Seattle Drupal Clinic Introduction to Drupal Part 1: Web Content Management, Advantages/Disadvantages of Drupal, Drupal terminology

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What does using a Content Management System (CMS) buy you? Content and settings stored in a database: edit content, menus, navigation, etc. on the web Web pages are generated by scripts from information in the database, not stored as individual files Enter information once, display in different ways on different pages (lists, grids, calendars, …) Content is separate from style/presentation, so style is consistent across site Permissions system: different users have permission to do different actions on the site

What are your options? Many Content Management Systems (CMS) are available:  Drupal  Joomla  WordPress  Expression Engine  WebGUI  Plone  …

Advantages of Drupal Free and Open Source software  You don’t have to pay for a software license  You can modify the software Large and vibrant community of users and developers  Many people testing it, finding security issues, etc.  Many modules freely available from developers  Many people donating their time to writing documentation, helping new users, etc. Flexible architecture  You can create your own modules for custom features  You can create your own themes for custom design Based on standards:  Core software is PHP/MySQL, giving many hosting options  Output uses XHTML, CSS, JavaScript, so compatible with most browsers

Disadvantages of Drupal Flexibility = Complexity  May not be the best alternative for simple or single- functionality sites  Takes some time to learn  Takes some time to set up Free and Open Source = No guarantees  Free support options may or may not be responsive (but you can pay for support)  Features you need may or may not be available  Your feature requests and bug reports may or may not be acted upon

What types of sites is Drupal good for? Examples:  – Showcase: Company brochure, artist profiles. Note innovative content reuse (see Artists page)  - Interaction and Community: Visitors can submit stories, comment, rate stories. See for more

Drupal Terminology Module  Def: Add-on code that adds functionality to Drupal  Can be core (comes with Drupal), contributed (download and install separately), or custom (written specifically for your site)  Examples: Forum, Blog, Web Form Theme  Def: Set of PHP files, CSS files, and images that defines the layout and styles for your site  Can be core, contributed, or custom Path  Def: Part of the URL of your site that follows the base URL for your site. For example, in the path is “node/add”

Drupal Terminology p. 2 User  Def: Anyone who visits your site  Non-logged-in visitors are known as anonymous  Users with accounts are assigned to roles that you can define, such as Master Admin, Content Editor, Member  Permissions are generally assigned by role Node  Def: A piece of content on your site, which could be displayed on its own page or as part of another page (or both)  Basic nodes have a Title, Body, a unique ID number, and some meta-data (creation time, last updated, author, etc.)  Each node also has a content type, such as “Page”, “Article”, “Press release”, “Event”, or “Member profile”.  Content types can have additional custom fields besides Title and Body, such as location, event date, banner image, etc.

Drupal Terminology p. 3 Taxonomy  Def: Categories, tags, or other classifications that can be applied to nodes (content) on your site Menu  Def: List of links to pages on your site, generally used for navigation in headers, sidebars, footers Weight  Def: Number that defines the order of a list, such as of menu items. Larger numbers “sink” to the bottom of the list. Block  Def: Text, links, images, etc. that can be placed in a region of your site’s theme (header, sidebar, footer, etc.), and configured to display on one or more pages