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Posts Tagged ‘Drupal’

Drupal Installation Guide.

Drupal is a well known Web Content Management System. Drupal version 4.x, 5.x, and 6.x and 7.x are available. In all these versions 6.x is highly used. Here I am wring the installation procedure of Drupal 6.x version. This document is explained in such a way that evens a non-technical mortal can do this.

Drupal is a WCMS that is developed in php. So you should have web server, mysql and php installed in the system. As a  web server you can use Apache in case of Linux Operating System and IIS in case of Windows Operating system. For Drupal 6.x, I strongly advocate php version 5.2.x and mysql version 5.0.x

If you are doing this installation locally in your system, superior install a WAMP (Windows Apache Mysql PHP) in Windows Operating System and LAMP (Linux Apache Mysql PHP) in Linux Operating System.

Here I am going to explain how to install Drupal in your local system.

Once your system is up and running configured in WAMP or LAMP you can follow the steps below. Here I suppose that you have installed a WAMP server in a Windows Xp system.

Step 1:

                Download the latest version of Drupal 6.x from Drupal  website.(drupal.org)

Step 2:

                Extract the file and rename the folder to a known study (say drupal6). Inside the drupal6 folder you can see includes, misc, modules, profiles, scripts, sites, themes, index.php, cron.php and some other files too. Here include folder contains the functions, modules contain the built in modules, themes contain the built in themes etc.

Step 3:

                Copy the entire drupal6 folder in to C:\wamp\www folder (I suppose that you have installed your WAMP server in C: drive)

Step 4:

                Go to C:\wamp\www\drupal6\sites\default folder. There you can see default.settings.php file. Create a copy of the file and rename the copy to settings.php

Step 5:

                Next is database creation. In any browser state (IE) take http://localhost/phpmyadmin/. There you can see Create new database. Give a Proper Name State (Drupal6db) and click create. Now you will get a message “Database drupal6db has been created.”

Step 6:

                Now go to http://localhost/drupal6. The moment you press enter key, it will direct you to http://localhost/drupal6/install.php?profile=default

Step 7:

                Now click on Install Drupal in English

Step 8:

                Now you will get “Database configuration” screen

                Database name: drupal6db

                Database individual name: root

                Password By default there will not be any password for mysql in WAMP. So let it be blank)

Step 8:

                Now you can see the Drupal installer working. Next is “Configure site”. Here you are required to give “Site name, Site e-mail address, Username (say admin), E-mail address, Password, Confirm password, Default time zone, Clean URLs”.

Clean URL: This is a technique by which we can remove the “?q=” from our website URL. You need to enable mod_rewrite in your apache sever in order to support this feature.

Finally click on Sava and Continue.

Remember that this is the first statement in your website. Whatever study you give, this will have Administrator privilege by default and the individual ID will be 1.

Step 9:

                Fine. Now you can see message “Drupal installation complete”. If your SMTP is configured, you will get mail in your mail box regarding this. If it is not configured, you will get the following error message

“* warning: mail() [function.mail]: Failed to connect to mailserver at “localhost” port 25, verify your “SMTP” and “smtp_port” setting in php.ini or use ini_set() in C:\wamp\www\drupal6\includes\mail.inc on line 193.

    * Unable to send e-mail. Please contact the site administrator if the problem persists.”

Fine. Now you can click on “your new site” to see your website ready.

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View Module

View is a wonderful module I have ever seen in Drupal. View 1.x is using with Drupal version 5.x and View 2.x is using with Drupal version 6.x. Here I would like to discuss the implementation of View 2.x in Drupal version 6.x.

View is a contributed module. That means you have to download and use it. It is acquirable in the website http://drupal.org/project/views

Where to use

View is a good query builder. It will create complex queries and will execute. A developer need not worry about the complexity of the query. He can just choose the required things from front end and view module will create the query for the result.

View module can be used to show your data in various formats. Various formats might include html list, table, Unformatted etc. Also we can download some other modules and can use along with view module to enhance the formats.

