Emma Jane Hogbin - Drupal Users Guide: Building and Administering a Successful Drupal-Powered Web Site

Building and Administering a Successful Drupal-Powered Web Site

Emma Jane Hogbin

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Hogbin, Emma Jane.
Drupal users guide : building and administering a successful Drupal-powered web site /
Emma Jane Hogbin.
p. cm.
Includes index.
ISBN 978-0-13-704129-9 (pbk. : alk. paper)
1. Drupal (Computer file) 2. Web site development. 3. Web sitesDesign. I. Title.
TK5105.8885.D78H695 2011
006.78dc23
2011025848

Copyright 2012 Pearson Education, Inc.

All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. This publication is protected by copyright, and permission must be obtained from the publisher prior to any prohibited reproduction, storage in a retrieval system, or transmission in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or likewise. To obtain permission to use material from this work, please submit a written request to Pearson Education, Inc., Permissions Department, One Lake Street, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458, or you may fax your request to (201) 236-3290.

ISBN-13: 978-0-13-704129-9
ISBN-10: 0-13-704129-2

Text printed in the United States on recycled paper at RR Donnelley in Crawfordsville, Indiana. First printing, September 2011

Editor-in-Chief
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Publishing Coordinator
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Cover Designer
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The CIP Group

For my mother, Maryann, who asked for the manual to her Web site.

In the late 1990s I began my career in Web development by making simple Web pages while studying at college. My degree in science and the environment combined with my summer jobs of Web site building landed me a job as a project manager at a firm making Web sites for environmental organizations. The in-house programmer would sometimes tell me that things couldnt be done, and being the stubborn sort of person that I am, I began to learn programming. We were always working on a shoestring budget, and free software was absolutely essential to our toolkit.

A few years later I branched out and created my own content management systemmine was going to feature a multilingual discussion board for college students learning a second language. (To this day, this is probably one of the hardest problems to solve.) Before writing a line of code, I downloaded all the different free content management systems that were available at the time. Drupal had the most sophisticated translation interface for multilingual Web sites. I ripped out the parts I thought were useful and spent two years working on my own little project. I thought I was doing a splendid job. And then I went back to check on Drupal. The work Id done in two years was an embarrassment compared to how Drupal had grown. With only a slight hesitation I threw out my work and started building Web sites with Drupal.

What made Drupal so much more successful than my own CMS? Drupal is an open source software package that is free to download, modify, and use. People who build modules and themes for Drupal are encouraged to contribute them back to the pool of add-ons. The software license used by Drupal (GPL) ensures that the code you download will always be free for you to alter in any way that suits your needs. But you dont have to be a programmer to take advantage of this (and theres no requirement to give back to the Drupal community). If this seems a bit weird to you, think of it as a potluck or a church dinnerwhen everyone brings a dish of food to share, a complete meal is made.

The more community contributions have been made into the community, the less programming is required to build a robust site in Drupal. Theres a module for that! is a common expression, and its all too true. Its rare that my Web sites need custom programming these days. Most of the time, its click-to-configure site building.

A few years ago I realized something really important: I dont love maintaining Web sites. What I love to do is empower people to manage their own online presence with the least amount of anxiety possible. This has shifted my work again. Where I was once a programmer and then a site builder, I am now primarily a trainer and technical author. The book you are reading right now is the book Ive been working on for nearly a decade. Its the planning workshops Ive given to small businesses that are getting ready to build (or rebuild) their Web sites. Its the how to maintain your site instructions that Ive created for clients. And its the case studies from my training program, Site Building Extravaganza.

I hope you find this book useful as you build your own site with Drupal.

In a nerdy Star Warsesque fashion, I think of this book as the prequel to my first book, Front End Drupal. It assumes you want to build a Web site without having to learn any code. It is structured to help you jump right in and start building your own Web sites. If you are new to Web site building, you may find it useful to start at the first chapter and work through to the end of the book. If you are a little more experienced with site building, you can use this book as a reference and jump around to suit your needs. Wherever possible, the topics are cross-referenced. Dont feel that you need to read every single word in this book. Skip the parts that you dont need (or youre not ready for). Learning Drupal shouldnt be stressful, and I promise not to quiz you on whether you read about such-and-such before proceeding to so-and-so. When you need to have specific skills, Ill let you know what the prerequisites are and where you can find them within the book or online.

The first four chapters of the book get you up and running with your first Drupal Web site. covers the installation of Drupal on OS X and Linux-based Web servers.