built into Drupal?
Good. Taxonomy module with browse_taxonomy with access controls very powerful.
 
   k) What types of integration is there with P2P networks?
N/A

   l) Another important feature for us is networking between the
      websites. If we want users from one website to have rights on
      another website in the network, how could we do this?
N/A

   m) We are concerned with the ability to easily rsync pages from a
      website to other servers and setup a type of mirroring scheme.
      How would this be accomplished with Drupal?
N/A

4) Survery Part 4 - Miscellaneous
   a) What do you believe are the top selling points for Drupal?
1) market penetration 2) open-source GPL 3) robust open-source dev com 4)customizability(?:)

   b) From what you know about the Indymedia network, how well do you 
      think IMC would mesh with the development community for the CMS?
Very well...the most elegant solution currently available at any price:)

   c) What are the top 3 areas you believe the development team for
      the CMS needs to be improved?
1) Rich media integration 2) ease of installation and implementation 3) creation of specialized theme templates for CMS

   d) Where do you see Drupal in five years?
in the forefront...no competition...

Good luck with this effort. I believe standardization, scalability and interoperability/interconnectivity are critical to the survival of independent, alternative and participatory media as a counterweight to the corporatized/government controlled media...

Speak truth to power.

Regards,

Michael A Kominsky

Produce/Director
MetaMEDIA Communications
http://www.metamediacom.tv

mak at metamediacom.tv


Thank you for your time and consideration. Please return this survey
to imc-cms at lists.indymedia.org
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://lists.indymedia.org/pipermail/imc-cms/attachments/20070220/93833b4b/attachment.html