Drupal … can it be used by non-developers?

If you enjoy tweaking the code that makes up the framework of a website, then Drupal is probably for you. This advanced content management system is more a developer platform than a traditional CMS. Its not to say that only developers can use the system though, but to say that they will feel more at home here than in the other two. Interestingly, being more developer friendly does not automatically make it more user friendly –  in fact the developer has to work hard to make it that way if they need the end-product to do so.
For those that are not so developer-minded, this can be the trial of their lives, but for people who live in code – well, they can literally get lost developing some very cool websites.
Being in essence a development platform and if you are a developer and are willing to learn the ins and outs of the proprietary system, you can surely make great websites with Drupal. But you will have a hard time make it look and feel the same way as it function. The underlying technology is perfect, the usability and the design is far from being perfect. So in a lot of cases, you could end up with a perfectly working website, but that is difficult to use and is not very neat in its design.
Drupal Advantages
Extremely developer friendly, but you need to engage in proprietary Drupal code.
Strong community to help discern the dozens (hundreds) of functions and tags available.
Can be used to create some really awesome websites that can outperform a majority of other sites out there.
Drupal Cons
Not very designer and user-friendly. It’s hard for someone with little code knowledge to make the leaps required to do the very cool things that Drupal is becoming known for.
Theming of Drupal has been a huge case of failure. Themes are made by developers, not designers
Getting a Drupal website published could cost you more time, and thus more money, than Wordpress or Joomla and certainly compared to commercial open source software like WebriQ.
content management system
online website builder
free websites online

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