DrupalCon

State of Drupal presentation (March 2026)

Thu, 26 Mar 2026 19:06:55 -0400

This year, Drupal turned 25. DrupalCon Chicago felt like the right place to mark that milestone. My keynote was part celebration and part wake-up call. I talked about Drupal's foundations, how AI is putting pressure on them, and why I believe we can rebuild them stronger than before.

If you missed the keynote, you can watch the video below or download my slides (32.6 MB).

It will be interesting to rewatch this keynote in 10 years, when AI is fully mainstream and has reshaped how we work, including our agencies, our craft, and how we collaborate in Open Source. It feels like a snapshot of an industry in transition.

Site templates and the marketplace

About a year ago at DrupalCon Atlanta, I introduced the idea of site templates and a marketplace to go with them. By DrupalCon Vienna, we had one site template, but no marketplace.

In Chicago, I showed eleven site templates available in a basic marketplace at marketplace.drupal.org. All eleven can be installed directly from the Drupal CMS installer.

AI for site building

For more than 20 years, Drupal's ecosystem has rested on a stable triangle: the platform itself, digital agencies who bring Drupal into the real world, and the community that builds and maintains it. That triangle has proven remarkably resilient through many waves of new technologies.

But what happens when AI disrupts all three sides at the same time? In my keynote, I showed how Drupal is responding.

I started by showing a demo of a workflow I believe will become common for Drupal agencies. You quickly prototype a website with AI, then turn it into a Drupal site with the help of AI and a skilled developer, all within hours.

AI gets you to a prototype fast. Drupal gives it the foundations that last.

I believe Drupal has a unique advantage in this new world. Organizations will always need real workflows, permissions, security, scalability, integrations, compliance, and governance. Drupal is very well suited for AI-driven workflows.

The demo worked because Drupal CMS ships with Drupal Canvas, which includes both CLI tools and AI skills. But the real strength comes from Drupal's foundations: its APIs, reusable building blocks, and mature architecture, refined over 25 years. This is the accidental AI advantage I have written about before. This is what makes Drupal one of the best platforms for AI-driven development.

AI for content management

At DrupalCon Vienna, I introduced the Context Control Center as a rough prototype. Since then, we have added many features. It is now nearly production-ready.

The idea is straightforward: AI agents need good context to help manage tasks in Drupal. With the Context Control Center, teams define their brand voice, target audiences, key messages, product details, and editorial guidelines in one place. Then every AI agent on the site draws from this single source of truth. The result is that you create knowledge once, and scale it to all the pages and content on your website.

In my keynote, I showed two demos of the Context Control Center in action. First, Drupal's AI agents turn a simple marketing brief into a complete, on-brand page using Drupal Canvas, consulting the Context Control Center along the way. It followed brand rules, asked clarifying questions, generated structured data for search, and added cross-links.

Second, I showed a proof of concept for dynamic contexts, where the Context Control Center pulls in real-time data from Google Analytics to help improve content performance after publication.

Saying no to AI slop

AI is lowering the barrier to contribute to Open Source projects like Drupal. On paper, that sounds great. More contributors, more patches, more momentum.

But it can also be a real challenge. The volume of contributions is going up while the quality is going down. More patches are landing on a small group of maintainers, and reviewing low-quality code wastes their time. This creates asymmetric pressure on Open Source.

If you're using AI to contribute, you are responsible for what you submit: don't submit code you don't understand. Our quality standards matter, and we will uphold them.

Our craft always evolves

In my keynote, I also told the stories of two community members who embraced AI in a meaningful way.

Aidan Foster, who has been running Foster Interactive for 17 years, chose to go all in on the Drupal AI Initiative instead of staying on the sidelines. Together with his team, he is rebuilding the foundations of his agency to leverage AI and prepare for what is next.

And Jürgen Haas, a longtime contributor and creator of the ECA module, used AI to move at the speed of a team and make Drupal's ECA module much easier to use. In both cases, AI amplifies expertise. It does not replace it.

The world is being flooded with AI-generated average. Average is cheap now, but expertise remains hard-earned and valuable. This community has spent 25 years building it, and that is not something AI can replicate.

AI is the storm, and AI is the way through the storm. I said that first in Vienna. Six months later, I believe it more than ever. Not as a slogan, but as something I have watched happen. We need more people like Aidan and Jürgen. If you want to get involved, join us on Drupal Slack or attend DrupalCon Rotterdam this fall.

I want to extend my gratitude to everyone who contributed to making my presentation and demos a success. A special thank you to Adam G-H, Aidan Foster, ASH Sullivan, Christoph Breidert, Cristina Chumillas, Emma Horrell, Gábor Hojtsy, Gurwinder Antal, James Abrahams, Jurgen Haas, Kristen Pol, Lauri Timmanee, Marcus Johansson, Martin Anderson-Clutz, Pamela Barone, Scott Falconer, Tim Lehnen. Many others contributed indirectly to make this possible. If I've inadvertently omitted anyone, please reach out.

DrupalCon Nara keynote Q&A

Wed, 19 Nov 2025 21:33:35 -0500

DrupalCon Nara just wrapped up, and it left me feeling energized.

During the opening ceremony, Nara City Mayor Gen Nakagawa shared his ambition to make Nara the most Drupal-friendly city in the world. I've attended many conferences over the years, but I've never seen a mayor talk about open source as part of his city's long-term strategy. It was surprising, encouraging, and even a bit surreal.

Because Nara came only five weeks after DrupalCon Vienna, I didn't prepare a traditional keynote. Instead, Pam Barone, CTO of Technocrat and a member of the Drupal CMS leadership team, led a Q&A.

I like the Q&A format because it makes space for more natural questions and more candid answers than a prepared keynote allows.

We covered a lot: the momentum behind Drupal CMS, the upcoming Drupal Canvas launch, our work on a site template marketplace, how AI is reshaping digital agencies, why governments are leaning into open source for digital sovereignty, and more.

If you want more background, my DrupalCon Vienna keynote offers helpful context and includes a video recording with product demos.

The event also featured excellent sessions with deep dives into these topics. All session recordings are available on the DrupalCon Nara YouTube playlist.

