Drupal CMS will come pre-installed with a set of modules and themes, using recipes, effectively replacing the "Standard" install profile. These recipes will provide the functionality that is considered must-have in modern CMSes, as well as what is deemed essential for our target persona and improve the overall user experience.
We have been calling this the base recipe, which adds functionality on its own (e.g. installing the necessary core and contrib modules) and also selects other recipes to be applied by default. A while back we ran a survey to ask the community what features they felt were essential for the out-of-the-box offering and this has informed the inclusions.
Along with the survey, we have done market research and benchmarking to see what our competitors include. But putting together a single proposal for the base recipe has proven challenging, because some features that we want are not yet available, or have some potential to conflict with Experience Builder or other upcoming initiatives. In some cases, contrib modules exist to provide a particular feature, but if it is not a high priority for our target user, we have left it out in order to focus our attention on what is.
So this plan is for the initial release of Drupal CMS, scheduled for 15 January 2025. New features will of course be added to future releases, and we plan to launch new work tracks with this in mind soon.
Current state of the base recipe
If you are not up for parsing the recipe.yml file linked above, here is a summary of what it currently does:
What
Why
Installs a bunch of core modules and applies some core recipes
We are no longer using install profiles, so we have to add the foundational stuff somehow
Adds a redirect on access denied to the login form, and then to the original destination (via ECA)
So users can easily reach their intended destination even if their session has expired
Adds support for logging in with email in addition to username (via Login Email or Username)
So users don't have to remember a separate username. There is also an issue for supporting this in core, and when that lands we will no longer require a contrib module.
#111317: Allow users to login using either their username OR their e-mail address
Adds Gin as the admin theme
Because Gin provides a more modern UI, and as a contrib theme, is able to innovate faster than Drupal core admin themes
Adds Navigation (with a left-side menu) instead of the traditional admin toolbar
So the admin UI feels more modern and aligned with other similar systems. Navigation is an experimental module in core and has a roadmap outlining the path to stable.
#3421969: [PLAN] New Navigation and Top Bar to replace Toolbar Roadmap: Path to Stable
Adds a quick search for the admin menu (via Coffee)
So users can easily search for the admin page they are looking for.
Adds Trash module
So users can recover deleted content
Adds Linkit support to CKEditor
So users can easily link to site content via search. Note there is an issue for adding a basic version of this in core, and we would prefer to use that. If it lands before 11.1, we will replace Linkit in the initial release.
#3317769: Drastically improve the linking experience in CKEditor 5
Adds a site dashboard (via Dashboard)
So users see a dashboard with relevant content when they first install, and when they log in (replacing /user as the default login page)
Adds focal point cropping to the image media type (via Focal point)
So users can select a focal point for their images to help them display nicely across aspect ratios
Adds Project Browser, Automatic updates, and Upgrade status
So users can add modules and keep their sites up to date from the UI, with no developer tools required
Adds some media management helper tools (Media entity download and Media file delete)
So the default media management experience is more intuitive. This will be extended and updated as part of the Media management track work.
Adds a Basic page content type
So every site has at least one content type available by default. See the full content strategy for more information.
Adds content cloning (via Quick node clone)
So users can duplicate content to easily create similar pages. This feature is a must-have, but the implementation is still up for discussion in #3474608: Evaluate cloning modules and #3477303: Create recipe to clone entities with ECA
Adds foundational SEO functionality: Pathauto, Redirect
Most sites require this functionality and the initial setup can be done generically
Coming soon
Some things that it does not yet include, but most likely will be in the initial release:
What
Why
Better default site search
Drupal core search is very limited and not what site owners would expect from a modern platform. Drupal CMS will provide a more robust search experience using Search API. This is being done in the Advanced search work track, with the recipe in progress in #3468271: Add recipe for search backend
Autosave on forms (via Autosave Form)
So users don't lose their work. This feature is a must-have, but we wanted to ensure the approach did not conflict with Experience Builder's approach to the same problem.
HTML email sending
So users can send nicely formatted emails without additional configuration. See #3480680: Handle sending email in Drupal CMS
Coming... sometime?
Some things we would like to include, but have some blockers:
What
Why
Better select lists
The default select list experience is suboptimal, however, there is not currently a viable non-jQuery solution for this. We would like to use the Accessible Autocomplete Element/Widget based on the Accessible Autocomplete library but there are technical limitations around managing front-end dependencies.
Sitewide alerts
This is a common feature request, but we don't want to implement something that will conflict with Experience Builder when it comes out, leaving sites with a problem to solve. We also feel it is a nice-to-have for our target person rather than a must-have.
What about [insert feature here]?
This summary covers the base functionality only. So if there is something extremely obvious that seems like it's missing, it is probably covered in one of the other work tracks! Many of them have not yet completed their work, so there are still lots of exciting things to come. Each of the metas links to their current proposal, if they have one. The final track proposal for the initial release are due by 1 November.
If you've scoured the track proposals and the Drupal CMS issue queue and still feel that we're missing a killer feature that is easily included, and high priority for the marketer types that we are focused on, let us know via Slack, in #starshot, or create an issue in the Drupal CMS project.