Foundation Drupal 7

337 Pages·2010·14.52 MB·English

by  R.J. Townsend

FOUNDATION
D
R
U
P
A
L

7
Use the Drupal framework to quickly build feature-rich websites
Add functionality to your site with modules ranging from dynamic JavaScript
menus and webforms to Search Engine Optimization, and much more
Configure a web host for Drupal in simple steps using the
popular cPanel software

Foundation Drupal 7

Robert J. Townsend
with Stephanie Pakrul
Foundation Drupal 7
Copyright © 2010 by Robert J. Townsend with Stephanie Pakrul
All rights reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means,
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system, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner and the publisher.
ISBN-13 (pbk): 978-1-4302-2808-0
ISBN-13 (electronic): 978-1-4302-2809-7
Printed and bound in the United States of America 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
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section.
Credits
President and Publisher: Coordinating Editors:
Paul Manning Mary Tobin and Jennifer L. Blackwell
Lead Editor: Copy Editor:
Steve Anglin Kim Wimpsett
Development Editor: Compositor:
Douglas Pundick Bronkella Publishing, LLC
Technical Reviewers: Indexer:
Christian Pearce & Seth Cohn BIM Indexing & Proofreading Services
Editorial Board: Artist:
Steve Anglin, Mark Beckner, Ewan Buckingham, Gary April Milne
Cornell, Jonathan Gennick, Jonathan Hassell, Michelle
Cover Image Artist:
Lowman, Matthew Moodie, Duncan Parkes, Jeffrey
Corné van Dooren
Pepper, Frank Pohlmann, Douglas Pundick, Ben Renow-
Clarke, Dominic Shakeshaft, Matt Wade, Tom Welsh Cover Designer:
Anna Ishchenko

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CONTENTS

For my family, my wife, and my son, who learned how to walk and say “cracker” while I was writing
this book.

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CONTENTS

Contents at a Glance
Contents....................................................................................................................vi
About the Author...................................................................................................xvi
About the Technical Reviewer............................................................................xvii
Acknowledgments................................................................................................xviii
Introduction............................................................................................................xix
Chapter 1: An Overview of Drupal..........................................................................1
Chapter 2: Setting Up a Web Host and Installing Drupal...................................19
Chapter 3: Configuring a Basic Drupal Web Site.................................................39
Chapter 4: Adding Content Types and Fields......................................................67
Chapter 5: People, Roles, and Permissions.........................................................91
Chapter 6: Enabling and Configuring Core Modules...........................................105
Chapter 7: Essential Contributed Modules.........................................................139
Chapter 8: Theming a Drupal Website.................................................................173
Chapter 9: Designing for a Browser....................................................................201
Chapter 10: Going Live.........................................................................................215
Chapter 11: Maintaining and Updating a Drupal Site .........................................229
Chapter 12: Translating Business Requirements to Drupal Functionality.......243
Appendix A: Drupal and Search Engine Optimization.......................................255
Appendix B: Drush, the Command-Line Shell for Drupal..................................263
Appendix C: 50+ Contributed Modules to Spice Up Any Site.........................269
Appendix D: Views Recipes................................................................................283
Index.......................................................................................................................293

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CONTENTS

Contents
Contents at a Glance.................................................................................................v
About the Author...................................................................................................xvi
About the Technical Reviewer............................................................................xvii
Acknowledgments................................................................................................xviii
Introduction............................................................................................................xix
Chapter 1: An Overview of Drupal..........................................................................1
How Drupal works.........................................................................................................1
Database powered......................................................................................................2
Organizing and displaying content..................................................................................2
People, roles, and permissions......................................................................................4
Adding functionality through modules..............................................................................4
Themes....................................................................................................................7
Navigating the administrative interface...........................................................................7
Creating a web page..................................................................................................11
How to create a basic page.........................................................................................11
How to create a block................................................................................................15
Chapter 2: Setting Up a Web Host and Installing Drupal...................................19
How to select a web host...........................................................................................19
System requirements................................................................................................19
Web host requirements..............................................................................................21
Setting up a web host with cPanel and WHM................................................................21
Create a cPanel account with WHM...............................................................................22
Adding a database and MySQL user with cPanel..............................................................24
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Drupal(cid:1)s file and folder layout......................................................................................25
Core files................................................................................................................25
The sites directory....................................................................................................26
Single-site and multisite installs...................................................................................28
Downloading and installing Drupal.................................................................................29
Download Drupal to your host......................................................................................29
Creating a site-specific directory..................................................................................30
Installing Drupal.......................................................................................................31
Summary...................................................................................................................37
Chapter 3: Configuring a Basic Drupal Web Site.................................................39
An iterative approach.................................................................................................39
Basic configuration settings.........................................................................................41
Site information........................................................................................................41
Cron......................................................................................................................43
Regional settings .....................................................................................................44
Date and time..........................................................................................................45
Clean URLs.............................................................................................................47
Configuring the file system and private downloads............................................................47
Blocks.......................................................................................................................48
How blocks work......................................................................................................48
Moving and arranging blocks.......................................................................................50
Configuring a block...................................................................................................50
Menus and menu links.................................................................................................54
Overview of Drupal(cid:1)s menu system...............................................................................54
Default menus.........................................................................................................55
Global menu settings.................................................................................................56
Adding a menu.........................................................................................................57
Listing links ............................................................................................................58
Creating a menu link..................................................................................................58
Setting up your front page..........................................................................................60
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Appearance ..............................................................................................................62
Selecting a theme.....................................................................................................62
Global and individual theme settings .............................................................................64
Summary...................................................................................................................65
Chapter 4: Adding Content Types and Fields......................................................67
What is a content type?.............................................................................................67
Knowing when to add a content type..............................................................................68
Adding a content type...............................................................................................68
Fields and form settings available to a content type ..........................................................70
Content publishing options..........................................................................................70
Displaying the author and publication date......................................................................71
Displaying comments................................................................................................72
Menu settings..........................................................................................................73
Adding fields to a content type..................................................................................73
Adding field types.....................................................................................................75
Managing the display of fields in multiple locations............................................................82
Adding comment fields and controlling how they display.....................................................86
Designing the taxonomy of your site ...........................................................................86
Summary...................................................................................................................89
Chapter 5: People, Roles, and Permissions.........................................................91
An overview..............................................................................................................91
How to add people....................................................................................................94
Customizing account settings.....................................................................................95
Anonymous users and administrator role........................................................................95
Registration and cancellation......................................................................................95
Personalization........................................................................................................98
E-mails..................................................................................................................99
Roles and permissions..............................................................................................100
IP address blocking..................................................................................................102
Summary.................................................................................................................103
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