GotDrupal.com | Drupal Tutorial Site - development

How To: Finding & Testing Out New Modules

Matt Petrowsky — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 22:59:25 +0000

Drupal changes so fast that it's hard to keep your head above water. Only now, are many site maintainers deciding to upgrade to version 6. The biggest reason for the delay, despite the amount of time version 6 has been out, is the slow going with various modules being updated.

So the question is... "How do I keep current with modules?", and "What new modules replace the modules I've been using?".

Well, much of this lies on your shoulders - such as reading the news. Fortunately, there are some tricks you can employ to get the information you need quickly.

In this video, I talk about the sites, tools and methods I use to keep up-to-date and notified about new modules and what modules provide which features.

If you're interested in yet even more information about how I research modules then this video might help you out.

Here is the list of links I use for keeping up-to-date.

If you're simply in need of the code I reference in the video article, then it's right here to copy/paste.

Note: Change the my_drupal_root with the path to your drupal install location on your development machine. The following are functions you place into your .bashrc file.

d6mod()
{
MODULE="${1}"; cd my_drupal_root/sites/all/modules/; \
cvs -z6 -d:pserver:anonymous:anonymous@cvs.drupal.org:/cvs/drupal-contrib co -d ./$MODULE contributions/modules/$MODULE
}

d6theme()
{
THEME="${1}"; cd my_drupal_root/sites/all/themes/; \
cvs -z6 -d:pserver:anonymous:anonymous@cvs.drupal.org:/cvs/drupal-contrib co -d ./$THEME contributions/themes/$THEME
}

drevs()
{
cvs log "${1}" | egrep 'DRUPAL-.*:' | sort
}

How To: Unique Pages by Content Type

Matt Petrowsky — Tue, 09 Sep 2008 23:54:32 +0000

Drupal provides a lot of default template files when it comes to page, node and block output.

There are, however, a few instances when you may want to theme a page based on the content type - such as having a dedicated page for when videos are viewed (I'm doing just such a thing on this site).

What you need to do then is tell Drupal about the dedicated and specific template file you wish to use for that content type. The way to do this is with preprocess functions.

This video shows you the few lines of code you need. Of course, if you don't want to watch the video then all you need is this.

<?php
/**
 * Adding or modifying variables before page render.
 */
function phptemplate_preprocess_page(&$vars) {

  // Page change based on node->type
  // Add a new page-TYPE template to the list of templates used
  if (isset($vars['node'])) {
    // Add template naming suggestion. It should alway use hyphens.
    $vars['template_files'][] = 'page-'. str_replace('_', '-', $vars['node']->type);    
  }
}
?>

Video Series: Building Drupal Modules - Getting Started

Matt Petrowsky — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 00:36:37 +0000

This series of 8 videos will walk you through the process of starting to develop a real Drupal module. Most of what the videos cover are techniques for accomplishing the process. There isn't as much covered about actual functions in the API and how to code. It's more about learning how to learn these things on your own.

There are a number of great tips (especially if you're using a Mac) for getting that all important inspiration going!

Video Links:

Building Drupal Modules: 01 Choosing an Editor

Building Drupal Modules: 02 Doing Thorough Module Research

Building Drupal Modules: 03 Learning By Example

Building Drupal Modules: 04 Learning code searching

Building Drupal Modules: 05 Watching your logs

Building Drupal Modules: 06 Using the Devel module

Building Drupal Modules: 07 Using Xdebug

Building Drupal Modules: 08 Debugging with Komodo IDE

Matt Petrowsky — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 00:18:32 +0000

Komodo is the PHP debugger I use on the Mac. There are others which work well too, such as Eclipse. Once you have Xdebug installed then it's just a matter of making sure the right port is used for intercepting the debugging call.

Building Drupal Modules: 07 Using Xdebug

Matt Petrowsky — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 00:14:08 +0000

There's an easy way to start the learning process of using a debugger for PHP. You don't have to know how to compile Xdebug (at least if you're on a Mac). You can get a copy of Komodo with a precompiled version of Xdebug. Oh, and if you're on a Mac and you're not using MAMP then you're really making it hard on yourself!

Building Drupal Modules: 06 Using the Devel module

Matt Petrowsky — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 00:09:02 +0000

The Devel module is a SUPER CRITICAL module which you need to use if you're even considering developing within Drupal. One of the most powerful parts of using devel comes in the form of it's ability to print out information about arrays and objects.

Building Drupal Modules: 05 Watching your logs

Matt Petrowsky — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 00:01:53 +0000

One of the key elements to knowing what is going on while you develop your module is watching what happens. Using a debugger isn't the only way to see exactly what is going on. You also need to know how to watch the logs of the web server, php and the database. Just remember tail -f is your friend.

Building Drupal Modules: 04 Learning code searching

Matt Petrowsky — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 23:53:59 +0000

Knowing how to search within the code of a project is what helps you learn any system faster. When you know where you want something to show up (in the browser) then finding where that code exists is the best way to start tackling your solution.

Building Drupal Modules: 03 Learning By Example

Matt Petrowsky — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 23:45:36 +0000

The best way, I find, for learning is to look at what exists and then pick and pull from those examples to accomplish what you want. Overtime, you end with the skills you need to create stuff from scratch.

Building Drupal Modules: 02 Doing Thorough Module Research

Matt Petrowsky — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 23:38:38 +0000

An 18 minute video about REALLY researching existing code for modules. I reference a number of methods to do your research. The tool that I use is SearchDrupal.org (disclaimer: I made the site). I also HIGHLY suggest that you master regular expressions! YES, I do know that drupal.org does allow you to search (the videos shows a time period when Drupal.org's own search was down). The native drupal.org search sometimes goes down due to load.

Building Drupal Modules: 01 Choosing an Editor

Matt Petrowsky — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 23:25:05 +0000

A quick discussion about choosing your coding editor. I discuss a few items about TextMate and BBEdit. On the windows side, I mention UltraEdit.

Building Drupal Modules: 00 Overview

Matt Petrowsky — Wed, 23 Jul 2008 23:26:45 +0000

This video is a quick overview of what will be covered by the other videos about building a Drupal module.