Acquia, the Company Drupal Software FAQs
What is Acquia?
We are a commercial open source software company. We provide an incredibly valuable set of software and network services for the popular Drupal open source social publishing system. Our goal is to amplify Drupal and make it rock even better and louder for more audiences.
What does Acquia sell?
We sell annual subscriptions for our software and services.
What software products does Acquia offer?
Acquia Drupal is our first software distribution. It includes Drupal core, a collection of Drupal community contributed modules, Acquia Network modules, and potentially, non-Drupal software, assembled together to provide an advanced starting point to begin building Drupal websites. It also provides the foundation for our Drupal support offerings via the Acquia Network.
What are the system requirements and supported platforms for Acquia Drupal?
See Acquia Drupal Supported Platforms.
What is the difference between Acquia Drupal and the software I can download from Drupal.org?
Acquia Drupal is the latest Acquia-supported version of the Drupal core, the latest Acquia-supported version of a number of contributed modules, the Acquia Network modules, and a number of high quality themes brought together in one integrated, tested, and commercially supported package. Some of these elements are individually available on Drupal.org, but finding and assembling the right versions of each package can be a time consuming process.
The role of Acquia is to provide a packaged Drupal distribution that is thoroughly tested for stability, security, performance, and compatibility and is backed by commercial grade support. The role of Drupal.org is to continuously advance the leading edge of Drupal technology with new capabilities. Both roles are essential for bringing the power of Drupal to the broadest possible audience and strengthening the Drupal community.
Acquia works continuously to ensure that the versions of Drupal core and contributed modules that ship with Acquia Drupal are appropriately up-to-date without compromising stability, security, performance, and compatibility.
Is Acquia Drupal a fork of Drupal?
No, and Acquia works continuously to ensure that such a thing never occurs. All Acquia created patches are submitted back to the Drupal project in a timely fashion. Acquia engineers work closely with core maintainers and contributed module maintainers to ensure that there is little or no divergence between Acquia Drupal source code and the source code of available on Drupal.org. Given that source code divergence creates costly duplicated effort for the Acquia engineering team, Acquia is highly motivated to minimize or eliminate it.
The relationship between Acquia Drupal and Drupal.org Drupal is similar in many (but not all) regards to the relationship between Ubuntu Linux and Debian Project Linux or Red Hat Enteprise Linux and Fedora Project Linux. The former is a commercially packaged and supported distribution of the leading edge innovation coming out of the former.
Under what license is Acquia Drupal released?
Acquia Drupal is released under the GPL license. Acquia reserves all rights to the Acquia trademark, logo, and trade dress.
Is Acquia Drupal free?
Yes. Acquia Drupal is free as in “free beer” and free as in “free speech.” You may download and use Acquia Drupal at no charge regardless of whether you have a paid Acquia Network subscription. Because the Acquia Drupal source code is released under a GPL license, you may modify or redistribute the source code as you see fit, as long as you comply with the terms of the GPL.
Acquia reserves all rights to the Acquia trademark, logo, and trade dress and their derivatives as they appear in Acquia Drupal. Other parties similarly reserve all rights to their respective trademarks and their derivatives as they appear in Acquia Drupal.
Can I get support from Acquia for Drupal 5?
No. Acquia provides commercial support for Acquia Drupal, which is based on Drupal 6.4 and higher. Acquia Professional Services and Acquia Solution Provider partners can provide expert assistance in migrating your site to the latest version of Acquia Drupal. The new features, improved usability, stability, and performance and the ability to obtain commercial support are well worth the investment. Please contact Acquia Sales for more information about how to get started with your migration.
How often will Acquia release Acquia Drupal?
Acquia plans to release incremental patched releases of Acquia Drupal approximately every two weeks and Long Term Support (a.k.a. “LTS”) releases approximately once every six months.
How soon after a major release of Drupal.org Drupal will Acquia release a corresponding release of Acquia Drupal?
The interval will vary from release to release, but it may take several months to port contributed modules and conduct compatibility, security, and performance testing. Acquia will coordinate with the core maintainer and work closely with module maintainers to help accelerate the porting and testing process.
How will Acquia keep up with the rapid evolution of Drupal core and modules?
It’s simply our job to do it, and we’ll make it work. That said, there are practical things that will help assure we can keep up. For example, testing. During the Drupal 7 development period Acquia will be actively participating in Dries’ vision to develop a strong testing foundation for Drupal. For us, this means contributing as many core tests as we can. As the strong testing framework matures, our efficiency in examining (and testing) new patches / modules will increase many-fold, which will go along way towards this goal.