Having much of the Drupal CMS leadership team together in Japan also turned the week into a working session. We met daily to align on our priorities for the next six months.

On top of that, I spent most of my time in back-to-back meetings with Drupal agencies and end-users. Hearing about their ambitions and where they need help gave me a clearer sense of where Drupal should go next.

Thank you to the organizers and to everyone who took the time to meet. The commitment and care of the community in Japan really stood out.

State of Drupal presentation (October 2025)

Thu, 23 Oct 2025 03:20:34 -0400

The web is changing fast. AI now writes content, builds web pages, and answers questions directly, often bypassing websites entirely.

People often wonder what this means for Drupal, so at DrupalCon Vienna, I tackled this head-on. My message was simple: AI is the storm, but it's also the way through it. Instead of fighting AI, we're leaning into it.

My keynote focused on how Drupal is evolving across four product areas. We're making it easier to get started with Site Templates, enabling visual site building through Drupal Canvas, accelerating development with AI assistance, and exploring complex workflows with new orchestration tools.

If you missed the keynote, you can watch the video below, or download my slides (62 MB).

Vienna felt like a turning point. People could see the pieces coming together. Drupal is finding its footing in the AI era, leading in AI innovation, and ready to help shape what comes next for the web.

Growing Drupal with Site Templates

One of the most important ways to grow Drupal is to make it easier and faster to build new sites. We began that work with Recipes, a way to quickly add common features to a site. Recipes help people go from idea to a website in hours instead of days.

At DrupalCon Vienna, I talked about the next step in that journey: our first Site Template. Site Templates build on Recipes and also include a complete design with layouts, visual style, and sample content. The result is that you can go from a new Drupal install to a fully working website in minutes. It will be the easiest way yet to get started with Drupal.

Next, we plan to introduce more Site Templates and launch a Site Template Marketplace where anyone can discover, share, and build on templates for different use cases.

A new visual editing experience

At DrupalCon Vienna, the energy around Drupal Canvas was infectious. Some even called it "CanvasCon". Drupal Canvas sessions were often standing room only, just like the Drupal AI sessions.

I first showed an early version of Drupal Canvas at DrupalCon Barcelona in September 2024, when we launched Drupal's Starshot initiative. The progress we've made in just one year is remarkable. My keynote showed parts of Drupal Canvas in action, but for a deeper dive, I recommend watching this breakout session.

Version 1.0 of Drupal Canvas is scheduled for November 2025. Starting in January 2026, it will become the default page builder in Drupal CMS 2.0. After more than 15 months of development and countless contributors working to make Drupal easier for everyone, it's hard to believe we're almost there. This marks the beginning of a new chapter for how people create with Drupal.

What excites me most is what this solves. For years, building pages in Drupal required technical expertise. Drupal Canvas gives end-users a visual page builder that is both more powerful and easy to use. Plus, it supports React, which means front-end developers can contribute using skills they already have.

Drupal's accidental AI advantage

Every content management system faces defining moments. For Drupal, one came with the release of Drupal 8. We rebuilt Drupal from the ground up, adopting modern design patterns and improving configuration management, versioning, workflows, and more.

The transition was hard, but here is the surprising part: ten years later those decisions gave Drupal an unexpected advantage in today's AI-driven web. The architecture we created is exactly what AI systems need today. When AI modifies content, you need version control to roll back mistakes. When it builds pages, you need structured data, permissions, and workflows. Drupal already has those capabilities.

For years, Drupal prioritized flexibility and robustness while other platforms focused on ease of use. What once felt like extra complexity now makes perfect sense. Drupal has quietly become one of the most AI-ready platforms available.

AI is the storm, and the way through the storm

As I said in my keynote: "Some days AI terrifies me. An hour later it excites me. By the evening, I'm tired of hearing about it.". Still, we can't ignore AI.

I first introduced AI as part of Starshot. Five months ago, it became its own dedicated track with the launch of the Drupal AI initiative. Since then, twenty two agencies have backed it with funding and contributors, together contributing over one million dollars. This is the largest fundraising effort in Drupal's history.

The initiative is already producing impressive results. At DrupalCon Vienna, we released Drupal AI version 1.2, a major step forward for the initiative.

In my keynote, I also demonstrated three new AI capabilities:

AI-powered page building: Drupal AI can now generate complete, designed pages in minutes using a component-based design system in Drupal Canvas. What site builders used to build in hours now happens in minutes while maintaining your site's structure and style.
Context Control Center: Teams can define brand voice, target audiences, and key messages from a single UI. All AI agents draw from this source of truth.
Autonomous agents: When you update information in the Context Control Center, such as a product price or company statistic, agents automatically find every instance throughout your site and propose updates. You review and approve changes before they go live.

Orchestration as a path to explore

Earlier this year, I wrote about the great digital agency unbundling. As AI automates more technical work, agencies need to evolve their business models and find new ways to create value.

One promising direction is orchestration: building systems and workflows that connect AI agents, content platforms, CRMs, and marketing tools into intelligent, automated workflows. I think of it as DXP 2.0.

Most organizations have complex marketing technology stacks. Connecting all the systems in their stack often requires custom code or repetitive manual tasks. This integration work can be time-consuming and hard to maintain.

Modern orchestration tools solve this by automating how information flows between systems. Instead of writing custom code, you can use no-code tools to define workflows that trigger automatically. When someone fills out a form, the system creates a CRM contact, sends a welcome email, and notifies your team without any manual work.

In my keynote, I showed how ECA and ActivePieces can work together. Jürgen Haas, who created ECA, and I collaborated on this integration. ECA lets you define automations inside Drupal using events, conditions, and actions. ActivePieces is an open source automation platform similar to Zapier or n8n.

This approach allows us to build user experiences that are not only better and smarter, but also positions Drupal to benefit from AI innovation happening across the broader ecosystem. The idea resonated in Vienna. People approached me enthusiastically with related projects and demos, including tools like Flowdrop or Drupal's MCP module.

