The Drop Times: Abled-Enough to Live, Triumph and Conquer Dreams: Matthew Ramir

Embrace the enlightening dialogue from an interview featuring Matthew Ramir, a pioneering DevOps Engineer with Cerebral Palsy, as he shares his journey of overcoming obstacles in the tech industry. The interview delves into Matthew's early influences in high school, his approach to problem-solving influenced by Cerebral Palsy, and his upcoming presentation at Florida DrupalCamp 2024. Matthew's unwavering commitment to inclusion and compassion in his leadership, paired with his unique blend of poetry and performance in public speaking, showcases his impactful contributions to the field and beyond.

Specbee: AI Overdose in Marketing: How to Balance AI and Human Creativity

Imagine using an AI content generator: <enter prompt> Hey, what are some of the AI-inspired movies we’ve all enjoyed watching and questioned our belief system? Response: Her Extinction I Am Mother And more… That’s how easy AI tools make it for us! AI has made a huge impact in the growing marketing industry and these movies portray what-ifs and maybes that entertain us. Nevertheless, it’s still safe to say that AI cannot take over humans. It’s my opinion, and I’d love to know what you guys think here. But before that, let me lay down the reasons for my opinion. Sure, the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) has revolutionized how businesses engage with their audience. However, it has been both a blessing and a challenge in various ways. It has raised questions about the role of the human touch and connection in marketing strategies. In this blog post, I’ll take you through an exploration journey of the impact of AI and shed some light to help you come up with an opinion about whether AI has indeed “taken over the human touch.” The Emergence of AI in Marketing Content Creation Artificial intelligence, sure, has become an integral part of modern marketing strategies. From personalized email campaigns to predictive analytics, AI-powered tools offer us the ability to analyze data, automate tasks, and deliver targeted content at scale. This has significantly enhanced efficiency and effectiveness in reaching and engaging with our customers.AI-driven algorithms can analyze vast amounts of data to identify patterns and trends, enabling all marketers to tailor messages to specific audiences with unprecedented precision. Moreover, AI-powered chatbots and virtual assistants have transformed customer service by providing immediate assistance and resolving inquiries around the clock. The Biggest Threat to AI-generated Content: The Importance of Authenticity One of the major concerns with AI-generated content is that it may lack the human touch necessary to resonate with audiences on a deeper level. While AI can analyze data to identify trends and preferences, it may struggle to capture the nuances of human behavior and emotions that drive consumer decision-making. Consumers crave authenticity and genuine connections with brands in today's hyperconnected world. They want to feel understood, valued, and appreciated beyond mere transactional relationships. While AI can facilitate personalized interactions, it cannot replicate the authenticity and empathy that come from genuine human interaction. Human creativity allows marketers to craft narratives that evoke emotions, tell stories, and build meaningful connections with their audience. Whether it's through compelling storytelling, evocative imagery, or engaging multimedia content, human creativity adds a layer of depth and authenticity that resonates with consumers on a profound level. The Role of Human Touch in Marketing While AI can streamline processes and optimize performance, the human touch remains indispensable in marketing. Human creativity enables marketers to think outside the box, experiment with new ideas, and push the boundaries of conventional marketing strategies. It allows us marketers to inject personality, humor, and emotion into campaigns, fostering genuine connections with the audience. Moreover, human judgment and intuition are essential for interpreting data insights and making strategic decisions that go beyond quantitative metrics. While AI can analyze data to identify trends, it's up to humans to interpret the data, extract meaningful insights, and translate them into actionable strategies that drive results. Meeting the Intersection of AI and Human Creativity: A Hybrid Approach Rather than viewing AI as a threat to human creativity, a hybrid approach that combines AI-generated content with the human touch would offer the best of both worlds. By combining the analytical power of AI with our human, creative vision, businesses can develop more holistic and impactful marketing strategies. AI can assist in data analysis, audience segmentation, and content optimization, allowing us to focus our time and energy on creative ideation, storytelling, and relationship-building. By automating routine tasks and processes, AI frees up human marketers to focus on higher-order thinking and strategic decision-making. Here’s a brief breakdown of how you can bridge the gap between AI-generated content and the human element resulting in a stronger and more consumer-friendly output: Initial Drafting by AI: Use AI tools to produce data-driven and formulaic content and lay the foundation for the creation process. Human Editing and Personalization: This is our cue to step in to add creativity, emotion, and personalization to the content, ensuring it aligns with the brand's voice and resonates with the audience. Maintaining Quality and Uniqueness: The collaboration between AI and human creativity ensures high-quality, unique content that originates from human oversight, ensuring content alignment with brand values and cultural sensitivity. Audience-Centric Content: As a marketer, understanding your audience is your driving element. While some of your customers may prefer human-crafted narratives, others may prioritize quick access to information provided by AI-generated content. Human Intervention for Fact-Checking and Guidance: Marketers and creators play a crucial role in fact-checking, cultural relevance, and refining AI output. With such human intervention, you can guide the AI tools to ensure accuracy and engagement in the final product. Final Thoughts To wrap it up, while AI has transformed the marketing landscape, it has not “taken over the human touch.” While AI-generated content can enhance efficiency and scalability, it still requires the human touch to imbue it with authenticity, emotion, and empathy.  All marketers can develop more meaningful and impactful relationships with their audience by embracing a hybrid approach that combines AI-driven insights with human creativity and intuition.  By harnessing the power of artificial intelligence while remaining authentic with human creativity, marketers can continue to inspire, engage, and delight audiences in this AI-influenced, creative-content-hungry digital world.

