A slideshow in Drupal 8

Posted on Tue, 03/15/2016 - 19:33

I thought I'd play around with creating this feature in Drupal 8. Here's the step-by-step run down. This is assumed your logged in with an administrative user. 1. "Slideshow Item" data structureCreate a slideshow item content type with any structure you desire. In my case, I added an image, a title, a description, and a link. This was all done by core provided field types.Manage > Structure > Content TypesAdd Content TypeFill out the form for slideshow items and SaveEnter the fields you desire for the data structure 2. Slide orderingI considered adding a weight as a numeric field. However, I

development drupal

Our fights are not your fights

Posted on Tue, 03/08/2016 - 18:05

I'm not one to really dig my heels into politics. I find it divisive and I recently had a clear example as to why. Earlier, I heard my doorbell ring. It was a Bill Shuster promoter walking door to door in my neighborhood. I have already grown tired of his campaign, seeing television commercials with scathing attacks on Democrats, his extreme views on health care, and the flashing images of Sarah Palin and other off-the-wall conservatives he self aligns with. I was handed a pamphlet of information and needed to look no further than the cover to set me off. Our fights are Bill's fights

people

Site Updates in Drupal

Posted on Thu, 03/03/2016 - 15:16

Site updates in Drupal are one of the most critical, proactive things needed to eliminate vulnerabilities on your site. While the open source community strives to make these updates smooth, there are no guarantees there won't be issues for your specific site based on how you've extended your Drupal instance. This is because each site may have it's own custom code, it may have it's own combination of contributed modules with unique interactions, and it may have it's own visual theme. The key point is that it's not a safe assumption that site updates meet all use cases. Most module maintainers

development drupal

Common DrupalVM Use

Posted on Mon, 02/29/2016 - 10:26

I long struggled with how to effectively do local development in Drupal. Few would argue the merits of doing local development over working directly on a production system. While the problem seems straightforward, nothing seemed to work quite right. It took me quite a while to land on DrupalVM. I'd like to explain how I landed here and some of the ways I use/configure DrupalVM to support my needs. RequirementsThis whole experiment made me think about what criteria I was evaluating these against...MOST IMPORTANT - I really want my solution to JUST WORK with as little set up as possible. Most

development drupal

2016 Pittsburgh Pirates Predictions

Posted on Mon, 12/14/2015 - 14:58

The annual winter meetings have passed. A lot of GMs have been aggressive in spending or prioritizing their team's urgent needs. As usual, the Pirates were not big spenders nor would I consider them aggressive. This fits into their typical patient and cost-effective operations. So, what is there to write about? The Pirates made some recent moves and seem to be staging something. Let's predict what. Offseason moves This is all about freeing up salary. Neil Walker - Pirates fans had to say goodbye to a fan favorite. This ripped off the band-aid from past Pirate teams where we allowed our talent

sports

"Just Enough" Planning - An Agile Concept

Posted on Wed, 12/02/2015 - 14:09

The Agile framework is all the rage. It aims to solve limitations introduced by waterfall. The framework is driven by value and priority, not fixed scope and heavy upfront planning. But, Agile and its Scrum variant is just a set of theories not intended to fully prescribe practice. There are many challenges that observing strict Agile/Scrum can present in practice, especially for agencies attempting to adopt it outside of a product development process. Background I believe the theory behind Agile and Scrum is sound. Where waterfall advocates for rigid planning first and foremost, Agile/Scrum

development people

Patterns of DevOps Practices

Posted on Tue, 11/10/2015 - 12:24

Recently, I read Codifying devops practices, a blog post written by Patrick Debois. This is food for thought. I spent some time trying to identify the patterns I recognize in daily practice. I may continue to update this as I learn more opportunities and categories. Approached with a build-measure-learn philosophy, patterns are less about the "how" and more about opportunities to improve and grow. These opportunities may be considered best practice, but are circumstantial based on your organization, your project, or other factors. I personally advocate addressing the most glaring problems

development