Between now and DrupalCon Chicago, we're inviting the community to explore and expand on this work. Join us in #orchestration on Drupal Slack, test the new Orchestration module, connect more automation platforms, or help improve ECA. If this direction proves valuable, we'll share what we learned at DrupalCon Chicago.

Building the future together

At DrupalCon Vienna, I felt something shift. Sessions were packed. People were excited about Site Templates and the Marketplace. Drupal Canvas drew huge crowds, and even more agencies signed up to join the Drupal AI initiative. During the contribution day, more people than usual showed up looking for ways to help.

AI is changing how people use the web and how we build for it. It can feel threatening, and it can feel full of possibility, but what became clear in Vienna is that Drupal is well positioned at this inflection point, with both momentum and direction.

What makes this moment special is how the community is responding with focus and collaboration. We are approaching it as a much more coordinated effort, while still leaving room for experimentation.

Vienna showed me that the Drupal community is ready to take this on together. We have navigated uncharted territory before, but this time there is a boldness and unity I have not seen in years. That is the way through the storm. I am proud to be part of it.

I want to extend my gratitude to everyone who contributed to making my presentation and demos a success. A special thank you to Adam G-H, Aidan Foster, ASH Sullivan, Bálint Kléri, Cristina Chumillas, Elliott Mower, Emma Horrell, Gábor Hojtsy, Gurwinder Antal, James Abrahams, Jurgen Haas, Kristen Pol, Lauri Timmanee, Marcus Johansson, Martin Anderson-Clutz, Pamela Barone, Tiffany Farriss, Tim Lehnen, and Witze Van der Straeten. Many others contributed indirectly to make this possible. If I've inadvertently omitted anyone, please reach out.

State of Drupal presentation (March 2025)

Mon, 31 Mar 2025 10:44:49 -0400

Three months ago, we launched Drupal CMS 1.0, our biggest step forward in years. Our goal is ambitious: to reimagine Drupal as both radically easier to use and a platform for faster innovation.

In my DrupalCon Atlanta keynote last week, I reflected on the journey so far, but mostly talked about the work ahead. If you missed the keynote, you can watch the video below, or download my slides (56 MB).

If you want to try Drupal CMS, you can explore the trial experience, use the new desktop launcher, or install it with DDEV. If you're curious about what we're working on next, keep reading.

1. Experience Builder

Some of the most common requests from Drupal users and digital agencies is a better page-building experience, simpler theming, and high-quality themes out of the box.

At DrupalCon Atlanta, I shared our progress on Experience Builder. The keynote recording includes two demos: one highlighting new site building features, and another showing how to create and design components directly in the browser.

I also demonstrated how Drupal's AI agents can generate Experience Builder components. While this was an early design experiment, it offered a glimpse into how AI could make site building faster and more intuitive. You can watch that demo in the keynote video as well.

We still have work to do, but we're aiming to release Experience Builder 1.0, the first stable version, by DrupalCon Vienna. In the meantime, try our demo release.

2. Drupal Site Templates

One of the biggest opportunities for Drupal CMS is making it faster and easier to launch a complete website. The introduction of Recipes was a big step forward. I covered Recipes in detail in my DrupalCon Barcelona 2024 keynote. But there is still more we can do.

Imagine quickly creating a campaign or fundraising site for a nonprofit, a departmental website for a university, a portfolio site for a creative agency, or even a travel-focused ecommerce site selling tours, like the one Sarah needed in the DrupalCon Barcelona demo.

This is why we are introducing Site Templates: ready-made starting points for common use cases. They help users go from a fresh install to a fully functional site with minimal setup or configuration.

Site Templates are made possible by Recipes and Experience Builder. Recipes provide higher-level building blocks, while Experience Builder introduces a new way to design and create themes. Site Templates will bring everything together into more complete, ready-to-use solutions.

If successful, Site Templates could replace Drupal distributions, a concept that has been part of Drupal for nearly 20 years. The key advantage is that Site Templates are much easier to build and maintain.

3. A marketplace discussion

The first Site Templates may be included directly in Drupal CMS 2.0 itself. Over time, we hope to offer hundreds of site templates through a marketplace on Drupal.org.

At DrupalCon Atlanta, I announced that we'll be exploring a marketplace for Site Templates, including the option for Commercial Site Templates. We believe it's an idea worth evaluating because it could bring several benefits to the Drupal project:

Help new users launch a professional-looking site instantly
Showcase Drupal's full potential through high-quality examples
Generate new revenue opportunities for Drupal agencies and developers
Support Drupal's sustainability through a revenue-sharing model with the Drupal Association

You can watch the keynote recording to learn more. I've also published a detailed blog post that dives deeper into the marketplace idea.

Looking ahead

Drupal CMS has brought a lot of fresh momentum to the Drupal project, but we're not done yet! The rest of this year, we'll keep building on this foundation with a clear set of priorities:

Launching Experience Builder 1.0
Releasing our first Site Templates
Expanding our marketing efforts
Exploring the launch of a Site Template marketplace
Building out our AI framework and AI agents

If you have time and interest, please consider getting involved. Every contribution makes a difference. Not sure where to begin? Join us on Drupal Slack. We're always happy to welcome new faces. Key channels include #drupal-cms-development, #ai, #experience-builder, #drupal-cms-templates, and #drupal-cms-marketplace.

As I said in the keynote: We have all the pieces, now we just need to bring them together!

State of Drupal presentation (December 2024)

Mon, 30 Dec 2024 05:43:30 -0500

At DrupalCon Asia in Singapore a few weeks ago, I delivered my traditional State of Drupal keynote. This event marked DrupalCon's return to Asia after an eight-year hiatus, with the last one being DrupalCon Mumbai in 2016.

It was so fun to reconnect with the Drupal community across Asia and feel the passion and enthusiasm for Drupal. The positive energy was so contagious that three weeks later, I still feel inspired by it.

If you missed the keynote, you can watch the video below, or download my slides (196 MB).

I talked about the significant progress we've made on Drupal CMS (code name Drupal Starshot) since DrupalCon Barcelona just a few months ago.

Our vision for Drupal CMS is clear: to set the standard for no-code website building. My updates highlighted how Drupal CMS empowers digital marketers and content creators to design sophisticated digital experiences while preserving Drupal's power and flexibility.

