Photo by Paul Johnson – Driesnote at DrupalCon Prague

Drupal is an open source project that helps foster an open web for everyone. At DrupalCon, project lead and founder Dries Buytaert laid out the latest developments for Drupal. Drupal’s authoring experience and headless capabilities are among the key features. Drupal will see an extra focus on accelerating product innovation and sustaining Drupal’s market growth. 

Drupal has a strong market position and is growing steadily. It empowers digital experiences for many top organizations worldwide, including Lufthansa and The European Government. With its API-first approach, Drupal is an ideal choice for organizations tying their CMS into their back office. Headless frameworks accelerate this even more. At DrupalCon in Prague, Dries Buytaert talked about Drupal improvements and innovation driving Drupal’s growth further.

Open Web

Drupal’s vision remains based on an open, flexible, and accessible platform that allows individuals and organizations alike to own their own data. This is something that has become very important in a world where big tech owns people’s data. Using open source gives full control over the digital experience you want to offer to people, whether it harvests data or not. Proprietary systems often give no control and lock in on privacy and limit creative possibilities. You can’t fix accessibility issues when you use proprietary systems. Open source gives full control to developers and organizations alike. There is no limit to what you can do. 

Dries Buytaert: “My personal belief has always been not to collect people’s data and personalities. I aspire to the privacy of a printed book.”

Drupal has commitments to various ingredients for an open web allowing organizations to own their own digital experience. Scalability, accessibility, and reliability are important cornerstones for Drupal. Good software cares about end users and helps people. This will remain at the heart of the Drupal project.

Gitlab

Moving Drupal’s code from its homegrown environment to Gitlab eliminates friction points for the open source community to contribute to Drupal and it will improve collaboration. Automated testing will offer instant review feedback which is a huge impulse for Drupal’s product innovation.

Buytaert finally underscores the importance of the work being done on Drupal by thousands of Drupal professionals worldwide. The vast support base helps to get started with Drupal and support organizations who believe in an Open Web. People are attracted to good software. It’s an important reason why people adopt Drupal, whether it’s for business purposes or making a career. 

Drupal 10

Drupal version 10 will be scheduled to release in December 2022. Drupal 9 users will have 11 months to upgrade to Drupal 10. This is because of underlying third-party dependencies that will end support by then. 

DrupalCon

DrupalCon is an international conference where individuals and organizations meet to talk about Drupal and exchange experiences. Over 1200 people meet in person in Prague this week at DrupalCon and collaborate on the project. The Drupal Association is a non-profit organization that caters to the needs of Drupal and its worldwide community. It focuses on helping the growth of the Drupal community and supporting the project’s vision to create a safe, secure, and open web for everyone. Are you using Drupal or are you a Drupal community? Feel free to connect!