This document discusses ways to improve the author experience when creating and editing content in Drupal. It provides information on modules that can enhance visual text editing, node form layout, managing fields, saving content, and workflow. Some highlighted modules include Spark, WYSIWYG, Field Group, Conditional Fields, Workbench, and Jammer. The goal is to streamline the content creation process and make it easier for authors to get their work done.

1. Happy Content Creators
Improving the Author UX
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2. Bio
Eric Aitala
Earth and Space Science
Partnership - College of
Earth & Mineral Science
ema13@psu.edu
@aitala
Drupal dev since 2006
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3. The out of the box Drupal
Author UX needs some help.
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4. Going from this...
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6. ... to this ...
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8. .... causes this.
{Insert obligatory Internet cat meme here.}
I used Drupal once...
... it sucked.
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9. Authors need to get stuff done...
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10. ...and they will find a way to do it.
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11. Visual Text Editing
Drupal Spark - for D8 but backporting to D7.
Inline Editing
Visual Editor
Responsive layout and preview enhancements
https://drupal.org/project/spark
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12. Visual Text Editing
WYSIWYG module - wrapper for visual editors.
CKEditor, TinyMCE, etc.
Version compatibility!
Text formats & profiles
Drupal & user defined
Lots of button pushing!
Perhaps the most useful and dangerous module!
Node body should not be an HTML dumping ground
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13. Visual Text Editing
WYSIWYG module add-ons.
https://drupal.org/project/better_formats
https://drupal.org/project/wysiwyg_template
https://drupal.org/project/imce
https://drupal.org/project/imce_wysiwyg
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14. Visual Text Editing
Inline editing - only works with the stand-alone
CKEditor module!
Does not work with the WYSIWYG module.
https://drupal.org/project/edit
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15. Node Form Layout
Node Form Column module
Adds a right column and footer
Vertical tabs can be an issue
https://drupal.org/project/nodeformcols
Display Suite module
Mostly used for node display, but can alter node forms.
More ‘flexible’, but requires some additional work
https://drupal.org/project/ds
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16. Node Form Column
Node Form Layout
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17. Node Form Layout
Removing form elements.
Jammer module removes confusing elements such as node
revision log textarea, preview buttons, etc.
Be careful....
https://drupal.org/project/jammer
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18. Fields
Node forms get messy
Hide fields
Group fields
Alter field widget
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19. Conditional Fields
Where the status of one field depends on the status of
another field.
Module is still in dev for D7, but is ‘stable’
Has many dependency and status options!
Visibility, required, empty, etc.
https://drupal.org/project/conditional_fields
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20. Group Fields
Display Suite module allows field grouping
Somewhat complicated
Field Group module
Create fieldsets, vertical tabs, horizontal tabs, accordions,
etc.
https://drupal.org/project/field_group
Also provides multi-step forms - https://drupal.org/project/
multistep
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21. Altering Fields - Taxonomy
Taxonomy Term
Reference Tree Widget
Adds new widget to
select taxonomies.
https://drupal.org/
project/
term_reference_tree
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22. Altering Fields - Options
Options Element
Better mechanism to
specify select list,
checkbox, and radio
button options.
https://drupal.org/
project/
options_element
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23. Content Locking
Prevents two authors editing the same content
Content locking module
Also prevents closing a browser window on an unsubmitted
node form!
https://drupal.org/project/content_lock
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24. Saving Content
Autosave - https://drupal.org/project/autosave
Save & Edit - https://drupal.org/project/save_edit
Save Draft - https://drupal.org/project/save_draft
Add Another - https://drupal.org/project/addanother
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25. Workflow
Very complicated issue, but look at...
Workbench suite of modules
WB Access
WB Moderation
WB Media
https://drupal.org/project/workbench
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26. A happy author....
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