Dries Buytaert

Drupal.com refresh launched

Back in March 2008, I blogged about a much-needed redesign soon to be deployed onto Drupal.com, to replace the oh-so-embarrassing placeholder page I've had there for years. I'm happy to announce that -- thanks in large measure to the great design and development work of the good folks at Development Seed -- the new and much improved Drupal.com has been launched.

The old Drupal.com site had always just been a way to protect our Drupal identity and direct folks to our true home at drupal.org. Over the years, I'd never put much thought into that site. Drupal's adoption has grown, however, and so has the traffic to Drupal.com – mostly from people typing that address directly into their browser. At 30,000 unique visitors a month, too many people see it for it to have remained its old simple self, but I still wanted a way to protect our identity and direct folks to Drupal.org.

The new site design does just that. First, it serves as a spotlight for Drupal and the Drupal community. Second, it continues to drive traffic to Drupal.org, the Drupal Planet, and groups.drupal.org. And, third, it protects our identity in two ways: when published, the Drupal.com trademark page will serve as the official repository of the Drupal trademark policy (and also generate some much-needed revenue from site ads to defray some of the licensing and trademark expenses that I am responsible for personally). Publishing the trademark policy is next on my TODO list (I'm currently incorporating some last feedback from Larry Garfield) and launching the ads will follow thereafter (more details to come).

As always, and as with any fresh launch of a new site, comments and suggestions are always welcome. Feel free to leave them here, attached to this post. I'll continue to add and tweak the the site over time, and I welcome your input.

On Drupal certification programs

Every once in a while, the discussion of Drupal cerification comes up. Is a Drupal certification program a good thing or a bad thing? Are certification programs overrated? Isn't one's track record as a contributor on drupal.org the best measure of someone's past (and possibly future) performance? Should the Drupal Association manage the program, and if not, then who? What do other Open Source projects do?

Lots of unknowns and lots of subjective questions always make for a good discussion.

While I'm often skeptical about certification programs myself, I do see the value in them. Certification isn't for everyone but for some people it is valuable. A masters degree from MIT, an MBA from Harvard or a Ph.D. from Stanford is a form of certification too. But, just as there are good examples, there is no lack of examples where bad certification programs deliver certified engineers that don't know what they are actually doing. That fact, though, doesn't invalidate the valuable certification programs that do exist; for example, the CISCO certification program is very thorough and valued by the market. Similarly, I think that employers do value certificates achieved in higher education. All things considered, I believe there is value in having a well-executed high-quality Drupal certification program, especially as Drupal continues to grow.

My personal view is that the Drupal Association is not the best body to create "the" Drupal certification program. It is my belief that we are best served by allowing many organizations to create their own Drupal certification programs, and have the marketplace set their value -- similar to how universities build reputations. Competition around Drupal certification programs could be a great thing, because it would likely improve quality and allow for specialization. A certification, of course, is ultimately only as valuable as the organization standing behind it. In such a scenario, it is very important that the certification programs are labeled properly; that is, "ACME Drupal certified" rather than just "Drupal certified", where ACME is the name of the company or organization providing the service. It has to be ACME's reputation that is on the line for the quality of their participants. The Drupal trademark policy is designed to help achieve that.

I also don't believe that a certification program is a zero-sum game: that is, holding a certification doesn't imply that your track record on drupal.org (through your user profile) is of either less or more value. Again, the market and the buyer will determine the value of a drupal.org user profile versus a certification program versus a resume versus a portfolio versus degrees obtained through higher education. In any event, it is unlikely that one would hire someone solely on the basis of having a Drupal certification. I certainly wouldn't.

When we launched Acquia two years ago, we announced a Drupal certification program code named 'Yellow Jersey'. That program hasn't materialized yet, and we're not putting resources in it at this point in time. Building a high-quality certification program is a significant undertaking and we're not ready to take on such a program. And last but not least, the marketplace hasn't demanded these types of programs to a sufficient degree. Yet.

Other Open Source projects like MySQL, Zend, Linux, Ubuntu, RedHat, BSD all have certification programs so I think it is a matter of time before we see one or more Drupal certification programs emerge. Personally, I would support a well-executed high-quality Drupal certification program.

Acquia adds 200 new customers in six months

I've posted a good bit about Acquia lately, because we had a lot of exciting things happening, and because I'm proud of the body of work that the Acquia team is producing, often in close cooperation with the Drupal community.