For more background on Drupal CMS, I recommend reading our three-year strategy document. We're about a quarter of the way through, time-wise, and as you'll see from my keynote, we're making very fast progress.

A slide from my recent DrupalCon Singapore State of Drupal keynote showcasing key contributors to Drupal CMS. This slide showcases how we recognize and celebrate Makers in our community, encouraging active participation in the project.

Below are some of the key improvements I showcased in my keynote, highlighted in short video segments. These videos demonstrate just 7 recipes, but we have nearly 20 in development.

Watching these demos, it will become very clear how much time and effort Drupal CMS can save for both beginners and experienced developers. Manually assembling these features would take weeks for a Drupal expert and months for a novice. These recipes pack a wealth of expertise and best practices. What once took a Drupal expert weeks can now be done by a novice in hours.

AI support in Drupal

We're integrating AI agents into Drupal to assist with complex site-building tasks, going far beyond just content creation. Users can choose to have AI complete tasks automatically or provide step-by-step guidance, helping them learn Drupal as they go.

Search

We're including enhanced search functionality that includes autocomplete and faceted search, delivering enterprise-grade functionality out-of-the-box.

Privacy

With increasing global privacy regulations, marketers need robust compliance solutions, yet very few content management systems offer this out-of-the-box. I demonstrated how Drupal CMS will offer a user-centric approach to privacy and consent management, making compliance easier and more effective.

Media management

Our improved media management tools now include features like focal point control and image style presets, enabling editors to handle visual content efficiently while maintaining accessibility standards.

Accessibility tools

Our accessibility tools provide real-time feedback during content creation, helping identify and resolve potential issues that could affect the user experience for visually-impaired visitors.

Analytics

Analytics integration streamlines the setup of Google Analytics and Tag Manager, something that 75% of all marketers use.

Experience Builder

Drupal's new Experience Builder will bring a massive improvement in visual page building. It combines drag-and-drop simplicity with an enterprise-grade component architecture. It looks fantastic, and I'm really excited for it!

Conclusion

Drupal CMS has been a catalyst for innovation and collaboration, driving strong growth in organizational credits. Development of Drupal CMS began in 2024, and we expect a significant increase in contributions this year. Credits have tripled from 2019 to 2024, demonstrating our growing success in driving strategic innovation in Drupal.

In addition to our progress on Drupal CMS, the product, we've made real strides in other areas, such as marketing, modernizing Drupal.org, and improving documentation. These are all important parts of the Drupal Starshot initiative.

Overall, I'm incredibly proud of the progress we've made. So much so that we've released our first release candidate at DrupalCon Singapore, which you can try today by following my installation instructions for Drupal CMS.

While we still have a lot of work left, we are on track for the official release on January 15, 2025! To mark the occasion, we're inviting the Drupal community to organize release parties around the world. Whether you want to host your own event or join a party near you, you can find all the details and sign-up links for Drupal CMS release parties. I'll be celebrating from Boston and hope to drop in on other parties via Zoom!

Finally, I want to extend my heartfelt thanks to everyone who has contributed to Drupal CMS and DrupalCon Singapore. Your hard work and dedication have made this possible. Thank you!

State of Drupal presentation (September 2024)

Mon, 30 Sep 2024 12:51:33 -0400

Approximately 1,100 Drupal enthusiasts gathered in Barcelona, Spain, last week for DrupalCon Europe. As per tradition, I delivered my State of Drupal keynote, often referred to as the "DriesNote".

If you missed it, you can watch the video or download my slides (177 MB).

In my keynote, I gave an update on Drupal Starshot, an ambitious initiative we launched at DrupalCon Portland 2024. Originally called Drupal Starshot, inspired by President Kennedy's Moonshot challenge, the product is now officially named Drupal CMS.

The goal of Drupal CMS is to set the standard for no-code website building. It will allow non-technical users, like marketers, content creators, and site builders, to create digital experiences with ease, without compromising on the power and flexibility that Drupal is known for.

A four-month progress report

A preview of Drupal.org's front page with the updated Drupal brand and content.

While Kennedy gave NASA eight years, I set a goal to deliver the first version of Drupal CMS in just eight months. It's been four months since DrupalCon Portland, which means we're halfway through.

So in my keynote, I shared our progress and gave a 35-minute demo of what we've built so far. The demo highlights how a fictional marketer, Sarah, can build a powerful website in just hours with minimal help from a developer. Along her journey, I showcased the following key innovations:

A new brand for a new market: A brand refresh of Drupal.org, designed to appeal to both marketers and developers. The first pages are ready and available for preview at new.drupal.org, with more pages launching in the coming months.
A trial experience: A trial experience that lets you try Drupal CMS with a single click, eliminating long-standing adoption barriers for new users. Built with WebAssembly, it runs entirely in the browser – no servers to install or manage.
An improved installer: An installer that lets users install recipes – pre-built features that combine modules, configuration, and default content for common website needs. Recipes bundle years of expertise into repeatable, shareable solutions.
Events recipe: A simple events website that used to take an experienced developer a day to build can now be created in just a few clicks by non-developers.
Project Browser support for recipes: Users can now browse the Drupal CMS recipes in the Project Browser, and install them in seconds.
First page of documentation: New documentation created specifically for end users. Clear, effective documentation is key to Drupal CMS's success, so we began by writing a single page as a model for the quality and style we aim to achieve.
AI for site building: AI agents capable of creating content types, configuring fields, building Views, forms, and more. These agents will transform how people build and manage websites with Drupal.
Responsible AI policy: To ensure responsible AI development, we've created a Responsible AI policy. I'll share more details in an upcoming blog, but the policy focuses on four key principles: human-in-the-loop, transparency, swappable large language models (LLMs), and clear guidance.
SEO Recipe: Combines and configures all the essential Drupal modules to optimize a Drupal site for search engines.
14 recipes in development: In addition to the Events and SEO recipes, 12 more are in development with the help of our Drupal Certified Partners. Each Drupal CMS recipe addresses a common marketing use case outlined in our product strategy. We showcased both the process and progress during the Initiative Lead Keynote for some of the tracks. After DrupalCon, we'll begin developing even more recipes and invite additional contributors to join the effort.
AI-assisted content migration: AI will crawl your source website and handle complex tasks like mapping unstructured HTML to structured Drupal content types in your destination site, making migrations faster and easier. This could be a game-changer for website migrations.
Experience Builder: An early preview of a brand new, out-of-the-box tool for content creators and designers, offering layout design, page building, basic theming and content editing tools. This is the first time I've showcased our progress on stage at a DrupalCon.
Future-proof admin UI with React: Our strategy for modernizing Drupal's backend UI with React.
The "Adopt-a-Document" initiative: A strategy and funding model for creating comprehensive documentation for Drupal CMS. If successful, I'm hopeful we can expand this model to other areas of Drupal. For more details, please read the announcement on drupal.org.
Global Documentation Lead: The Drupal Association's commitment to hire a dedicated Documentation Lead, responsible for managing all aspects of Drupal's documentation, beyond just Drupal CMS.

