Seattle Drupal Clinic Introduction to Drupal Part 1: Web Content Management,...

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

Transcript of Seattle Drupal Clinic Introduction to Drupal Part 1: Web Content Management,...

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

Seattle Drupal Clinic

Introduction to Drupal

Part 1: Web Content Management, Advantages/Disadvantages of Drupal, Drupal terminology

Page 2: Seattle Drupal Clinic Introduction to Drupal Part 1: Web Content Management, Advantages/Disadvantages of Drupal, Drupal terminology.

Disclaimer and Copyright

This presentation was created by Jennifer Hodgdon of Poplar ProductivityWare LLC.

This presentation is placed in the public domain.

You are therefore granted permission to use and modify this presentation as you wish. However, an attribution to the source is always appreciated.

Information contained here is believed to be accurate, but is presented with no warranty as to its accuracy. Use at your own risk.

Page 3: Seattle Drupal Clinic Introduction to Drupal Part 1: Web Content Management, Advantages/Disadvantages of Drupal, Drupal terminology.

What does using a ContentManagement 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

Page 4: Seattle Drupal Clinic Introduction to Drupal Part 1: Web Content Management, Advantages/Disadvantages of Drupal, Drupal terminology.

What are your options?

Many Content Management Systems (CMS) are available: Drupal Joomla WordPress Expression Engine WebGUI Plone …

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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

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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

Page 7: Seattle Drupal Clinic Introduction to Drupal Part 1: Web Content Management, Advantages/Disadvantages of Drupal, Drupal terminology.

What types of sites isDrupal good for?

Examples: http://www.warnerbrosrecords.com – Showcase:

Company brochure, artist profiles. Note innovative content reuse (see Artists page)

http://www.fastcompany.com/ - Interaction and Community: Visitors can submit stories, comment, rate stories.

See http://drupal.org/cases for more

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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 http://example.com/admin/node/add, the path is “node/add”

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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.

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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