After outsourcing comment processing to Disqus due to the lack of the Akismet module, fighting a buggy alpha version of the Views module for Drupal 6.0 to implement a front page that doesn’t use those damn teasers, and installing yet another security update using an update process that can best be described as a pain in the ass, I’ve finally asked myself why I use Drupal for what is basically textbook blogging.

The answer? Well, once upon a time, back in 2005, I had an HTML site that I’d painstakingly built, and I shopped around content management systems trying to find one flexible enough to let me reconstruct that look and feel in a theme. I looked far and wide, at WordPress, DotNetNuke, PHPNuke, MovableType, and just about every other CMS and blogging platform one can imagine. The only one with the flexibility I thought I needed was Drupal. I spent days getting my head around it’s ridiculously expansive surface area, cooked up a theme, and that was that.

Problem is, Drupal 6.0 is out and it feels like a step back. None of the modules I need work, and the system is unimaginably complicated, which is probably why lots of high-profile sites with unique requirements use it. However, apocryph.org is neither high profile nor possessing of unique requirements, and I’m now willing to accept a site redesign if it means I can use a blogging platform that Just Works.

Which brings me to the next problem: how in the hell am I going to get years of posts out of Drupal and into something else? Obviously the answer will involve me writing data migration code, which sucks and makes it less likely I’ll get around to it.

Still, I’m getting really tired of slogging through the Drupal mud.