Drupal.org blog: Drupal means innovation: Introducing the innovation hub

As many of you may already know, the Drupal Association has set strategic goals for 2023 to 2025, such as doubling the number of organizations that are makers and tripling the number of contributions (Read the strategic plan here). In line with these objectives, I joined in 2023 to contribute to boosting activities in support of these goals. Since then, we've been up to some pretty exciting stuff.

While I've been spreading the word and championing these activities, it became apparent that Drupal needed a dedicated space – a specific hub – where we could discuss these initiatives, particularly focusing on innovation. The aim? To not only highlight the efforts of the Drupal Association but also to capture the essence of Drupal Innovation.

Drupal is mature software. Some people in the industry call this type of software "boring technology”. Can Drupal can be classified as this… well, yes, probably. But mind you, even the derogatory connotation that can bring to our minds, that designation can be powerful. A boring technology is a stable, proven, and reliable technology. Those technologies that don’t break, are hard to hack (if maintained properly of course) are exactly the kind of technology you would recommend to NASA, big pharma companies, Aerospace (hello Elon Musk), councils, universities, and a long list of fame. Read the famous essay about why to choose "Boring Technology" here https://boringtechnology.club/). 

What is more, mature (boring) technologies can be innovative, modern and full of exciting and new cool things as well that can attract young talent. Imagine a technology that could combine both… it's not too hard; I'll give you a clue: ahem… Drupal.

But I digress. Coming back to my point, in order to continue to spread the word and image of innovation that Drupal deserves we have created the Innovation hub with a few key goals:

🔍 Exploring Innovation: Delve into the latest projects, initiatives, and breakthroughs shaping the future of Drupal. From experimental features to groundbreaking modules, discover how Drupal continues to innovate and evolve.

💡 Inspiration and Ideas: Get inspired by the creative endeavors of our community members. Explore case studies, success stories, and thought-provoking articles that showcase the innovative spirit of Drupal enthusiasts worldwide.

🤝 Contributing to Progress: Be part of the movement driving Drupal forward. Discover opportunities to contribute your skills, expertise, and ideas to the Drupal project and help shape its trajectory in the years to come.

We invite you to join us in sharing, participating, and collaborating in the Drupal innovation journey. Together, let's shape the future of digital experiences and contribute to the vibrant ecosystem of Drupal.

👉 Explore the Drupal Innovation Hub! 👈

Talking Drupal: Talking Drupal #438 - CKEditor 4 End of Life

Today we are talking about CKEditor 4 End of Life, Moving to CKEditor 5, and what you can expect from CKEditor 5 now and in the future with guest Wim Leers. We’ll also cover CKEditor 5 Premium Features as our module of the week.

