Posted by itangalo on July 14, 2009 at 1:12pm
I've just updated the list of modules that might be useful for newspapers. This page is intended to host any discussions concerning the wiki list.
(I know the list overhaul was kind of drastic, but since I compiled most of the original list I figured no-one would be more upset than me. The old list can still be found on this page.)
Cheers!
//Johan Falk, Sweden
Comments
Some more coming ...
Interesting; I didn't know about NITF Views. Good to know. We have a NewsML feed generator (to support our Yahoo deal) that we maybe ought to clean up and generalize for release.
I think Geoff Maxey is going to release his do-everything module for managing ad tags and metrics tags by the end of the month. Plug-ins cover Omniture, Google metrics, Open AdStream, Yahoo APT, Yahoo content match.
I don't think we ever got around to releasing Daypart (switches homepages on a schedule) and Pathlogo (switches logo based on path). Is there interest?
We are, of course, making heavy use of CCK, Views, Panels, etc. Don't know how we could live without them. But the devil is in the details, and we've learned how to recycle views and use styles effectively.
A quick tour of some of the modules we're using in our D6 rollout that you didn't mention:
Activity (we have big plans for this, but little use as yet)
Abuse (helps manage jerks in the comments and forums)
BlogMU (multiuser/multiblogs of our own design, not yet released)
Authcache
DateAPI, Date popup, Date timezone
A bunch of custom modules to integrate with FAST search -- probably too specific to our situation to release.
Flags (the are a million uses for this, including as a Twitter-like buddylist)
Image, ImageAPI, Imagecache
Advanced User Management (helps find/kill profile spammers)
Formfilter (helps us clean up the UI, simplify forms for editors and reporters)
GoogleNews (sitemap generator)
TinyMCE, IMCE and Wysiwyg API
Lightbox2
Quick Tabs
Twitter, Twitter Actions (tweet announcements of story postings)
.., a couple of dozen minor modules, including some that are specific to our templates.
This week we're having sort of an internal Drupalcon -- folks from the Florida Times-Union and the Augusta Chronicle are spending the week at Morris DigitalWorks, learning about D6 and how we're using it. A not-very-exciting picture is here: http://mypict.me/show.php?id=adAJ
Tomorrow there's going to be a code sprint to develop a module supporting a library of "thinglets" that can be automatically or manually plugged into stories. Examples would be: A cluster of links to crime resources that would appear with all crime stories. Mini-profiles and links to blogs/past columns/user profiles for newspaper columists. Et cetera. A library of stuff. You could do this with blocks, except that Drupal Blocks would suck for this purpose.
I'm hoping this ends up a releasable module.
Nice list!
I hope the list of modules on the wiki page will grow, and there are definately modules in your list that fits in the wiki page. (Who can build a newspaper site without DateAPI?)
When updating the wiki list, I more or less tore everything down and started a new list. A few modules were kept just because they seemed interesting (such as NITF Views), but mostly the list was built from scratch. I assume this means that a few good and useful modules were taken away from the list, but I also assume they will make it back in.
Thanks also for pointing out some interesting modules I hadn't paid much attention to before, such as Activity.
//Johan Falk, Sweden
Updated!
The modules list has been updated to include the availble modules in your list, along with a few others (such as Nodequeue och and Vertical Tabs).
I also made some re-ordering in the modules list, adding a section for user management.
Keep 'em coming!
//Johan Falk, Sweden
Don't forget Memcache API
Even though Authcache is nice and does allow for authenicated user information to be cached, Authcache cannot be clustered nor scaled out for individual session tables. This is where the Memcache API (http://drupal.org/project/memcache) comes into play.
One limitation you need to be aware of is that D6 only allows one contributed caching module at a time.
By default, Memcached assigns everything to a single 'default' queue environment. If you want to even tweak Memcache even farther and bring a higher rate of speed to your D6 site, I highly recommend setting up a multi-instance Memcached environment, assigning session tables to their own bins (i.e. views, page, block, etc). [If ya'll would like help on setting this up, let me know.]
And a quick update -- With the beta7 release of Authcache, it is now possible to have both Authcache and Memcache API to run together (whichout having to use the patch/hack I designed), thus allowing for unauthenticated and authenticated sessions to be cached plus allow for session tables to use their own assigned bins.
-- M
very interested
I would be very interested in utilizing your modules. The managing ad tags module seems especially useful : )
CustomError
Search404 is a really nice module, but there's a compelling case against it--which is that it takes up too many system resources, especially for non-human visitors. I want to put a vote in for CustomError instead, which can be configured to do almost the same thing, but without the overhead. Take a look at this blog post about it--the configuration code to handle 404s and 403s is clever and gives almost the same results as Search404 without all the extra calories.
