drupal

Approximately 1,100 of Drupal enthusiasts gathered in Barcelona, Spain, this week for DrupalCon Europe. As a matter of tradition, I delivered my State of Drupal keynote, often referred to as the "DriesNote".

If you missed it, you can watch the video or download my slides (177 MB).

In my keynote, I gave an update on Drupal Sharshot, an ambitious initiative we launched at DrupalCon Portland 2024. Originally called Drupal Starshot, inspired by President Kennedy's Moonshot challenge, the product is now officially named Drupal CMS.

The goal of Drupal CMS is to set the standard for no-code website building. It will allow non-technical users, like marketers, content creators, and site builders, to create digital experiences with ease, without compromising on the power and flexibility that Drupal is known for.

A four-month progress report

While Kennedy gave NASA eight years, I set a goal to deliver the first version of Drupal CMS in just eight months. It's been four months since DrupalCon Portland, which means we're halfway through.

So in my keynote, I shared our progress and gave a 35-minute demo of what we've built so far. The demo highlights how a fictional marketer, Sarah, can build a powerful website in just hours with minimal help from a developer. Along her journey, I showcased the following key innovations:

1. A new brand for a new market: A brand refresh of Drupal.org, designed to appeal to both marketers and developers. The first pages are ready and available for preview at new.drupal.org, with more pages launching in the coming months.
2. A trial experience: A trial experience that lets you try Drupal CMS with a single click, eliminating long-standing adoption barriers for new users. Built with WebAssembly, it runs entirely in the browser – no servers to install or manage.
3. An improved installer: An installer that lets users install recipes – pre-built features that combine modules, configuration, and default content for common website needs. Recipes bundle years of expertise into repeatable, shareable solutions.
4. Events recipe: A simple events website that used to take an experienced developer a day to build can now be created in just a few clicks by non-developers.
5. Project Browser support for recipes: Users can now browse the Drupal CMS recipes in the Project Browser, and install them in seconds.
6. First page of documentation: New documentation created specifically for end users. Clear, effective documentation is key to Drupal CMS's success, so we began by writing a single page as a model for the quality and style we aim to achieve.
7. AI for site building: AI agents capable of creating content types, configuring fields, building Views, forms, and more. These agents will transform how people build and manage websites with Drupal.
8. Responsible AI policy: To ensure responsible AI development, we've created a Responsible AI policy. I'll share more details in an upcoming blog, but the policy focuses on four key principles: human-in-the-loop, transparency, swappable large language models (LLMs), and clear guidance.
9. SEO Recipe: Combines and configures all the essential Drupal modules to optimize a Drupal site for search engines.
10. 14 recipes in development: In addition to the Events and SEO recipes, 12 more are in development with the help of our Drupal Certified Partners. Each Drupal CMS recipe addresses a common marketing use case outlined in our product strategy. We showcased both the process and progress during the Initiative Lead Keynote for some of the tracks. After DrupalCon, we'll begin developing even more recipes and invite additional contributors to join the effort.
11. AI-assisted content migration: AI will crawl your source website and handle complex tasks like mapping unstructured HTML to structured Drupal content types in your destination site, making migrations faster and easier. This could be a game-changer for website migrations.
12. Experience Builder: An early preview of a brand new, out-of-the-box tool for content creators and designers, offering layout design, page building, basic theming and content editing tools. This is the first time I've showcased our progress on stage at a DrupalCon.
13. Future-proof admin UI with React: Our strategy for modernizing Drupal's backend UI with React.
14. The "Adopt-a-Document" initiative: A strategy and funding model for creating comprehensive documentation for Drupal CMS. If successful, I'm hopeful we can expand this model to other areas of Drupal. For more details, please read the announcement on drupal.org.
15. Global Documentation Lead: The Drupal Association's commitment to hire a dedicated Documentation Lead, responsible for managing all aspects of Drupal's documentation, beyond just Drupal CMS.