We’ll also think carefully about what new modules we add to our distribution, examining data such as module popularity, module code quality, the depth of relationship we can form with a module maintainer, etc. All of these can help us focus our efforts where we, the maintainer, and our customer all win.
Will Acquia backport new functionality from newer releases of Drupal into older supported releases?
We have no plans to do so. Such a move would be inconsistent with the long-established Drupal Project development philosophy and culture. Our practice and strong preference is to align with, seek leverage from, and provide leverage to the Drupal community. Back-porting new features into an older version without the overwhelming support of the Drupal community would be tantamount to forking Drupal, with all the associated redundant effort and diffusion of scarce resources. Acquia opposes the forking of Drupal, so no back-porting is planned.
How does Acquia work with contributed module maintainers?
Acquia works hard to cultivate shared vision, strong working relationships, and a common development philosophy/discipline with the maintainers of the contributed modules included in Acquia Drupal. Acquia works closely with the maintainers to deliver timely patches to Acquia Network subscribers in the course of delivering support.
In order to preserve the spirit of volunteerism and integrity that is so essential to the health of the Drupal community, Acquia avoids direct compensation relationships with module maintainers who are not Acquia employees.
How does Acquia handle new security vulnerabilities in Drupal?
Acquia conducts it’s own automated and manual source code security reviews for all components of Acquia Drupal. Acquia also participates in the Drupal security team to continuously monitor and address a variety of sources for news of new security vulnerabilities.
When a new vulnerability is discovered, Acquia works closely with the Drupal community to verify and fix the vulnerability and disseminate information about countermeasures and patches that address the problem.
What is the review process for new versions of core and modules that are part of Acquia Drupal?
We conduct security reviews, functional testing, compatibility testing, and documentation reviews before including a module or new version of Drupal core in Acquia Drupal.
Does Acquia offer indemnification against third party claims of intellectual property ownership for the Acquia Drupal software?
In general, no. However, it may possible in some instance, depending on the specific details of your situation. Pleasecontact Acquia Sales for assistance.
Will Acquia support contributed modules or third party themes that are not included in Acquia Drupal?
It depends. The quality and supportability of contributed modules varies widely. Some contributed modules or third party themes may cause serious functionality conflicts, instability, performance degradation, or security vulnerabilities when installed on Acquia Drupal.
If you would like Acquia to support one or more contributed modules not included in Acquia Drupal, the first step is to engage Acquia Professional Services to complete a feasibility assessment project. This assessment will be billable at standard Acquia Professional Services rates and will be customized to suit your situation. Based on the results of the feasibility assessment, Acquia will either provide you with a custom quote for an annual support contract for the module(s) in question, or decline to support the module(s) and provide a detailed explanation.
Will Acquia support my custom-developed module(s) or themes?
Possibly. It depends on the Acquia assessment of the quality and supportability of the module(s). It may not be commercially feasible for Acquia support your custom developed module.
If you would like Acquia to support your custom in-house module(s), the first step is to engage Acquia Professional Services to complete a feasibility assessment project. This assessment will be billable at standard Acquia Professional Services rates and will be customized to suit your situation. Based on the results of the feasibility assessment, Acquia will either provide you with a custom quote for an annual support contract for the module(s) in question, or decline to support the module(s) and provide a detailed explanation.
If I make modifications to Acquia Drupal source code, can I still get support from Acquia?
If you would like Acquia to support your modifications, the first step is to engage Acquia Professional Services to complete a feasibility assessment project. This assessment will be billable at standard Acquia Professional Services rates and will be customized to suit your situation. Based on the results of the feasibility assessment, Acquia will either provide you with a custom quote for an annual support contract for the modifications in question, or decline to support the modifications and provide a detailed explanation.
If you decide to proceed with unsupported modifications, Acquia will still attempt to assist you with issues that are clearly unrelated to your modifications. When it is uncertain whether the issue is related to unsupported modifications, Acquia will attempt to assist you until it becomes clear that the issue is related to the unsupported modifications, at which point Acquia will disengage and close the ticket.
Can I use modules and themes not included in Acquia Drupal without losing support?
Yes. However, unless you make separate arrangements as explained elsewhere in this FAQ, modules and themes not included in Acquia Drupal are unsupported. In practice, this means that Acquia will still try to assist you with issues that are clearly unrelated to the unsupported modules and themes you are using. When it is uncertain whether the issue is related to unsupported modules and themes, Acquia will attempt to assist you until it becomes clear that the issue is related to the unsupported elements, at which point Acquia will disengage and close the ticket.