The feedback on my presentation has been incredible, both online and in-person. The room was buzzing with energy and positivity! I highly recommend watching the recording.

Attendees were especially excited about the AI capabilities, Experience Builder, and recipes. I share their enthusiasm as these capabilities are transformative for Drupal.

Many of these features are designed with non-developers in mind. Our goal is to broaden Drupal's reach beyond its traditional user base and reach more people than ever before.

Release schedule

Our launch plan targets Drupal CMS's release on Drupal's upcoming birthday: January 15, 2025. It's also just a couple of weeks after the Drupal 7 End of Life, marking the end of one era and the beginning of another.

The next milestone is DrupalCon Singapore, taking place from December 9–11, 2024, less than 3 months away. We hope to have a release candidate ready by then.

Now that we're back from DrupalCon and have key milestone dates set, there is a lot to coordinate and plan in the coming weeks, so stay tuned for updates.

Call for contribution

Ambitious? Yes. But achievable if we work together. That's why I'm calling on all of you to get involved with Drupal CMS. Whether it's building recipes, enhancing the Experience Builder, creating AI agents, writing tests, improving documentation, or conducting usability testing – there are countless ways to contribute and make a difference. If you're ready to get involved, visit https://drupal.org/starshot to learn how to get started.

Thank you

This effort has involved so many people that I can't name them all, but I want to give a huge thank you to the Drupal CMS Leadership Team, who I've been working with closely every week: Cristina Chumillas (Lullabot), Gábor Hojtsy (Acquia), Lenny Moskalyk (Drupal Association), Pamela Barone (Technocrat), Suzanne Dergacheva (Evolving Web), and Tim Plunkett (Acquia).

A special shoutout goes to the demo team we assembled for my presentation: Adam Hoenich (Acquia), Amber Matz (Drupalize.me), Ash Sullivan (Acquia), Jamie Abrahams (FreelyGive), Jim Birch (Kanopi), Joe Shindelar (Drupalize.me), John Doyle (Digital Polygon), Lauri Timmanee (Acquia), Marcus Johansson (FreelyGive), Martin Anderson-Clutz (Acquia), Matt Glaman (Acquia), Matthew Grasmick (Acquia), Michael Donovan (Acquia), Tiffany Farriss (Palantir.net), and Tim Lehnen (Drupal Association).

I also want to thank the Drupal CMS track leads and contributors for their development work. Additionally, I'd like to recognize the Drupal Core Committers, Drupal Association staff, Drupal Association Board of Directors, and Certified Drupal Partners for continued support and leadership. There are so many people and organizations whose contributions deserve recognition that I can't list everyone individually, partly to avoid the risk of overlooking anyone. Please know your efforts are deeply appreciated.

Lastly, thank you to everyone who helped make DrupalCon Barcelona a success. It was excellent!

State of Drupal presentation (May 2024)

Tue, 07 May 2024 21:11:45 -0400

This week, approximately 1,400 Drupal enthusiasts came together for DrupalCon North America in Portland, Oregon. As a matter of tradition, I delivered my State of Drupal keynote, often referred to as "DriesNote". In case you missed it, you can watch the video or download my slides (385 MB).

This year's keynote was inspired by President John F. Kennedy's famous "Moonshot" speech. After being global leaders, the U.S. had fallen behind in the Space Race. Challenged by the Soviet cosmonaut program, President Kennedy rallied Americans around the ambitious goal of landing on the moon before the decade was out.

Drupal Starshot, a new version of Drupal

Drupal has always been known for its low-code capabilities. However, many competitors now offer similar features, and in some areas, they even surpass what Drupal provides. While Drupal is celebrated for its robustness, it can be challenging for newcomers, especially those with limited technical expertise. So in my keynote, I was excited to introduce Drupal Starshot, our "Moonshot" to make Drupal more accessible and easier to use.

Twenty-three years after Drupal's inception, we are preparing to launch a second official version of Drupal. For the time being, we're calling this second version "Drupal CMS". It will be built on top of Drupal Core and common contributed modules, and available as a separate download alongside Drupal Core.

Wireframe of the Drupal.org download page featuring two options: Drupal CMS (Drupal Starshot) and Drupal Core, with Drupal CMS being promoted as the preferred starting point for most.

Drupal Starshot will be designed to have a great out-of-the-box experience. It will enable Ambitious Site Builders without Drupal experience to easily create a new Drupal site and extend it with pre-packaged recipes, all using their browser.

The vision for Drupal Starshot is the outcome of highly productive brainstorming sessions with Drupal Core Committers, the Drupal Association, colleagues at Acquia, various Drupal agencies, and others.

From an implementation standpoint, it will primarily rely on the Project Browser and Recipes initiatives, while also incorporating the Experience Builder initiative. We actually started prototyping Drupal Starshot a few weeks ago and showcased our progress at DrupalCon. Our goal is to launch a first version of Drupal Starshot within 8 months.

