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FCC.gov: A Modern Open Platform

An anonymous reader writes "FCC.gov just launched a public beta which aims to take the agency into the future. The $1.35 million site follows the WhiteHouse.gov lead to Drupal. Agency director Steven Van Roekel spoke with O'Reilly about the agency's push for an open platform: 'It's not breakthrough stuff, but it's breakthrough for government.'"

6 of 88 comments (clear)

  1. Federal COMMUNISM Commission... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    A brand new site would have been a golden opportunity to lock themselves into some sort of proprietary solution developed by an incompetent but well connected contractor, complete with an endless upgrade treadmill of licensing fees and restrictions.

    Instead, they go with Drupal. Why does the FCC hate business so much?

    1. Re:Federal COMMUNISM Commission... by LordStormes · · Score: 4, Funny

      VOTE REPUBLICAN AND SAVE AMERICA!

      That's a two-step plan. First, vote Republican. Then, save America from them.

  2. Some Unusual Positive News by blueZhift · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Ok, now who are you and what have you done with the FCC?! It certainly is unusual to hear of a government agency doing anything sane with technology, so kudos to the FCC! While Drupal has its detractors, it's a great platform if you know what you're doing. So I'm glad to see the FCC taking advantage of good OSS and thereby delivering a better product to the people at a lower overall cost. Sadly, the US government is not known for this sort of thing.

  3. Re:Why Drupal? by LWATCDR · · Score: 3, Informative

    It really depends on your needs.
    http://www.cmsmatrix.org/matrix/cms-matrix Will allow you to compare CMSs. Drupal is a much more complex and flexable system then Wordpress. That comes at a cost in simplicity. I think the key here is "big projects like this"

    --
    See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
  4. Re:Why Drupal? by cultiv8 · · Score: 3, Informative

    Because Drupal can scale and fit into most development life cycles. There are thousands of modules available so you don't have to re-invent the wheel. Views + CCK is a relatively easy way to build sql queries through a simple UI. Developer tools abound; drush, ctools, integration with firebug, devel, theme developer, etc. Lots of APIs to hook into almost anything Drupal does (node API, forms API, etc), and quick integration with 3rd party systems through services (XMLRPC, JSON, JSON-RPC, REST, SOAP, AMF, etc). Yes, it has a steep learning curve, but unlike Wordpress, Drupal is written for developers, not end users.

    --
    sysadmins and parents of newborns get the same amount of sleep.
  5. Re:Why Drupal? by cultiv8 · · Score: 4, Informative

    You may want to checkout installation profiles, this might be a good fit for you.

    --
    sysadmins and parents of newborns get the same amount of sleep.