Still, a lot of people ask me how Acquia is doing and whether the support business model is working. In this post, and in an accompanying press release, I want to provide some additional insight in the state of Acquia's support business model.

As you might remember, Acquia opened for business in October 2008, less than one year ago. In less than one year, Acquia now supports over 250 enterprise customers across a wide variety of markets. In the last six months, we've quadrupled our customer base and now help support open-source solutions in places where proprietary software once predominated. Places like The Economist, Intuit, WEEI, Sony Music, Adobe and more.

The reality is that with less than one year into the Drupal support business, it is too early for us to tell if the support business model will be viable for Drupal. We need many more customers before we've built a scalable business; however, the early signs are good and beat our expectations.

Acquia has grown substantially from its beginnings less than two years ago, and since opening its doors for business less than one year ago. The road to making Acquia a successful company is still long but I'm very excited about what we have accomplished to date, and where Acquia is heading with its new products and services.

Internet Systems Consortium using Drupal

Internet Systems Consortium, also known as ISC, is using Drupal on their website at http://isc.org. ISC was founded by three internet pioneers Rick Adams, Carl Malamud and Paul Vixie to support BIND and other software that helps power the internet. ISC also operates one of the 13 root name servers. Pretty cool and a testament to Drupal!

Acquia.com website refresh

For those who haven't seen it yet, we've refreshed the Acquia website, both the design and the content. I think we've taken a big step forward with the new design (apart from putting my picture on the main page). The most noticeable change is that the previous version of the website was targeted at the existing Drupal community, whereas the new version speaks to new and different target audiences; designers, developers, and business owners that might not be familiar with Drupal. This is a fairly radical change in our messaging -- we'll have to see how that plays out for us. We are also trying to highlight more the importance and work of our partners.

To me, this reflects an important trend for the Drupal community at large though. Traditionally, Drupal has been very developer centric and we have grown organically through word-of-mouth marketing and good reputation. While we obviously need to continue to foster that, we also need to get traction with the designer community as well as get the attention of senior business decision-makers. It is something we all have to work on, but I hope Acquia's refreshed website contributes to making that happen.

As always, our website continues to be a work in progress, so let us know what you think! As a reference, I included screen shots of older versions of our site.

Acquia raises $8 million series B

I'm very pleased to announce that Acquia has raised an additional 8 million USD in a Series B round of funding. As explained in our press release, the investment was led by our existing investors, North Bridge Venture Partners and Sigma Partners. Combined with our Series A funding, this brings our total funding to 15 million USD.

The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) published our filing faster than expected and as a result, some of you may have already heard this news. That will teach us to coordinate things better -- not a big deal, but another lesson learned. Interestingly, there is nothing like a scoop to generate coverage and the funding news was picked up by TechCrunch, Washington Post, The Boston Globe, Mass High Tech, Venture Beat, CMS Wire, Xconomy and many others.

Raising this additional money is no small thing, especially in the current global economy. It is a testament to the hard work and dedication of all the Acquians and the momentum we have achieved.

But how will the money of our series B funding be used, you ask?

First, this new funding lets us accelerate our existing support business. Our support business is performing better than we expected but, of course, there is still a lot of work to do. We'll use the money to grow our support business and to expand the market for Drupal in the enterprise world.

Second, the new funding allows us to complete the strategy that we laid out early in 2009, directly leading to new products like Acquia Hosting, Acquia Gardens and Acquia Training. We'll also be looking to add some new products and services to the Acquia Network as part of our subscription offerings.

My vision for Acquia has always been to offer a unique combination of products, services, and technical leadership that complement and help fuel the Drupal project, and that help Drupal reach its full potential. It is why I started Acquia to begin with, and our Series B investment doesn't change that vision. Expect us to continue to give back to the Drupal community through code, by organizing sprints, through attending and sponsoring events, and more.

Last, the new funding means that I can continue to follow my heart, directing my time, resources and passion toward Drupal and the many people it touches. I have found a joy in participating in Open Source and doing start-ups that I have not found in academia, and that I likely wouldn't have found as a programmer at a local bank. ;)

I'm writing this blog post in San Jose where I'm attending the annual OSCON conference to meet and work with people in the Drupal community, and to educate people about Drupal. It is on days like today that I am reminded of how lucky I am, and of what both Drupal and Acquia enable me to do.

Australian Prime Minister using Drupal

The website of Kevin Michael Rudd, the Prime Minister of Australia is using Drupal: see http://www.pm.gov.au. Go Aussies!