At DrupalCon, hundreds of people pledged to get involved, and we had two "super BoFs" with over 50 people each. If you're interested in getting involved with Drupal Starshot, you can register your interest at https://drupal.org/starshot. Additionally, join the conversation in the #Starshot channel on Drupal Slack.

Drupal's brand refresh and marketing strategy

Alongside our technical efforts, we've launched a bold marketing strategy. At DrupalCon Lille, I discussed the need for a fresh marketing approach. Since then, we've made tremendous progress.

I introduced a Drupal brand refresh, which includes updated brand guidelines to ensure a consistent and modern visual identity. This refresh aims to invigorate our brand – making it more vibrant and appealing to newcomers, while still honoring our history and representing our diverse, global community.

I couldn't cover all the details around the brand refresh in my keynote, so I'm expanding on them in this blog post. For a detailed explanation of Drupal's refreshed brand, check out this video by Shawn Perritt: Drupal 2024 brand refresh explained.

Our efforts went beyond just a brand refresh. The Marketing Committee has also guided the community in developing a comprehensive marketing toolkit, which includes messaging guides, pitch decks, and more. All these resources will be available at https://www.drupal.org/marketing.

Let's reach for the stars

As we advance with Drupal Starshot, I recall President Kennedy's famous words:

We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win.

Embracing the Drupal Starshot initiative reflects a similar ethos; we're not choosing the easy path, but the one that tests our strength, creativity, and ability to do hard things. The success of Drupal Starshot will be a testament to the incredible collective power of the Drupal community. It's a challenge we are also unwilling to postpone, and intend to win.

Drupal Starshot is more than a technological leap; it represents a shift in how we think, innovate, and collaborate. It's about reaching for the stars and making the Open Web accessible to everyone.

Thank you for being part of this journey. I can't wait to see where it takes us together. The feedback from the last two days at DrupalCon has been overwhelmingly positive. I am more committed than ever and excited to pledge a significant amount of my time to this mission, and to the future of Drupal.

State of Drupal presentation (October 2023)

Tue, 24 Oct 2023 06:14:40 -0400

Last week, approximately 1,300 Drupal enthusiasts came together in Lille, France for DrupalCon. In good tradition, I delivered my State of Drupal keynote, commonly referred to as the "Driesnote". You can watch the video of my keynote or download my slides (264 MB).

This keynote was unlike any other. I narrated a fairy tale that explores how the Drupal community is working together to simplify the process of starting, building, and maintaining Drupal websites. Yes, you read that correctly – a fairy tale. However, rest assured, it's a fairy tale with a happy ending.

If you're keen to experience the full magic of the Drupal fairy tale, I highly recommend watching the video instead of reading this blog post. And if you want to avoid any spoilers, stop reading here.

A tale of four cities: learning from competitors

As the speaker, I took the audience on a journey that started with my discovery of a mysterious book related to Drupal. The book uses an analogy to explain Drupal as a character living in the Drupal Village. This village is full of different types of houses, from cozy cottages to grand estates. In this bustling village, ambitious villagers work together to construct and take care of their homes.

The Drupal villagers cherish core values such as creativity, flexibility, scalability, accessibility, collaboration, empowerment, security, and freedom.

In the Drupal Village, a young builder grows frustrated with the challenges of constructing and maintaining homes. Driven by curiosity about alternative approaches, the young builder makes the bold decision to leave Drupal Village and embark on a journey to neighboring towns. Their hope was to uncover if there were superior methods for homebuilding.

The Drupal character leaves on a journey to visit nearby villages.

Drupal, our central character, decides to follow the young builder, embarking on a journey that takes them to four unique villages: Reactopia, Contentville, Squarix, and Edoby Heights. Along the way, Drupal gathers valuable insights from each of these unique villages. Despite uncovering some of their shortcomings, Drupal also came to understand why these villages hold allure for young builders.

Summary of lessons learned from Drupal's visits to Reactopia, Contentville, Squarix, and Edoby Heights.

Learning from the strengths of these four villages, the Drupal character realizes that for Drupal Village to prosper, it must offer an exceptional builder experience. Furthermore, through their visits to these four villages, our main character developed a clear idea of what an exceptional experience might look like. With a clear goal in mind, Drupal decides to simplify the process of starting, building, and maintaining homes in the Drupal Village.

Drupal understands that for the Drupal Village to prosper, the builder's experience must be exceptional: it should be simpler to get started, easier to build, and effortless to maintain.

Drupal brings together some of the most skilled craftspeople from the community to meet at a nearby atelier called OuiWork. Within this collaborative space, initiative leaders Tim Plunkett (Acquia), Cristina Chumillas (Lullabot), and Lauri Eskola (Acquia) shared valuable insights about the work they are doing.

In practical terms, I discussed the significance of the Project Browser and Automatic Updates Initiatives. These initiatives serve to streamline the process of starting and maintaining your Drupal sites. Our goal is to include Automatic Updates and Project Browser into Drupal 10.3, scheduled to be released in June 2024. Achieving this milestone will be the culmination of over a decade of dedicated effort. I believe Drupal's Automatic Updates and Project Browser will be both the most advanced and most security-conscious tools of their kind among all PHP applications.

I also highlighted various efforts to make it easier to build with Drupal. This includes improvements in content modeling features (watch video segment) and enhancements to Drupal's administration toolbar (watch video segment). This work not only follows a design-first approach but also showcases our ability to make rapid progress, underscoring changes in the way we work and collaborate.

Drupal announces a new strategic initiative: a Next Generation Page Builder.

Lastly, I introduced a new strategic initiative aimed at improving the user experience for building pages with Drupal (watch video segment). The initiative is called Next Generation Page Builder and focuses on improving Drupal's layout builder, which was first introduced in Drupal 8.

Beyond the dark clouds: advocating for an Open Web

The Closed Web proponents casting dark clouds over Drupal Village.

After working on improving the builder experience, the Drupal character returns home to discover Drupal Village shrouded in dark clouds. These ominous clouds are the work of the Closed Web advocates, sinister figures in the story.

Hope arrives in the form of a visit from Fairy Godfather Tim Berners-Lee. The visit inspires Drupal to become an unwavering promoter and protector of the Open Web. In the morning, the Drupal character takes it upon themselves to write the Open Web Manifesto. This seminal document binds the entire community to a shared commitment: the creation of a digital future that is more accessible and inclusive for all.