If I continue this explanation, it will be boring and difficult to understand. So let me take an example and discuss with the same.

Requirement

I have a custom content type called “news” and I have added contents in it. The content type contains default fields such as title, Body (I call it as description here). In home page of my web site I want to display the latest 3 news in a small block (title with link to node). This is my requirement.

In normal case we need to write a query in the order of node created date with limit and we can show it. Let me explain this how we can do it using view.

Here I suppose that, you have created the content type “news” and added data.

Following are the steps that have to be followed.

Step 1:

                Download the view module from the link http://drupal.org/project/views

Step2:

                Extract the module and place it is your “sites/all/modules/” folder. Now your module is “sites/all/modules/view”

Step3:

                Go to Administer-> sitebuilding -> Modules, and install Views,Views exporte and Views UI.

Step 4:

                Again Go to Administer-> sitebuilding ->views.

Step 5:

                Click on Add

Step 6:

                Type View name, View description, View tag. Here only View study is Mandatory.

Step 7:

                Next is View type. For the stipulation I have explained above take node as View type and click Next.

Step 8:

                Now you will reach admin/build/views/edit/news page. Here you can see “Add Display”. Just above you can see a Drop down too. It contains attachment, Block, Feed and Page. That means our view can be any of these types. In my stipulation I want to show the latest news as a block in home page. So choose Block from the drop down and click on “Add Display”

Step 9:

                Next you need to choose Fields. Now you can see “None defined” by default. Click on “+” to add a new field. This is the field you are going to display in the Block.

Step 10:

                On clicking “+” you can see “Block: Add fields”. Choose node from the drop down Under “Groups”. Now scroll down to find “Node: Title” and tick it, then Click on Add.

Step 11:

                Here you can see “Block: Configure field Node: Title”. Label option, you can use if you want, for time being I am deleting it. Bottom you can see “Link this field to its node”. Tick it; this will help you to link the title to node. Now click on update default display.

Step 12:

                Next is you need to filter the display. For this you can see Filter where “None defined by default”. Click on”+” to add a new filter. You can see “Block: Add filters” and a drop down. As per my requirement, I need to get the latest news, means I want to filter with content type. So Choose “Node” from the drop down and search “Node: Type” and tick it. Now you can see “Block: Configure filter Node: Type” where all the content types in your web site are listed. From there choose “news”, operator as “Is one of” and click on “Update default display”.

Step 13:

                Now I want to display Published news only. So click on “+” in Filter again, choose “Node” from drop down, tick “Node: Published” and click “Add”. In the configuration, choose “Published” yes and click on “Update default display”. Now I want to display only 3 items, Click on “Items to display” make it 3 instead of 10 and Update.

Step 14:

                Now I want to get the latest news first. So I need so sort. So Click on “+” in “Sort criteria”, choose “Node” from drop down tick “Node: Post date” and Click “Add”. In “Block: Configure sort criterion Node: Post date”,Select “Sort Order” Descending and “Granularity” second. Now you can click on “Update default display”.

Step 15:

Now “Style” option, click on “styles”, you can change the style to “Grid, HTML List, Table and Unformatted”. Here I am taking” HTML List” and click on “Update default display”. Her List type can be “Unordered or ordered “and you can have Grouping, if you have more than one filed. Now click on “Update default display”. Title of the Block can be changed in the same way.

Step 16:

Now everything is done, save the view. Bottom you can see “Live preview” choose “Block” from drop down and click “Preview” you can see how view generates the query.

Step 17:

  Now we want to show it in home page. So go to Administer-> site building ->Blocks choose your theme, you can see “news: Block” generated, Enable it in your region and click on “Save block”.

Now come to home page and we can see the latest news entries coming with their title.

For your info: View module in a very huge one. I know this much of explanation is not satisfactory. Still if I tried to explain the whole in single Article, It will be difficult to understand. That is why I have taken an Example and explained.

