[TYPO3-UG US] Drupal vs. TYPO3

[Ries van Twisk]

On May 6, 2009, at 6:01 PM, Christopher Torgalson wrote:

> Hi,
>
> On Wed, May 6, 2009 at 11:26 AM, Zachary Davis, Cast Iron Coding LLC
> <zach at castironcoding.com> wrote:
>> We regularly get clients who have been told by their colleagues,
>> acquaintances, etc that they should be looking at Drupal for their  
>> CMS
>> needs, and we end up trying to convince them that TYPO3 is a better  
>> fit.
>> I expect this happens to the rest of you as well on occasion.
>>
>> I'm sure that there are some things that Drupal does better than  
>> TYPO3
>> and some things that TYPO3 does better than Drupal, and I'd like to  
>> make
>> a list of these items so I can help my clients make educated  
>> decisions.
>> What are some of the things that you think TYPO3 does really well in
>> relation to Drupal and vice versa?
>
> Both systems have lots A quick list off the top of my head from the
> developer's point of view...:
>
>
> Drupal strengths:
>
> * (Relative) simplicity of development (YMMV!)
> * Built-in community-related features (compare to the potentially huge
> setup times with sr feuser register...)
> * Built-in news publishing (i.e. 'stories' content type)
> * Very nice custom content creation capability (i.e. CCK)
> * Very nice custom db queries (i.e. Views)
> * Ease of module development/better API docs (i.e. it's easier to code
> a basic module)
> * [Possibility of making a] totally accessible admin area
>
>
> Drupal's weaknesses:
>
> * INSANE default html (i.e. in blocks and--especially!--views)
> * Blocks interface
> * Inflexible layout engine (note: you *can* make anything you want,
> but there's nothing like the ease and flexibility of TYPO3's
> many-content-elements-per-page paradigm)
> * Manual module installation
> * Too many core updates!
>
>
> TYPO3 strengths:
>
> * Flexibility of layouts (not Drupal's stupid, inflexible,
> hard-to-manage content/blocks system)
> * Typoscript (!) (Drupal has nothing this flexible)
> * Permissions (Drupal has no way to set permissions per db-field  
> link TYPO3)
> * Page Tree/List module (Drupal has only an analogue of the List
> module, and there's no real way to get an overview of the structure of
> a site)
> * Sophistication of extension development (i.e. it's easier to code a
> complex extension)
> * GIFBUILDER (though I think imagecache actions may be competitive...)
> * HMENU/TMENU (Drupal's menus simply have nothing like this kind of  
> power)
> * TSconfig (i.e. a Super-configurable BE)
> * Extension manager
> * Better (content-level!) caching
>
>
> TYPO3 weaknesses:
>
> * Complexity (YMMV here too)
> * Forms templating (e.g. I will NOT recommend TYPO3 to any client who
> needs an online registration system without a damned good
> reason...customizing the forms in sr feuser register and other similar
> extensions involves a prohibitively large amount of labour...)
> * Totally inaccessible BE
>
>
> I could go on...
>

Nice Christopher!

However... One thing to add based on the original mail
 > 'and we end up trying to convince them that TYPO3 is a better fit. '

Sometimes it's hard to explain to a client that your gut knows better
then your brain, right?

I usually do the comparison based on the clients requirement,
to put it simple... TYPO3 is not always a good fit, specially
not when you need a community, or blog!!! But if the client
want's something flexibly, special HTML template and such I can show  
then
often quickly how good TYPO3 is with custom layouts. And that the easy  
install of
whatever other 'CMS' is really not a good fit.

A demo often really helps...

Ries