Shining a light on Drupal: the role of Drupal marketing

Drupal seeks the assistance of three sorcerers with magical (marketing) powers.

Sadly, the Open Web Manifesto alone can't clear away the dark clouds created by the Closed Web advocates. As the dark clouds creep closer and obscure the village, Drupal seeks help from three powerful sorcerers. The sorcerers use their magic to dispel the dark clouds, unveiling the remarkable work occurring in Drupal Village to the entire world.

In reality, the "sorcerers" are the Drupal Marketing Committee. Their mission is to shine a light on Drupal, promoting it to showcase the impressive work being done. The goal is to encourage more individuals to consider Drupal over closed web solutions, who often have significant resources for marketing themselves.

The Drupal Association launched a Drupal Marketing Committee after DrupalCon Pittsburgh. Comprising seasoned marketing professionals like Lynne Capozzi (former Acquia CMO), Suzanne Dergacheva (Evolving Web), Nikhil Deshpande (State of Georgia), and more, this committee is developing a marketing strategy for Drupal – a first in Drupal's 20+ year history. I had the honor of conducting an on-stage interview with them during my keynote (watch video segment), where they discussed the importance of marketing for Drupal and how it might impact the Drupal community.

We're committed to investing in Drupal's marketing efforts in the next few years. While the full marketing plan will be unveiled towards the end of this year, expect to see things like:

A new website launch, with more focus on outsiders and evaluators.
Refreshing the Drupal brand, with focused messaging aimed at attracting fresh talent.
Improving Drupal's visibility and presence at conferences.
Increase presence and engagement with universities.
Grow the involvement of Drupal Certified Partners.

The Drupal Marketing Committee welcomes all Drupal community members to participate in our marketing efforts.

Drupal's three promises

In the end, our main character, Drupal, commits to three important promises:

Enhance the builder experience to make it easier to start, build, and maintain Drupal sites.
Advocate for an Open Web, championing a more inclusive and accessible digital future.
Amplify our marketing efforts to highlight the outstanding work happening in Drupal, and to expand Drupal's reach and influence in the market.

With these promises in motion, the dark clouds fade. As they clear, the village's future sparkles with newfound hope, and the eager young builder returns home.

The Drupal Village celebrates after the clouds vanished. Finally the world can see what a great place it is for ambitious villagers.

Thank you

Last but not least, I want to thank everyone who made DrupalCon Lille a tremendous success. I always come away inspired and full of ideas, and this year is no exception. Here is to a long and prosperous future for Drupal Village and all of its ambitious villagers! I look forward to sharing future chapters of the fairy tale as we continue to grow our community and software together!

State of Drupal presentation (June 2023)

Mon, 12 Jun 2023 15:02:05 -0400

Last week, approximately 1,500 Drupal enthusiasts came together in Pittsburgh for DrupalCon North America. In good tradition, I delivered my State of Drupal keynote. You can watch the video of my keynote or download my slides (240.6 MB).

The theme of this keynote was innovation. As we like to say in Drupal, the drop is always moving. If we don't keep progressing and innovating, we risk falling behind. That is simply not an option because our mission and purpose are just too important.

License to innovate

In my keynote, I talked about the Drupal Association's goal to support and prioritize product innovation. To shed light on this important topic, I moderated a Q&A session with Tim Doyle, the new CEO of the Drupal Association, and Baddý Breidert, the current chair of the Drupal Association Board of Directors.

We discussed the strategic goals of the Drupal Association, the three-year plan we have been working on, and the actions we're taking to help accelerate product innovation. Given that it was a brief 15-minute Q&A, we only scratched the surface. Stay tuned for more details in the upcoming weeks!

Jumping S-curves by letting a 1,000 flowers bloom

I also discussed the importance of Drupal "jumping S-curves". The pattern of innovation and growth over time follows an S-curve, with periods of slow progress, rapid innovation, and stagnation, followed by a leap to the next curve.

Lessons from S-curve jumps include the importance of having a vision and purpose, grassroots innovation, a supportive environment, and allowing time for ideas to flourish. I applied this theory to Drupal and emphasized how we are well-positioned for innovation, and have been able to jump S-curves over the years because of this.

Drupal has a clear vision and purpose, receives contributions from many individuals, provides a supportive environment, and allows ideas to grow and flourish over time. Additionally, we have initiatives like Project Browser and Recipes that help showcase innovative ideas.

Pitch-burgh innovation contest

Finally, we determined the winners of the Pitch-burgh innovation contest, where individuals from all over the world pitched their own innovative Drupal ideas via video submissions. The response to our contest was overwhelmingly positive, with many attendees expressing their desire to see it return and expand in future DrupalCons.

We received 35 proposals for DrupalCon Pitchburgh, which exceeded expectations. Moreover, thanks to the incredible support from our sponsors, we raised $75,000 in sponsorship funds. I would like to extend my heartfelt appreciation to each and every one of our sponsors: Drupal Association, Acquia, 1xINTERNET, Skilld, Palantir.net, Digital Polygon, Zoocha, ImageX. I also want to express my gratitude to Lee Walker from Code Journeymen and Jonathan Daggerhart from Daggerhart Lab for their real-time support. When the audience vote fell short by $3,000 to fully fund the fifth winner, they stepped in, and shouted from the audience that they will provide the extra funds.

All 35 submissions can be viewed on Drupal.org. I would like to extend a special congratulations to the five exceptional projects that were granted funding as a result of the live audience vote. I'm excited to see your projects come to life over the months to come.

Decoupled Layout Builders (PreviousNext, $20,000)
Using Drupal Gutenberg towards the most easy to use enterprise CMS (Frontkom, $22,000)
JSON data and schemas FTW (Brad Jones, $20,000)
Drupal API Client (Brian Perry, $10,000)
Contributing and Mentoring the mentor (AmyJune Hineline, $6,000)

I'm really excited about these particular projects being funded because many Drupal site builders have requested enhancements for Drupal's page/layout builder (proposal 1 and 2), and more and more Drupal developers are embracing an API-first approach to website development (proposal 3 and 4). The funded projects offer an interesting blend of both. While we can't guarantee that these projects will be added to Drupal core itself, they surely deserve to be taken into consideration. We'll decide that in time through our regular process.