The feedback on my presentation has been incredible, both online and in-person. The room was buzzing with energy and positivity! I highly recommend watching the recording.

Attendees were especially excited about the AI capabilities, Experience Builder, and recipes. I share their enthusiasm as these capabilities are transformative for Drupal.

Many of these features are designed with non-developers in mind. Our goal is to broaden Drupal's reach beyond its traditional user base and reach more people than ever before.

Release schedule

Our launch plan targets Drupal CMS's release on Drupal's upcoming birthday: January 15, 2025. It's also just a couple of weeks after the Drupal 7 End of Life, marking the end of one era and the beginning of another.

The next milestone is DrupalCon Singapore, taking place on December 9–11, 2024, less than 3 months away. We hope to have a release candidate ready by then.

Now that we're back from DrupalCon and have key milestone dates set, there is a lot to coordinate and plan in the coming weeks, so stay tuned for updates.

Call for contribution

Ambitious? Yes. But achievable if we work together. That's why I'm calling on all of you to get involved with Drupal CMS. Whether it's building recipes, enhancing the Experience Builder, creating AI agents, writing tests, improving documentation, or conducting usability testing – there are countless ways to contribute and make a difference. If you're ready to get involved, visit https://drupal.org/starshot to learn how to get started.

Thank you

This effort has involved so many people that I can't name them all, but I want to give a huge thank you to the Drupal CMS Leadership Team, who I've been working with closely every week: Cristina Chumillas (Lullabot), Gábor Hojtsy (Acquia), Lenny Moskalyk (Drupal Association), Pamela Barone (Technocrat), Suzanne Dergacheva (Evolving Web), and Tim Plunkett (Acquia).

A special shoutout goes to the demo team we assembled for my presentation: Adam Hoenich (Acquia), Amber Matz (Drupalize.me), Ash Sullivan (Acquia), Jamie Abrahams (FreelyGive), Jim Birch (Kanopi), Joe Shindelar (Drupalize.me), John Doyle (Digital Polygon), Lauri Timmanee (Acquia), Marcus Johansson (FreelyGive), Martin Anderson-Clutz (Acquia), Matt Glaman (Acquia), Matthew Grasmick (Acquia), Michael Donovan (Acquia), Tiffany Farriss (Palantir.net), and Tim Lehnen (Drupal Association).

I also want to thank the Drupal CMS track leads and contributors for their development work. Additionally, I'd like to recognize the Drupal Core Committers, Drupal Association staff, Drupal Association Board of Directors, and Certified Drupal partners for continued support and leadership. There are so many people and organizations whose contributions deserve recognition that I can't list everyone individually, partly to avoid the risk of overlooking anyone. Please know your efforts are deeply appreciated.

Lastly, thank you to everyone who helped make DrupalCon Barcelona a success. It was excellent!

Migrating from Drupal 7 to the latest version, like Drupal 11, might seem like a big challenge, but it doesn’t have to be. One of the most common obstacles is figuring out how much it will cost. You want to know the price, but you don’t want to give full access to your site just to get an estimate. The good news? You can collect all the necessary information for an accurate project estimate in just 5 minutes.

Dear Readers,

DrupalCon Barcelona 2024 closed its doors this past week, but the conversations and ideas sparked by the event are just beginning to take root. For four days, the Drupal community gathered to share, celebrate, and look ahead to what’s next for the platform. DrupalCon Barcelona 2024 has wrapped up, and now the wait for DrupalCon Vienna 2025 begins!

Reflecting on the progress of Drupal, Dries Buytaert proudly remarked, 

“I’m so proud of how far we have come and how fast. This transformation is an incredible collective effort involving everyone from core committers, Drupal Association staff, volunteers, and agency partners; together, we focused on iterating rapidly and focused more on user experience than ever before. We had some brave out-of-the-box thinking…”

Giannis Kyriazopoulos of E-Sepia reported for The DropTimes on all three days of the conference, offering comprehensive coverage of the event.

