Open Source CMS, Drupal takes the Reins at WhiteHouse.gov

Something both sides of the aisle can agree on…

Last month, the White House re-launched its figurehead web presence, WhiteHouse.gov featuring among other changes, a switch from a proprietary Content Management System (CMS) to Drupal, an open source CMS. The switch was brought on not by efforts to save money or use a more secure web publishing system, but to better foster communication between the White House and WhiteHouse.gov visitors, according to the Obama Administration.

Drupal is one of the big three open source CMS’s and has built-in functionality for everything from e-commerce to podcasting, and in particular, as the Obama Administration notes, Drupal integrates blogs, comments, polls, user profiles, newsletters, and forums. These are all things useful in encouraging communication between the Government and its citizens, or as Steele Agency notes, a brand and its potential consumer base.

At Steele Agency, we use open source CMS’s like Drupal, Joolma, and Wordpress to provide clients with the ability to easily manage and update their own web content and foster the interaction between staff and customers. Other federal agencies currently use Drupal for various purposes, including the Departments of Defense, Commerce, and Education and the General Service Administration, and the White House’s move only further validates the professional use of open source software. When talking to people about using open source in their businesses, they have concerns over costs, effectiveness, and security. When federal agencies employ its usage it does add a sense of authority, but from a business person’s perspective, its important to note three things:

• Open source software is very cost effective and has no licensing fees
• Open source CMS’s, when paired with Unix server platforms, are unparalleled in speed and reliability
• Though not all open source software is safe (just like proprietary software), Drupul is currently the undisputed security king among CMS platforms.