What a year.

I suppose there is a temptation to say that toward the end of every year but really, WHAT A YEAR FOR DRUPAL.

Here are six things we learned in 2014:

1. There is no challenge too large or complex for Drupal

If there were any remaining questions about Drupal’s ability to scale, they should be more than answered with Weather.com’s migration to Drupal. The site is one of the largest in the world, serves more than 100 million unique visitors per month, and contains more than 20 million pages of content. There were many other big wins for Drupal in 2014, including becoming the CMS of choice for the Australian federal government and NASA.

2. Drupal is still very popular among beginners and hobbyists

Drupal may be a top solution for large, complex sites, but it is also still popular among beginners and hobbyists. In 2014, the Drupal Association-backed Global Training Days program saw significant growth in participation around the world. Thirty-five countries hosted 170 free or low-cost Drupal training courses designed as an introduction for beginners and hobbyists. Additionally, about a quarter of DrupalCon attendees in 2014 identified themselves as “beginners.” Why is this important? See the next item.

3. Learning Drupal is a smart career move

It’s no secret that Drupal skills are in high demand and have been for some time. In fact, 82% of employers we surveyed during the summer indicated they plan to hire Drupal talent within the next 6 months. Forty percent of hiring managers say they are in “constant” hiring mode for Drupal talent. Few career paths experience that kind of demand.

4. Drupal is free, but it’s also very valuable

If you want to get a feel for the value of technology markets or ecosystems, pay attention to where investors are placing bets. In 2014, big bets were made in the Drupal ecosystem. Within the space of a month, Acquia raised $50 million and Pantheon raised more than $21 million. That kind of confidence by investors requires strong businesses built on mature technologies like Drupal.

5. Signs point to broad adoption of Drupal 8

In our recent Drupal community survey we asked respondents whether they had plans to adopt Drupal 8. More than 80% of Drupal service providers and organizations using Drupal said Drupal 8 is firmly planted on their roadmap. Another 10% said they had plans to evaluate it (look for all results from the survey in the next few weeks). Drupal 8 sessions at 2014 DrupalCon events were among the most widely attended talks. Plus, the momentum toward a final release is building with Drupal 8 now in beta and efforts like the Drupal Association’s “Drupal 8 Accelerate” funding program. Drupal 7 catapulted Drupal into the mainstream. Where will Drupal 8 take the project?

6. The project and the community are strong

The year saw the two highest-attended DrupalCon events ever in Austin and Amsterdam. The number of contributors has topped 2,400 and it's still growing. And here is an interesting number compiled by the Drupal Association engineering team: more than 18 thousand unique people had 10 or more contributions on Drupal.org and its subsites in 2014. “Contributions” in this case could include anything from commenting on an issue to providing a translation, to writing a module. The project also weathered a severe security vulnerability under the leadership of the Drupal Security Team. The year showed just how durable and stable the project and community are.

There were many other triumphs during the year -- too many to list. But all taken together, they point to an exciting 2015 and beyond. I don’t know about you but I’m very excited for the future.