The event started with contribution workshops and the opening ceremony, where the Women in Drupal Awards took center stage. Esmeralda Braad-Tijhoff was celebrated for her innovative leadership, earning the Define award, while Pamela Barone took home the Build award for her role in advancing key Drupal solutions. Alla Petrovska received the Scale award for her work in growing businesses using Drupal, demonstrating the platform's transformative impact.

One of the most anticipated moments was the Driesnote, where Dries Buytaert delivered his 40th State of Drupal address. He shared several key updates, as reported by The DropTimes, including the announcement that Drupal CMS 1.0 is set to launch on January 15, 2025. The Experience Builder (XB), built using React, is also set to revolutionize how users interact with Drupal, though it will be completed after the release of Drupal CMS. Dries emphasized Drupal's commitment to AI with the introduction of a Responsible AI Policy and demonstrated AI’s potential for automating tasks such as content creation and migration. He also announced the introduction of Drupal Recipes, which are bundles of reusable solutions aimed at streamlining common processes. Additionally, a partnership with Drupalize.me was unveiled to overhaul Drupal's documentation through the “Adopt a Document” initiative, inviting organizations to sponsor specific sections of the new tutorials.

The second day of the conference featured a moving story shared by Theódór Ragnar Gíslason, who recounted how an accident led him to extensive computer use and, eventually, hacking. He founded the organization "Defend Iceland" to address digital threats by introducing bounty programs accessible to both the public and private sectors. Gíslason also highlighted Drupal's security robustness, noting that after testing nearly 32,000 modules, very few vulnerabilities were found, solidifying Drupal's reputation for security.

In governance news, the Drupal Association Board election results were announced. Alejandro Moreno was elected to the At-Large seat, joining Sachiko Muto, Chairperson of OpenForum Europe, and Stella Power, CEO of Annertech, on the Board of Directors.

Esmeralda Tijhoff reported on the BoF session, ‘Getting started with la_eu: local association site,’ led by Bjorn Brala. The session brought together associations, builders, and potential users to discuss the roadmap of the Drupal La_eu project. Participants agreed on monthly check-ins via Slack, focusing on new features and automated updates for local sites. The session also highlighted the need for creating user stories and a roadmap for further development, with discussions about potentially involving an agency to accelerate progress.

Finally, the location of next year's event was revealed—DrupalCon Europe 2025 will take place in Vienna from October 14-17. The event will feature a new mascot, the White Horse, symbolizing the next chapter of Drupal's journey. Stay tuned for more details as they unfold in the coming months.

On other news, in an article for The DropTimes, Sinduri Guntupalli explores how Lupus Decoupled Drupal merges the power of Drupal's backend with modern frontend frameworks like Vue.js and Nuxt. The platform offers a flexible, API-driven architecture with custom elements, caching optimizations, and diverse deployment options, providing an efficient solution for both developers and content editors working on complex web projects.

Drupal CMS is set to receive significant enhancements to its advanced search functionality as 1xINTERNET announces a community-driven plan based on insights from nearly 100 experienced users. The comprehensive survey revealed an overwhelming preference for the Search API module as the standard search solution, with 87% of participants endorsing it over the Core Search module. Related technologies also received strong support, including Facets (88%), Search API Autocomplete (87%), and Search API Decoupled (78%).

We have also covered Provus Edu from Promet Source and Blökkli Starterkit from Liip. A story on Government Website Usability and another on the exclusion of direct module installs in Drupal 10.4 are a bonus. 

Last but not least, The DropTimes would like to extend our heartfelt gratitude to all those who helped us cover DrupalCon Barcelona 2024. 

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

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

Thank you, 
Sincerely 
Alka Elizabeth 
Sub-editor, The DropTimes.

Drupal provides a robust framework for creating and managing content. However, managing form fields in complex content entities can be challenging. The Field Group, Inline Entity Form, and Conditional Fields modules offer practical tools for improving the user experience and streamlining the content creation process.

