Building user-centred
websites with Drupal
Amanda Etches-Johnson
Greg Sennema
Catherine Baird
OLA Super Conference, January 29, 2009

Quick show of hands...
how many of you have heard of Drupal?
how many of you are planning to use Drupal?
how many of you are already using Drupal?

Here’s what we’re going to do
The what, how, why of Drupal
The Laurier Experience
The McMaster Experience
Wrap-up: lessons learned, what not to do, etc.

The what, how, why of
Drupal

http://drupalib.org

drupalib.interoperating.info

www.lib.uwo.ca

www.londonpubliclibrary.ca

library.wlu.ca

library.mcmaster.ca

Drupal: out of the box
blogs + comments
regular web pages
polls
forum
user profiles
taxonomies
...and a few other things

So, what does “modular”
mean?
turn on the features you want
ignore the ones you don’t want
add new “modules” as you build

But, what does it
really mean?
out of the box = a reasonably functional site
modules enabled = a super-duper, highly customized,
wicked functional site!

Modular is good!
remember that HUGE development community?
over 5,800 modules in the directory
if you can dream it, there is a module that can do it

Working with Drupal
HTML
CSS
PHP
Server admin

The Laurier Experience

library.wlu.ca
easier web site maintenance
web-based maintenance
incorporate different functionality
easily re-purpose content
just completed site redesign
sick of Dreamweaver!

The timeline
June – Aug. 2007: evaluated Drupal
Sept. 2007 – Feb. 2008: surprise me!
V5 or v6?
Mar. – Apr. 2008: tried to break Drupal
May - July 2008: moved content
August 2008: final testing, went live

Altering our workflows
Reformulated web advisory committee
Gave access to more staff
Held series of training sessions
Created help pages

The players
web advisory committee
systems programmer (90%)
me (40%)

The cool stuff...

Library
Tamarak
Juniper
Hemlock

Our plans...
Gallery
Events/Calendar
Taxonomy
CCK/Views/Panels, i.e….
…the cool stuff Amanda will show you from the
McMaster site…

The McMaster Experience

Why Drupal?
make site admin easier
past experience with Drupal

The players
advisory committee
sysadmin
co-op student
me

Decision time!
which version of Drupal?
decided on 5
module development

Decision time!
to CCK or not to CCK?
CCK is not essential but it’s a really good idea
think about site updating & permissions
20+ content types

The cool stuff...

The McMaster
[Intranet] Experience

Staff intranet redesign
Redesigned public website
Busy organization
Many projects/initiatives
Increased use of blogs/wikis, particularly for projects
Improve internal communication
Clarity and consistency

Where I’m coming from
1992 1996 1998
2006 2008 2009

Where we started

Requirements
Solutions to all of the problems (navigation, search,
consistency, etc.)
Self-serve
Customizable permissions
Dynamic
Interactive

Process
Inventory of content
Examined usage statistics
Staff survey
Wireframes

Wrapping my head around
Drupal

Content types for staff
intranet
Department
Committee
Project
Service
Page (default)
Policy & Procedure
Training & Development page

Sample committee page

Categories/taxonomies

The redesign

The redesign

Time & resources
1 librarian
1 co-op student
Support from User Experience Librarian
Started Fall 2008
Plan to launch Spring 2009

Wrap up:
Must-Have Modules, Lessons Learned,
What NOT to do

Must-have modules
CCK
Views Webform
PathAuto IMCE
Faceted Search Google Analytics
FCKEditor/TinyMCE Backup and Migrate
Nice Menus
Akismet/CAPTCHA

Lessons learned
it can be done!
envision the site first
think about who will maintain what
think of content types in terms of consistency of information and
permissions
having a blogging background helps
use PathAuto for human-readable URLs
when templating, start with a core theme (e.g. Zen)
multiple backups and test servers
carefully consider version

What NOT to do
mess with core code
use alpha release versions of modules
install modules 1st time on live server
get deterred: lots of help online and in library
community

Questions?

Thanks!
These slides are online at:
http://blogwithoutalibrary.net/talk/ola2009/drupal.pdf
amanda@etches-johnson.com
gsennema@wlu.ca
bairdca@mcmaster.ca