Drupal Google maps can be easily integrated into your website and help visitors find your physical address. This is an essential advantage in a competitive business environment because potential buyers will have to do one less action. This means the chance of a successful sale and visit to the store increases. We will tell you how to put google maps on the site and how custom drupal website development could help your business.

5 best modules to implement Drupal Google Maps

The first thing to do is to study the assortment of valuable and simple Google maps Drupal modules presented. Each of these will help make the final result on the site more attractive and functional. We recommend learning in detail about the available options, and at the end, we can collect together a small database that will help your users.

I am pleased to announce that the Drupal Association has hired Fran Garcia-Linares, as of 1 April 2023! We are thrilled to bring Fran’s talent to the team.

Fran had been doing contract work with the Drupal Association since October 2021 as part of the GitLab acceleration initiative. He currently lives in El Puerto de Santa Maria, Cádiz, Spain.

Fran’s hiring is part of the Drupal Association’s effort to become more global in our hiring. We now have a relationship with a professional employer organization that allows us to hire in over 130 countries, making the possibilities of hiring international talent endless!

Fran has worked on a myriad of important projects including:

• The GitLab issue migration. This project will allow the community to handle the issue queues in GitLab instead of the current system. The team is working on migrating all current and past issues to this new system.
• The redesign of the Contribution Records system. Built in Drupal 10, the redesign will replace the existing Drupal 7 system. This new system accepts contributions from drupal.org and GitLab, once GitLab issues are enabled.
• The jsonapi endpoint for Project Browser, which will allow Project Browser to list all existing Drupal projects and allow querying by multiple filters. This is also built with Drupal 10.
• The relaunch of api.drupal.org with Drupal 10. This relaunch is a full rewrite of the existing Drupal 7 site.
• The final stages of Project Messaging, a core module that will allow sending notifications to all Drupal sites directly.

Fran’s background includes studying Computer Engineering and working as a teacher during the first few years of his career. He then switched to web programming, working with several PHP frameworks, before beginning to work with Drupal 6/7 around 2012. Fran was excited about how much he could achieve with Drupal and never looked back!

Over the years, Fran has enjoyed maintaining Drupal sites and backend programming. In his free time, Fran enjoys being active and outdoorsy, usually by going for bicycle rides and family hikes. A fun fact about Fran is that he knows how to juggle with basketballs, although it’s been a while since he’s tried the feat!

Ever since I joined the Drupal Association, I’ve been heavily involved in community projects, and I enjoy that part the most, knowing that the work I do has an impact on the whole community.” - Fran Garcia-Linares

I look forward to having him on staff and witnessing all he will accomplish! I also look forward to more global hires in the Drupal Association’s future.

Tim Doyle
Chief Executive Officer, Drupal Association

We answer the questions that we are frequently asked about staying on Drupal 7 as its end-of-life date approaches. 

Prior to attending my first DrupalCon, I had always wanted to learn more about Drupal, the Drupal community, and the Drupal Association. I was able to connect with Von Eaton, the Drupal Association’s Director, Programs, who was beyond amazing in diving deeper with me about the Drupal community. Through our interview engagement, I discovered more about DrupalCon and was offered the chance to attend!

DrupalCon is a four day-long conference where the Drupal community gets together, shares ideas, and collaborates on new ventures. It offers the opportunity to network within the community and also take time to break bread together. This is something I had a great interest in attending, and it was made possible through the DrupalCon Scholarship Program.

This initiative is a very comprehensive experience as a new attendee to DrupalCon. Prior to the conference, you get to connect with other new members like yourself and also have a dedicated mentor assigned to you to help navigate the events. The Welcome Breakfast for scholars on the first day is a great way to bond to Discover Drupal graduates and other scholars. Another useful tool that was resourceful to me was the guide for first-timers or scholars – this helped me to select which sessions to attend.

The Drupal Association is able to provide funding for these scholarships because of our amazing, dedicated, and mission-driven partners, donors, and members. If you would like to help support this year’s scholars, you can directly donate to the scholarship fund! Donors are invited to attend the Welcome Breakfast, where they will be honored for their contribution and have the chance to meet and network with our scholars.

Attending DrupalCon is something I look forward to every year, and it was all made possible thanks to the DrupalCon Scholarship Program!

Kwasi Afreh, DrupalCon North America Scholarship recipient 

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Help make a difference by donating now to the DrupalCon scholarship program. Each scholarship recipient receives a 1-year membership to the Drupal Association, complimentary registration, lodging, and travel, and will be paired with a mentor to create a welcoming conference experience.

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Don’t miss this year’s DrupalCon Pittsburgh in-person conference for the opportunity to meet, collaborate, and network with the Drupal Community. We look forward to seeing you in Pittsburgh!

A stable version of Recipes is yet to be released in 2023, this initiative is a prominent part of Drupal 10.

Drupal 10 provides a powerful platform for building websites and applications. It offers various ways of site-building, including profiles, distributions, and now recipes. 

As part of the Drupal strategic initiative, site-builders & developers can greatly benefit from the improvements to be provided by the recipes initiative.

Drupal 10 recipes are expected to provide more flexibility and ease of use to site builders and developers, allowing them to create custom solutions that meet their specific needs. Although a stable version of recipes is yet to be released in 2023, this initiative is a prominent part of Drupal 10 features. 