For show notes visit: www.talkingDrupal.com/438

Topics
  • CKEditor 4 end of life June 2023
  • Issues people might see if they are still on CKE4
  • Why a third party library and not roll our own
  • Are there other alternatives
  • Why did Drupal decide on CKEditor
  • Drupal 10 moved to CKE5 How should people update
  • Upgrade gotchas
  • What's new in CKE5
  • What is on the roadmap regarding Drupal and CKE5
  • Is there going to be a CKE6
  • Native Web Components
  • Does CKE in core affect Gutenberg
Resources Guests

Wim Leers - wimleers.com Wim Leers

Hosts

Nic Laflin - nLighteneddevelopment.com nicxvan John Picozzi - epam.com johnpicozzi Ivan Stegic - ten7.com ivanstegic

MOTW Correspondent

Martin Anderson-Clutz - mandclu

  • Brief description:
    • Have you ever wanted to offer your content creators advanced capabilities like real-time collaboration? There’s a module for that.
  • Module name/project name:
  • Brief history
    • How old: created in Sep 2022 by Wiktor Walc, although recent releases are by Wojciech (vOYchekh) Kukowski, both of CKSource, the company behind CKEditor (Wiktor was on episode 372 https://talkingdrupal.com/372)
    • Current version available: 1.2.5 which works with Drupal 9 and 10
  • Maintainership
    • Actively maintained, latest release in the past month
    • User Guide available, link is in the README
    • Number of open issues: 16, 8 of which are bugs
  • Usage stats:
    • 159 sites
  • Module features and usage
    • To me, the most compelling features enabled by this module are the ones that turn your Drupal WYSIWYG into a robust collaboration tool, similar to what users may be used to in tools like Google Docs or Office 365
    • Real-time inline comments and changes from multiple users
    • Track changes to suggest ways the content could be improved
    • A history of changes made in the WYSIWYG, independent of the saved Drupal revisions
    • Tag users with @ mentions to have them notified
    • There’s also a Productivity Pack to enhance your WYSIWYG, and again some of these will be familiar to users that also use popular online collaboration tools
    • A document outline that uses heading within your content to make navigation for moving quickly within the document
    • Can generate a linked Table of Contents, which will automatically update as headings are added or changed
    • Slash commands to execute actions
    • Enhanced Paste from Office, to preserve complex incoming content structures, but with clean HTML as the result
    • And more!
    • Another premium feature is the ability to export to Word or PDF, and it can also restore full screen editing, a feature that didn’t make the transition from CKEditor 4 to 5, as part of the open source offering
    • Finally, it also includes an AI Assistant that provides yet another interesting way to empower your content authors to leverage AI tools for their writing, including the ability to change the style, length, or tone of selected content using pre-made prompts, or generate content with custom queries. It also works with a number of different models out of the box, so you’re not restricted to ChatGPT
    • The module is open source but using these premium features does require a subscription. The pricing will depend on the number of active users and which features you need, so if you’d like more information you can use the contact form at ckeditor.com
    • Also worth mentioning here that the team at Palantir has released a YouTube video of an open source collaborative editor that they’re calling Edit Together. It’s based on the ProseMirror rich-text editor framework, and the blog where they announced it mentioned a mid-2024 release, but that was back in Jul 2023 and I haven’t been able to find any updates since then

The Drop Times: Pantheon Autopilot Toolbar Module Shouldn't Need to Exist...

The Pantheon Autopilot Toolbar module addresses navigation deficiencies within Pantheon's Dashboard UI, enabling efficient access to Autopilot. Kevin Reynen, the Principal Web Applications Developer at the University of Colorado, discusses the module's creation and its significance. Also, understand Pantheon's response to the issue. Explore the collaborative efforts and responses surrounding this crucial dashboard enhancement.

The Drop Times: Embracing Challenges and Seizing Opportunities

Hello Readers,

Hope everyone had an amazing week! While casually scrolling through social media, I stumbled upon a random post featuring the timeless wisdom of Nelson Mandela: 

 "It always seems impossible until it's done."

 Reflecting on this, I couldn't help but relate it to my own experiences. Often, when I embark on a new task, it feels daunting and insurmountable. Yet, as I push through and complete it, I realize it wasn't as challenging as I initially imagined. I'm sure many of you can resonate with this feeling.

Often, our hesitation to take on responsibilities stems from a fear of making mistakes. This brings to my mind the words of Ruth Cheesley, the Project Lead of Mautic. 

"The hardest thing to do is to raise your hand and say 'I’d like to help,' so jump over that hurdle and see where it takes you!"