Bonus announcement and unexpected funding

Since Automattic is the main developer behind Gutenberg, I shared the Gutenberg proposal with Matt Mullenweg, co-founder of WordPress and CEO of Automattic. Matt was really excited about the idea of more Drupal sites using Gutenberg, and he kindly offered to provide the full €20,000 in funding through Automattic. Furthermore, he will be sending some Gutenberg experts to join the sprint without any cost to the Drupal community. Thank you, Matt!

Matt shared this great news after my keynote, which means we received some unexpected last-minute funding. It brings the total funding for Pitch-burgh close to $100,000!

As a result, we are able to fully fund the next project chosen by the audience at DrupalCon: Policy based access in core (Factorial, €13,000). The remaining funds will be carried over to the next innovation contest or used for other strategic initiatives of the Drupal Association.

Conclusion

I always love the energy that fills the air when so many from the Drupal community gather together in one place. Every time I attend DrupalCon, I go home full with ideas, enthusiasm, and energy. The creativity and passion of the Drupal community constantly inspires me. I firmly believe in our ability to drive innovation at an even faster pace in the years to come.

Shark Tank meets Drupal: pitch your best innovation ideas

Wed, 19 Apr 2023 11:46:35 -0400

In just a few months, the Drupal community will be gathering for DrupalCon Pittsburgh. I've started planning my opening keynote, and decided to focus it on innovation. Specifically, I want to discuss how we might increase innovation.

To keep things fresh and engaging, I've come up with an exciting idea. During the keynote, I'll be dedicating a portion towards an innovation contest called Pitch-burgh, loosely inspired by Shark Tank.

For those unfamiliar with Shark Tank, it's an American TV show where entrepreneurs pitch their business ideas to a panel of potential investors, known as "sharks". The entrepreneurs give short 2-3 minute presentations in the hopes of securing funding for their idea.

To participate in Pitch-burgh, members of the Drupal community are invited to submit a short video pitching their innovative idea, along with a request for funding. Anyone can participate; attending DrupalCon Pittsburgh is not a requirement.

At DrupalCon, I'll share the best ideas in my keynote and help determine the crowd's favorite. We'll also encourage digital agencies and end-users to contribute funds towards the most promising ideas.

After DrupalCon Pittsburgh, all submissions will be made public, and anyone is invited to contribute funding to the projects that excite them.

Just like how sharks help on TV, the Drupal Association (including myself) will help guide projects that receive investment to help make sure projects succeed and funds are used wisely.

In essence, this is an experiment to connect innovative and impactful ideas with funders. I hope that individuals and organizations in the Drupal community will get involved and fund the ideas they are most excited about.

The deadline for video submissions is May 25th. A panel of judges (see below) will review all submissions between May 25th and May 30th, and pick the best pitches to showcase in my keynote. As mentioned, the top pitches will be revealed during my keynote at DrupalCon Pittsburgh. However, we'll make sure to publish all submissions afterwards.

For more information, check out the official Pitch-Burgh innovation contest page on Drupal.org.

Pitch guidelines

To make it easy for anyone in the Drupal community to participate, submissions for Pitch-burgh should be in the form of a video, with a maximum length of 2 minutes and 30 seconds.

For inspiration on creating a compelling 2.5 minute pitch, we highly recommend reviewing some of the winning pitches on Shark Tank, which can be found on YouTube.

A compelling pitch tends to include the following elements:

Introduction – Start by introducing yourself or your team, and briefly explain why you're likely to be successful.
Executive summary – Provide a clear and concise overview of your idea, explaining what it is and why it's valuable for the Drupal community. This should be done up front in the pitch.
Pain point – Explain the pain point or need that your idea is addressing in more detail, and help us understand why it's important to solve this issue.
Solution – Describe how your idea addresses the pain point or need, and explain the innovative or impactful aspects of your approach.
Funding and resources – Clearly state the amount of funding or resources you're seeking and how you plan to use the funding. Make sure to specify your currency.
Deliverables – Identify the key deliverables that you will provide, such as a module, documentation, or other assets.

In addition to these structural guidelines, we would like to provide some additional guidelines:

Submissions can come from individuals, teams, or organizations, including digital agencies.
Attending DrupalCon Pittsburgh is not mandatory for submitting a proposal. Anyone can participate.
Ideas can either be completely novel, or improvements to Drupal Core or existing contributed projects.
We encourage the use of wireframes, mockups, prototypes, or examples to help bring your idea to life.
While there is no set limit on the amount of funding you can request, we recommend that the ask does not exceed $20,000. Requests that are too high may be less likely to secure the necessary funding.

Remember, the goal of your Pitch-burgh submission is to convince the judges and potential funders in the Drupal community that your idea is innovative, impactful, and worthy of support. Be creative and convincing.

Evaluation criteria

We're looking for innovative and impactful ideas that have the potential to make a difference in the Drupal community. Judges will be asked to select the top pitches based on the following two criteria:

Potential impact – Judges will assess the potential impact of the idea on Drupal, and how it can contribute to the growth and improvement of Drupal or the Drupal community.
Likelihood of success – Judges will assess the potential for the idea and team to succeed by considering various factors, including their qualifications and experience, the feasibility of the proposed concept, the realism of the funding requirements, etc.

Judges

I currently have secured three judges for Pitch-burgh:

Tim Doyle, CEO of the Drupal Association
Baddy Breidert, Chair of the Drupal Association Board
Dries Buytaert, the Project Lead and founder of Drupal

We're still looking for more judges and want to ensure that we have a diverse group of judges who can offer a variety of perspectives and feedback to participants.

Conclusion

I'm thrilled to see what innovative ideas the Drupal community will come up with and look forward to featuring them in my keynote at DrupalCon Pittsburgh. Above all, I hope to see more people get paid to develop impactful features for Drupal.