This blog will help you understand how recipes are different from profiles and distributions and how they are a way forward in Drupal site-building. 

Understanding Profiles & Distributions

Profiles and distributions are often confused, but they are not the same thing. Drupal vanilla, or the basic Drupal installation, is relatively bare and lacks many of the essential features required to create a full-fledged website.

Profiles and distributions are pre-configured packages that contain a set of modules, themes, and configurations that can be used to create a specific type of website.

Profiles and distributions are pre-configured packages that contain a set of modules, themes, and configurations that can be used to create a specific type of website.

Distributions are built on top of Drupal and provide a use-case-specific package. They include a pre-selected set of modules, themes, and configurations that are designed to fulfill a particular use case.

For instance, a media and publishing distribution will include modules like feed, carousel banner, facet search, or similar features specific to media websites. 

Distributions are a great way to get started quickly and provide a solid foundation to build on top of.

Profiles, on the other hand, are subsets of distributions and are included in Drupal core. Drupal core comes with three installation profiles: Standard, Minimal, and Demo (Umami). 

Installation profiles determine the set of modules, themes, and configurations that are included in a distribution. 

For an e-commerce site, one could use the standard installation profile as a base and add additional modules and themes to customize the site.

Drupal vanilla is bare and lacks any pre-configured settings or features. Profile and Distribution are similar concepts in Drupal, but serve different purposes.

Enter recipes!

What are Drupal Recipes?

Recipes are a modular approach to site-building in Drupal. They are small use cases that can be easily combined or customized to create a unique solution. Recipes are like microservices that can be plugged in and played as needed.

Recipes are modular building blocks that allow developers to create custom site features quickly and efficiently.

A distribution is a use case that customizes Drupal to fulfill a specific need. Unlike distributions, recipes do not use installation profiles and can be tweaked at any point in the site-building process.

Installation profiles are part of Drupal core. These profiles determine which set of modules, themes, and configurations are installed during the initial setup of your Drupal site. 

The actual backend of any distribution is happening here, as installation profiles are responsible for setting up the initial site structure.

A Profile is a type of distribution that provides a more focused set of features for a specific use case. Profiles can be thought of as smaller, more specific distributions that cater to particular needs.

Unlike distributions, recipes do not use installation profiles and can be tweaked at any point in the site-building process.

To illustrate the differences between these site-building methods, let's consider an example. Suppose you want to build a news website that includes features such as a feed, carousel banner, and facet search. You could use a pre-built news distribution that includes these features out of the box. 

However, if you need to make further customizations, you would need to modify the installation profile or distribution, which could be time-consuming and complicated.

Alternatively, you could use an installation profile such as Standard and then install the necessary modules manually. This approach provides more flexibility, but it requires more effort and expertise to set up. 

Finally, you could use a recipe approach and install each required module and configure them individually. This approach provides the most flexibility but requires the most effort to set up.

Steps to install Drupal recipe

Why Recipes?

One of the primary objectives of Recipes initiatives is to overcome the challenges, site maintainers and developers face with distributions and to:

• Allow users to install multiple Drupal recipes on the same project, unlike the current scenario where selecting a distribution like OpenSocial prohibits the installation of another distribution like Commerce Kickstart or Thunder. This limitation will be eliminated, and multiple Drupal recipes can be installed on the same site.
   
• Install a recipe at any point in a project's life cycle, which is currently not feasible. For instance, if a user wants to incorporate community collaboration tools in their site after a few years of using standard Drupal, they can do so without any impediment.
   
• Simplify the process of maintaining the multisite architecture. This initiative aims to ensure that any changes made do not create additional challenges in this regard.
   
• Make updating easier, which is currently a challenging task as every existing site is in a different state, the Update Helper module developed by a few distributions will be integrated into the core.
   
• Make it easy for Drupal recipes to provide demo content, which is currently done in different ways such as importing from CSV or using custom modules, a functionality will be provided in the core to enable Drupal recipes to ship demo content.

What Drupal recipes are not

Drupal recipes have certain limitations, such as:

• The inability to provide functionality themselves, like implementing hooks and services. In cases where a Drupal recipe requires custom functionality that involves code, this must be included in a regular Drupal module.
   
• Once a Drupal recipe has been applied, the responsibility for updating configuration and content falls to modules and core, and the recipe cannot provide an upgrade path.
   

• Can't be part of a deployment. Deploying the content created by a Drupal recipe is out-of-scope.

Wrapping Up

In conclusion, Drupal provides several site-building methods that allow users to create custom solutions to their specific needs. Profiles, distributions, and recipes are all powerful ways that can help you build your Drupal site efficiently and effectively. 

Drupal 10 recipes are an exciting addition to the Drupal ecosystem and will help make building websites and applications faster and more efficient than ever before. 

As a leading open-source community leader, OpenSense Labs has helped numerous enterprises transform their digital presence with our expert Drupal services and solutions. From custom Drupal development to UX design, we have the experience and expertise to help your organization succeed in the digital landscape.

Don't miss out on the opportunity to partner with a trusted and experienced team. Contact us today at hello@opensenselabs.com to learn more about how we can help you achieve your digital goals.