Introduction
This introduces this ebook, tells you how it is organised, how to approach it and what typographic conventions are used to distinguish different types of content.
Table of contents
- Welcome!
- About this ebook
- What you don't need to read
- How this ebook is organised
- Conventions
- Final word
Welcome!
Welcome to Drupal for site builders. This ebook is written especially to cover three use cases:
- It is for you if you want to build your own Drupal website, but haven't a clue about how to start or where to begin.
- Or maybe you already have a website, but it is built on some proprietary platform that you don't know how to use, and you want to move its contents to a new Drupl website.
- Or maybe you already have a Drupal website, person who initially built for is no longer around to help when things break.
Either way, I hope you'll find this ebook useful!
This ebook is about building a website from scratch using Drupal. It is written using everyday language. It doesn't assume you know how to create web pages. You don't need to know code, either. In fact, you can create your site without writing a single line of code. The goal is to show you how to build your own site with the features you want, without programming, without deciphering technical jargon, and without pulling a single hair from your head in frustration.
I am making only one assumption about who you are: You're someone who wants to build a website and has heard that Drupal is a good choice.
This ebook his platform neutral: Apple Macintosh users, Microsoft Windows users, and Gnu/Linux users can all use this ebook.
About this ebook
There are a couple of ways to use this ebook, depending on your preferences and experience.
If you're just starting out with content management or Drupal, you can start with reading this introduction and keep going until you reach the the end. Everything shouød fall into sequence as you build experience and knowledge. I explain the concepts and give you practical instructions. Each of the chapters in this ebook covers a specific aspect of building a website with Drupal – such as building a basic site with a blog and forum, extending your website with more functions by installing contributed extensions to Drupal.
But you don't have to read through all of it in sequence. When you need to know something, you can just read about the topic you need to know about. All the materials in this ebook is self-contained and extensively cross-referenced. You need to know how to put a YouTube video on your Drupal website? Read chaper 13 [Interacting with other sites]. You need to know how to create a contact form for your customers? Read about contact forms in chapter 12 [Creating a robust website].
Start with the topic you want to find out about. The table of contents is detailed enough that you should be able to find most of the topics you're looking for.
After you find your topic in the table of contents, turn to the area of interest and read as much as you need or want. Then leave the ebook and try it out yourself.
Read as much or as little as you want. If you want to take a brief excursion into your topic, you're more than welcome. If you want to know the ins and outs of building an online store, read the whole chapter on storefronts. But if you just want to know how to post a product on your site, read just the section about adding products.
What you don't need to read
Aside from the topics you can use right away, some of this ebook is skippable. I carefully placed extra-technical information in self-contained breakout boxes and clearly marked them so that you can steer clear of them. Don't read this stuff unless you're really into technical explanations and want to know a little of what's going on behind the scenes.
How this ebook is organised
In this ebook, you find chapters arranged in five main sections. Each chapter breaks down into sub-sections that cover various aspects of the chapter's main subject. The chapters are in a logical sequence, so reading them in order (if you want to read the whole thing) makes sense. But the ebook is modular enough that you can pick it up and start reading at any point.
Here is a summary of what there is in each of the main sections.
Section 1: Getting started with Drupal
The chapters in this part introduces Drupal: What it is all about, and how to get access to your very own Drupal website by means of managed hosting.
The best thing about this part is that it starts at the very beginning and doesn't assume you know how to download and upload and extract and install software. It also suggests simple solutions on how to get started. In other words, this part is aimed at ordinary people who know almost nothing about how to set up and manage websites.
Section 2: Your first Drupal website
The goal of the chapters in this section is to show you how to build your first website quickly and easily. And it takes you beyond simply building a site, into fun stuff such as changing the appearance and building a site with a blog, forum, and user comments.
Section 3: Extending Drupal
After you get a basic website up and running, the chapters in this part show you how to control and extend it. You find out all about safely allowing others to use your site and controlling what they can and can't do. You also spend time making your site even more your own by customizing colors, logos, and artwork. You will also learn how to pull content and data from other websites, how to build a storefront, and how to create an image gallery.
Section 4: Drupal recipes
Short step-by-step recipes to accomplish specific tasks, such as linking to and uploaded file, or resetting your Drupal password.
Section 5: Recommendations
This section highlights some extensions (aka modules, plugins, or add-ons) you may want to add to your Drupal site. It also tells you about some useful websites you can visit to learn even more about Drupal.
Conventions
In this ebook, you will find a number of styles of text that distinguish between different kind of information. Here are some examples of styles and an explanation of their meaning.
Names of Drupal extensions (module projects and themes) are presented in bold typeface (e.g.: Backup and Migrate, Bootstrap5).
Names of websites, products, languages, fonts, standards and similar, are presented in an italic typeface (e.g.: Drupal.org, MS Office).
Breadcrumbs showing how to navigate to reach a particular page are shown in a sans-serif greenish font with a right pointing double guillemet between the elements (e.g.: ). The starting point is always a menu item in the black administrator's menu that appear on top of the page when your logged in to your Drupal site as an Administrator or Content editor.
Clickable words (links) that you see on the screen, in menus and dialogue boxes are quoted (e.g.: Click “Next” to navigate to the next item).
Strings and symbols to look for when navigating the GUI are also shown inside quotes. Example:
Locate the icon for the “Image tool” on the “Current toolbar” and move it down to the “Available buttons” toolbar.
A mono-spaced typeface are used for filenames (e.g.: update.php), directory names, and variables.
A mono-spaced typeface is also used for functions. An
empty opening and closing parenthesis are appended to the function
name, but the list of arguments is not reproduced (e.g. the
function dpm() is useful for debugging).
Keystrokes are shown inside a frame: (e.g.: Ctrl+Shift+V, Spacebar).
Blocks showing detailed settings in some program are separated from the running text in a box, like this:
Blend Mode: Normal Opacity: 100% Color: R 255 G 60 B 60 (faded red)
Blocks showing interactions with the CLI, program code, SQL queries, scripts or markup are also separated from the running text in a box with a tan background, like this:
SELECT u.uid, u.name, u.mail, n.status, n.node, n.teasers, n.comment
FROM {users} u
LEFT JOIN {notify} n
ON u.uid = n.uid
WHERE u.uid = :uid AND u.status = :status;
In a box showing how to use the CLI, what is typed by the user is black, while prompts and response from the computer is grey:
Unix:
$ pwd /var/www
MS Windows:
PS C:\Users> cd .. PS C:\>
SQL shell:
mysql> use mysql;
mysql> update user set password=PASSWORD("NewPass") where User='root';
mysql> flush privileges;
mysql> quit
Example domain will be “example.com” and example IP-address will be “192.0.2.0” (re: RFC5737). Example username will be “Janet”.
There are also breakout-boxes marked with nifty little icons that denote special contents:
Additional technical details – read on only if you have a pocket protector.
Tips and tricks – perhaps a shortcut or a little-used command that is a great help.
Important notes and caveats. This information may help you avert disaster.
Make a special note to make sure you remember this.
Links to externally hosted materials that may expand on the topic discussed.
Since this is a work in progress, some sections may still be unwritten. This is indicated with a placeholder with the letters “TBA” (To Be Added) in square brackets. Example:
[TBA]
Final word
With this ebook in hand, you're ready to build your own robust and useful website with Drupal. Browse through the table of contents and decide where you want to start. Be courageous! Be adventurous! But above all, have fun!
Last update: 2021-01-17.