Jesus Manuel Olivas' Alternative Vision for Drupal’s Future

Jesus Manuel Olivas, co-founder of the digital agency Octahedroid, has published a detailed critique of Drupal’s current strategic direction. In his article, “Beyond the Official Narrative: Building Drupal’s (Alternative) Future,” he expresses concern over what he describes as a narrowing of the platform’s vision.

Jesus refers to DrupalCon Atlanta 2025, where the Drupal CMS initiative featured prominently across sessions and keynotes. This initiative promotes a low-code and no-code model centered around monolithic site-building using PHP, Twig, and Single Directory Components. According to Jesus, this approach was presented not as one possible method but as the future of Drupal. He notes a departure from the diversity of strategies and voices that have historically shaped the community.

He contrasts this centralized vision with the work being done by agencies like Octahedroid, which focus on decoupled architecture, API-first design, and frontend flexibility. These methods are commonly used to support enterprise clients with complex content delivery needs, multi-platform consistency, and integration with modern JavaScript frameworks such as React, Next.js, and Astro.

Jesus draws a comparison to the Drupal 7 to 8 transition period, during which Octahedroid created Drupal Console to assist developers in adapting to the new Symfony-based architecture. Although the tool was not initially embraced by Drupal leadership, it gained adoption for solving real challenges faced by developers. He sees similar dynamics in how unofficial tools and architectures are currently treated within the ecosystem.

The article highlights ongoing development of tools like GraphQL Compose and Drupal Decoupled, which were built in direct response to client demands. These tools, according to Jesus, are examples of practical innovation taking place outside the boundaries of the official roadmap.

While acknowledging the value of the Drupal CMS model for simpler use cases, Jesus argues that positioning it as the default for all scenarios risks alienating developers and organizations with advanced requirements. He maintains that Drupal’s historical strength lies in its adaptability, not in a uniform build process.

He closes with a call for maintaining architectural diversity within the community. Innovation, he writes, often begins at the edges of an ecosystem, not in centralized decision-making. Open-source development, in his view, should continue to support a variety of methods tailored to the specific needs of different users.

“No one needs permission to innovate,” Jesus writes. “We’re building for this future regardless of whether it receives official recognition.”