1. Journey to the Center of Drupal: How I learned to build Drupal sites the right way in 1001 easy steps Julia Kulla-Mader Triangle NC Drupal @TriDUG

2. Julia Kulla-Mader Drupal.org member for 2 years and 31 weeks 3. Agenda1. What is Drupal? 2. Why use Drupal? 3. What Not to Do 4. Building Drupal Sites the Right Way 4. What is Drupal? Open Source Content Management System Written in PHP Drupal is an English rendering of the Dutch word druppel, which means drop (as in a water droplet) 5. Part I: Why Use Drupal 6. Trustworthy Security Customizable Permissions 7. Small, Modular and Useful Lightweight core code 4,000+ Modules 8. Lots of Smart, Helpful People 1,400+ at last Drupalcon Active support forms Used by major businesses & nonprots Acquia 9. Part II: What Not to Do 10. Hello Frankenstein Theres a module for that! CRM + E-Commerce = Pain 11. Hacking Core & Other Misadventures 12. Highly, Highly Customized Design = Pain 13. Part III: Building Drupal Sites the Right Way 14. 1. State Your Goals From the Start 15. 2. Work with a Stakeholder Group to Develop a Work Plan 16. 3. Develop a Communications Plan 17. 4. Introduce Non-Technical Staff to Drupal Early 18. 4. Assess In-House Technical Skill Early 19. 5. Get Drupal Technical Training Early Watch Lullabot or Lynda.com videos and/or go to a workshop Purchase Using Drupal and/or Pro Drupal Development Listen to Drupal podcasts 20. 6. Build a Drupal Support Network Join the Triangle NC Meetup group Ask questions at groups.drupal.org Tweet Drupal questions Ask questions in #drupal-support in IRC Have someone to call when problems arise 21. 7. Hire Experts for Complex Tasks 22. 8. Think Carefully Before 3rd Party/Drupal Integration 23. 9. Prioritize Content Migration Add content to your Drupal site during the development process Use content export and import modules to move content from development to live sites (Node Export, Deployment) If you are migrating from an existing CMS, heavily test your content migration modules during the rst phase of the project 24. 10. Evaluate Modules Before Starting Development Review modules at drupalmodules.com Check to see how many times a module has been downloaded on Drupal.org Read through the modules issue queue on Drupal.org before installing it Dont put untested modules on a production site 25. Part IV: What Comes Next? 26. What Comes Next?: You1. Download Acquia Drupal distribution 2. Buy Using Drupal 3. Join Triangle Drupal 4. Fill out Julias survey if you have built a Drupal site before http://bit.ly/drupalsuccess 27. Thank you for listening