Ruth engaged in an email correspondence with me prior to India's first and APAC region's largest Mautic Conference, MautiCon India 2024. The interview delves into her journey from beneficiary to influential contributor within the open-source community. Sharing insights into her path, she recounts pivotal moments that led her to Mautic and discusses the project's evolution, community engagement, and future aspirations. 

As someone who lives with disbility and has gulped down many harsh experiences, Ruth with her ethos motivates us to challenge ourselves to overcome this fear and embrace opportunities to contribute. You never know where it might lead you!

Now, let's shift our focus and explore some of the latest news stories and articles we covered last week.

Alka Elizabeth discussed the newly developed Contribution Health Dashboard with Alex Moreno in a comprehensive interview. Alex discusses CHD development, technological underpinnings, and potential impact on the global diversity of the Drupal community. Discover the challenges faced, future steps, and how the Drupal community can contribute to the dashboards' enhancement with this conversation.

The DropTimes is embarking on a special project aimed at gathering insights directly from individuals within the Drupal community and its users. Your perspectives will play a crucial role in shaping a series of articles titled "Drupal's Innovation and Future: 2024 and Beyond." In our inaugural article, authored by Kazima Abbas, we engage with a variety of experts to delve into the challenges and opportunities present within the Drupal ecosystem.

An article by Irina Zaks, Co-Founder & CTO of Fibonacci Web Studio, published in TDT, delves into the topic of managing ambitious projects with limited budgets, specifically focusing on the transition from Drupal 7 to Backdrop CMS and streamlining the migration process for site-builders.

Kazima Abbas reached out to the organizers of the upcoming Drupal Delhi Meetup Group scheduled for February 24, 2024, to delve into what participants can anticipate at the event. Additionally, this weekend features one more notable gathering: Florida DrupalCamp 2024, happening from February 23rd to 25th.

Drupal enthusiasts are invited to participate as Scholarship Mentors for DrupalConPortland, offering support and guidance to scholarship recipients throughout the DrupalCon experience. Stay updated with this week's Drupal events by checking the published list here.

Victoria Spagnolo's blog underscores a noteworthy proposal within the Drupal community: the elimination of support for Windows in production environments in Drupal 11. Learn more here. Tim Doyle, CEO of the Drupal Association, unveiled substantial improvements to the Drupal Certified Partner program, slated to be implemented on April 1, 2024. Announced on February 9, 2024, nominations are now being accepted for the 2024 Aaron Winborn Award, presented by the Drupal Community Working Group. Learn more about this here.

In a notable development, Piyush Poddar, currently leading Sales and Partnerships at Axelerant and renowned for his open-source advocacy through foundational work with the Jaipur Drupal User Group and key contributions to the Drupal Association of India, has been appointed as the newest member of the Drupal Association Board, signaling a new era of global collaboration, as confirmed by the Association earlier this week.

Alex Moreno, announced the extension of The Drupal Association's Bounty Program, which aims to foster innovation and progress within the community by streamlining contributions in essential areas and addressing long-standing challenges.
Announcing a collaborative effort, The Drupal Association and Cloud-IAM are working together to enhance Drupal.org's user experience through the implementation of a secure, GDPR-compliant KeyCloak single sign-on (SSO) system. 

Selwyn Polit's latest update to Drupal at Your Fingertips introduces a revamped interface and improved functionality, utilizing the VitePress Vite & Vue Powered Static Site Generator. To delve deeper into this update, click here.

We acknowledge that there are more stories to share. However, due to constraints in selection, we must pause further exploration for now.

To get timely updates, follow us on LinkedIn, Twitter and Facebook. Also, join us on Drupal Slack at #thedroptimes.

Thank you,

Sincerely
Elma John
Sub-editor, TheDropTimes.

Salsa Digital: Salsa and Rules as Code at the GovCMS Mega Meetup 2023

Image removed.Salsa’s Rules as Code presentation  At last year’s GovCMS Mega Meetup in November 2023, Salsa was honoured to present to the GovCMS community. The topic: Rules as Code, or RaC.  2023 - GovCMS Mega Meetup Rules as Code Empowering citizens through more personalised experience Summary of the Rules as Code presentation  In this presentation, Salsa’s Founding Director Alfred Deeb  talks about the application of Rules as Code (RaC) within GovCMS to enhance personalised digital experiences for citizens. The presentation outlines the rationale behind RaC, its workings, real-world applications and resources for getting started. Below is a summary of the key points.
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