Drupal is an open source content management platform which allows fast development and maintenance of both small and large web sites.
It is possible to create almost any type of web site with Drupal by calling down community contributed modules . There are users within the Drupal community who have recreated sites like Digg, Flickr and YouTube from currently available modules.
Drupal was started by Dries Buyaert whilst at The University of Antwerp, he and a group of friend wanted an internal messaging system for dorm room discussions. The system Buyaert developed for this purpose morphed into Drupal.
Why Drupal?
Dries meant to purchase Dorp.org which is Dutch for ‘Village but thanks to a typing error he actually bought Drop.org. When time came to release the software which made the community run he chose the name Drupal from the Dutch word ‘druppel’ meaning ‘Drop’.
Drupal is now on it’s seventh release.