Does Acquia provide long-term support for Acquia Drupal?
Yes. For each release designated as a Long Term Support release (a.k.a. “LTS release”), Acquia provides several years of active maintenance for all current subscription holders and an additional year of extended maintenance for customers with premium subscriptions. Customers who use an LTS release may receive support throughout the Active Maintenance period.
What does Long Term Support release mean?
A Long Term Support release (a.k.a. “LTS release) is a release that Acquia has designated as being eligible for long-term support and maintenance. LTS releases are deemed to be stable enough for long-term production use and normally contain only Drupal core and contributed modules that are labeled “released” on Drupal.org (e.g. not Alpha, Beta, RC, etc.). Acquia provides active maintenance and extended maintenance for LTS releases to keep them functioning properly within their supported environments. Acquia may require certain patches to be applied to an LTS release in order to maintain its long-term support status.
LTS releases have the “LTS” designation in the version number of the release in the form “Acquia Drupal x.x.x LTS”.
What is an Interim Support Release?
An Interim Support release (a.k.a. “IS” release) is a public release of Acquia Drupal that is supported, but is not designated as an LTS release. An IS release may include new functionality and patches that are not yet available in an LTS release and may also include Drupal core or modules not designated as “released” on Drupal.org. Current subscription holders may request and receive support for an IS release, but upgrading or downgrading to an LTS release may be the required in order to resolve the issue.
IS releases have the “IS” designation in the version number of the release in the form “Acquia Drupal x.x.x IS”.
What does Active Maintenance mean?
For LTS releases that are within their active maintenance period, Acquia will deliver or coordinate the delivery of patches and updates as needed to keep the release functioning properly within its supported operating environment. The supported operating environment includes the specific combinations of specific versions of operating systems, databases, web servers, and PHP versions and configurations that are listed in the supported platform matrix at the time the LTS release in question was released and their follow-on patches, minor releases, and service packs.
As an example, suppose you are using an Acquia Drupal 1.x.x LTS release that lists MySQL 5.0 in the supported platform matrix. In order to address a critical security vulnerability discovered in MySQL 5.0, you decide to upgrade to MySQL 5.1. However, you quickly discover that the database upgrade causes Acquia Drupal to experience an unwanted 20% performance degradation.
You have an active Acquia Network Professional subscription, so you open a ticket to get assistance with the performance issue. In this case, Acquia would most likely work with Drupal core/module maintainers as needed to generate a patch for Acquia Drupal 1.x.x LTS that addresses the incompatibility with MySQL 5.1.
Aquia will post an end of life schedule for each LTS release of Acquia Drupal when the first LTS release becomes available. This schedule will contain precise dates for the Active Maintenance and Extended Maintenance periods.
What does Extended Maintenance mean?
Extended maintenance is a premium entitlement for owners of premium Acquia Network subscriptions. Extended maintenance provides an extended window of support beyond the active maintenance period for LTS releases of Acquia Drupal.
For LTS releases that are within their extended maintenance period, Acquia will deliver or coordinate the delivery of patches and updates as needed to address defects that occur on supported platforms and are the root cause of tickets classified with Critical or High Urgency level. The supported operating environment includes the specific combinations of specific versions of operating systems, databases, web servers, and PHP versions and configurations that are listed in the supported platform matrix at the time the LTS release in question was released and their follow-on patches, minor releases, and service packs.
As an example, suppose you are using an Acquia Drupal 1.x.x LTS release that lists PHP 5.0 in the supported platform matrix. It has been several years since this application went into production and Acquia Drupal 1.x.x LTS is out of the active maintenance period. You have seriously considered upgrading the system to a newer version, but have decided it is not feasible to do so.
One day you notice a high load instability issue in PHP 5.0 that is affecting a custom PHP application running on the same server as Acquia Drupal, so you decide to upgrade to PHP 5.1. However, you quickly discover that the PHP upgrade causes your Acquia Drupal site to white screen, making it totally non-functional.
You have an active Acquia Network Enterprise subscription, so you call the Technical Assistance Center to open an urgent ticket to get your site back online. In this case, assuming a suitable patch does not already exist, Acquia would work with Drupal core/module maintainers to generate a patch or workaround for Acquia Drupal 1.x.x LTS that addresses the incompatibility between your implementation of Acquia Drupal and PHP 5.1.
Aquia will post an end of life schedule for each LTS release of Acquia Drupal when the first LTS release becomes available. This schedule will contain precise dates for the Active Maintenance and Extended Maintenance periods.