In the above live stream, we’ll use all three modules to organize and clean up fields on an “Event” content type.

Below are the show notes for the live stream.

This is the fourth article in a series of articles about the Batch API in Drupal. The Batch API is a system in Drupal that allows data to be processed in small chunks in order to prevent timeout errors or memory problems.

So far in this series we have looked at creating a batch process using a form, followed by creating a batch class so that batches can be run through Drush and then using the finished state to control batch processing. All of these articles go together to form a basis of batch processing in Drupal.

In this article we will look at bringing these concepts together to perform a task that is quite common on websites, processing Comma Separated Value or CSV files, which we will do using the Drupal Batch API.

Processing CSV data is very common on the web. Whilst it is quite common to integrate with an API it is sometimes simpler to just generate a CSV file of the data you need from one system and upload it into a form on a website. Most systems will allow you to export data as a CSV file of some kind, but it's also very easy to export a CSV from commonly used programs like Excel and Google Sheets.

Processing a CSV file in PHP is quite simple, but once you reach one hundred records you will find that PHP will start to throw errors due to timeouts or memory issues. The solution is to employ the Batch API to spread the load of that processing over a number of different requests.

Read more

Every great product needs a great supporting documentation - this rule is as simple and well known as it is hard to stick to, especially if we are talking about the continuously growing Open Source system that Drupal is. A while ago we came to realise that Drupal documentation needs a revamp. Together with ever amazing community members, the DA engineering team has been looking for a solution that will bring world class documentation to Drupal and that joint effort did not go in vain as such a solution has been defined!

As each of you can imagine, the goal of overhauling documentation tooling to a modern docs-as-code system is a big challenge so it is logical that we decided to define bite-sized deliverables and today we are happy to announce the first phase of the project - delivering clear and easy to follow user guide for Drupal CMS. And we need your help!

The Drupal Association is kicking off an initiative to bring Drupal.org documentation and accompanying software to world-class level. For the first phase dedicated to the Drupal CMS we are partnering with Drupalize.me: they will create the gold-standard user guide for Drupal CMS. 

But that is just the beginning! As a next step Drupal Association will onboard the Documentation Lead who, in close collaboration with the community, will help to ensure that Drupal.org documentation is clear, comprehensive and current. 

Last but not the least, we will implement a docs-as-code system that will improve the creation and maintenance process of documentation. 

Now the question is how you can help? And the answer is simple - by “Adopting a Document”!

Inspired by the “Adopt a Highway” program that is becoming more and more popular in North America, we created a way for the partners to get involved in creating great documentation by taking care of one of the Drupal CMS milestones and sponsoring creation and further maintenance of the documentation for one or multiple Drupal CMS working tracks.

Thanks to your support, future users of Drupal CMS will be able to easily find answers to the questions that might arise as they discover Drupal CMS capabilities.

But not only that, as we find it fair for the partners who will decide to contribute to the initiative to receive some benefits:

• Your logo will be placed in the sidebar of the adopted documentation section—which Your logo will be placed on the documentation page(s) you adopt, visible to the thousands of new users we expect to try Drupal CMS

• Your logo will be highlighted on Drupal.org as a Drupal CMS sponsor, as well as at DrupalCons for the next year!

• For each $100 of contribution you will receive 1 credit that you will be able to use within 1 year.

We’ve got 30 documentation sections available for sponsorship so far. You can adopt one of those and by donating $2400 you will ensure that future users will be able to easily find answers to the questions that might arise as they discover Drupal CMS as well as will enable for the next phase of the project to get started. 

Sounds exciting, right? So if you are keen to be part of Adopt a document - do reach out to me and let’s work together to bring Drupal Documentation to the new level!

After watching the Driesnote earlier this week, I wanted to try and play around with the AI tools that were demonstrated. Here's my notes so far. And instructions on how you can set it all up to experiment with the new AI tools in Drupal.