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Drupal CMS boasts of over 5800 contributed modules and variety of themes. Drupal cms been widely adopted by over 7.2 million sites including social networking sites, news, blogs, forums, media, entertainment, charities, politicians, corporate and many more. Drupal won the hall of fame honor in 2009, several packt open source CMS Awards and won the Webware 100 awards thrice. Drupal has a massive community following with over 830,000 users and 2000 developers.

Drupal has done everything right but lagged behind in a few key areas. The upcoming release of version 7 promises to correct these shortcomings and add even more power to this astonishing system. The final release of Drupal 7 is expected in the primeval 2011.

Usability

The usability features enhanced with more menus and panels. Previously fog settings are now easier to find and interfaces are superior organized. These UX improvements will certainly helps more users to conveniently use the CMS.

User Interface: Drupal 7 is inducted with a new user-friendly interface that makes it easier for users to navigate and work on their drupal site.

Shortcut Bar:Shortcut Bar grants the individual to add their own shortcut to handle and manage their site. It also grants saving variations of the shortcut bar, so as to utilize different shortcuts bars based on individual activity.

Editing Page:  Drupal 7 is now equipped with administrative links to edit existing page elements on apiece web page, without visiting an administration page first to edit. This feature provides a nice easy interface and seamless ability with editing the content on pages.

WYSIWYG editors: Drupal 7 wage improved support for integration of WYSIWYG editors.

Metadata: Drupal 7 accords permissions with more meta data capabilities.

Drupal Themes

Drupal 7 has included three new themes, Bartik, Seven and Stark. Users can now install contributed themes directly from the Appearance admin screen.

A. Database layer: The new release also features a new database layer providing wider support for other DB platforms and it improves scalability and integrity. For developers, they have added a query builders for INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE, MERGE, and SELECT queries. Advanced queries are automatically compiled to work with the appropriate database server, which also increases the portability of drupal.

B. SQLite database support: SQLite grants hosting of smaller drupal installations without providing them database access.

C. jQuery UI: jQuery UI 1.8 added as it grants improvements to drupal’s UI.

D. Node access control system: Node access control system has been improved and is now much superior than that of  Drupal 5 and Drupal6

E. Popular modules integrated now with the core: There are plenty of useful modules which nearly each site has to download, install, enable and configure. Drupal 7 will now include some of those favourite modules directly in to its core framework as they are widely used. Drupal 7 will integrate them into its core framework.

Author:

Drupal 7 has evidenced with its many new features and functionality that it is one of the ideal and flexible CMS that has taken its usability to a whole new level in drupal development. Our drupal developer is keenly awaited for making a greater and more powerful CMS to power your sites.

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The Drupal Technology is used to build websites. It is one of the most modular open source web content management framework that adds a lot of emphasis on collaboration. The designing of the this technology application is such, that it needs to be customized according to the stipulation of the project. But a limitation of its customization is that, these changes are done by overriding or adding new modules to the application. Drupal technology is exclusive and unique, because it separates content management from content presentation.

Drupal Technology website applications are used to build any kind of World wide web portal, websites based on e commerce, online stores and even corporate websites. The software is extremely dynamic an can be utilized to create any kind of website, as a matter of fact it has also been used to create online directories and e-learning sites.

The Drupal Technology is secured by thriving security team that responds to each threat in order to keep the software safe. It is backed by a 24X7 online community, site administrator, designers and software developers who work continually to superior the technology.

Drupal technology of web content management is not only used to create online trading sites, but it can also successfully create, instant messenger, it can also be used to include audio and video facilities in the sites along with pic galleries. This content management system is absolutely innocuous and secured.

The fact that Drupal can easily enable the customization of its websites according to the individualized stipulation of the site projects makes it even more one-of-a-kind and a favourite of the developers.

The Drupal CMS Technology is also a search engine friendly method, which has resulted in simple and effective ranking of the websites constructed by this technology to rank well in the search engines.

The ideal way to utilize the Drupal technology is to get your website created in the CMS technology through a reputed web solutions company that has expertise in the field. Web designers who are trained in drupal technology will be healthy to help you alter the Drupal templates according to your stipulation and ready your website according to your own desire.