*_*
How about context module?
With context module, the site is able to organise the content irrespective of paths. One can set block, menus and other information based on the content being viewed.
Regards.
:)
Beautifulmind
BeautifulMind
Sure!
When restructuring the list I had the feeling that the Context module was one of those modules that should be on the list, but since I hadn't tried it I excluded it. (The reasoning being that a too short list is more useful than a too cluttered list.)
Please add the module if you have time! (The same goes for anyone else who has a useful module to add to the list. I'm on vacation and don't have a reliable connection to use, or I would add it myself...)
//Johan Falk, Sweden
Perhaps Boost
I didn't see Boost on the list. It may be worth adding.
Boost downside
For sites that have more dynamic pages than static content, Boost is more of a hindrance rather than a help. One issue that we encountered is the boost cache can build up and if you don't have a script to clean out the queue from time to time, the Drupal site will actually start to slow down dramatically.
-- Michael
Boost is for smaller sites
As Michael knows (he runs our servers), configuring a scalable high-performance server setup is a very complicated task. We run the Pressflow patches, which optimize Drupal for scalable performance. Like drupal.org, our servers are shielded from the Internet by a Squid reverse proxy, a load balancer and a couple of firewalls. Drupal cache tables are moved from MySQL to Memcached. When it works it's awesome. When it doesn't work it's very hard to figure out why.
We do all this because we're trying to support dozens of sites and more than 50 million pageviews a month.
If you're running a single news site with under a million pageviews on a single server, Boost is your friend -- easy to configure, easy to maintain, and gives you a huge performance boost for anonymous visitors while protecting you against the occasional slashdotting. (News site traffic is heavily skewed anonymous.) I have it running on my blog and I think the current version is cleaning up after itself during cron runs.
Context + Boost + Memcache
Great suggestions! They have all been added to the wiki page (and I added a comment that one should use Boost with caution on sites with much dynamic content).
It seems people are a bit afraid of adding modules themselves. I hereby invite anyone with a good module suggestion to extend the wiki list!
(If the general opinion is that such a list should be moderated I'd be happy to nominate myself for the job. But an open list is probably the best solution, as long as it works.)
//Johan Falk, Sweden
Content access control not available in D6?
It seems like the list should acknowledge (as the old list did) the need to control access to a node's body vs. teaser -- vital in a site that has paid subscribers.
Using Drupal 5 I run a multi-magazine site with some free content but mostly paid/subscriber content. The behavior needed for these sites is: When a non-subscriber (anonymous or authenticated) visits the site, they can see all the content -- section header, title, deckhead, byline, blurb/summary/teaser. They can see the BODY only if the article/node is marked as free/all (via Taxonomy in our case), but they can't see the BODY of any subscriber-only articles. But when a subscriber signs-in (via a role) they can see the body too.
This is not the same as hiding nodes based on role, which is not an acceptable method. Only by showing the node (with limited info) can a visitor know what they are missing and be motivated to subscribe. Also, search engines need to see/index all articles to bring new visitors, so we take care to make the blurb/summary/teaser interesting and relevant.
The apparently-abandoned Premium module was the closest to doing this in D5. But being abandoned, it's too risky to use in D6, and nothing else seems to have surfaced.
We're stuck at D5 because of not obvious way to control this in Drupal 6 (tons of searching/reading finds others with the same need but no evident solution). Of course we could dive into programming something, but there's no business case for that, since Drupal 5 is "good enough". Not to my liking, but hard to argue with.
Am I overlooking a module or capability available for D6? If so, please add it to the list! Thank you.
We need to do this too!!!
We need to do this too!!! I am having a hard time figuring out the best solution for D6 as well.
Domain Access module
I run a multi-magazine site (see prior comment about content access control).
Some of our magazines are super-sets of others. Subscribe to magazine A and you get all the content of magazine B and C. Or subscribe to just magazine B and that's all the content you get.
Our magazines are in a "family" rooted at out main domain.com, then each publication has its own URL in the form subdomain.domain.com, which determines what main page (a panel of views) is shown, and what nodes/articles are shown on that page and sub pages/views.
We manage this with Domain Access, a very powerful module. Its basic function is to let Drupal recognize the incoming domain and show/hide nodes accordingly. There are submodules that extend this in various ways, such as into views, and controllable by node type.
It can even handle unrelated domains, so the subdomain.domain format structure that we use is not required.
You might want to list this module.
Excellent list. I didn't
Excellent list. I didn't even know of some of the modules existed!!!
There's one module I use extensively: Workflow.
No one else seems to mention it. So if you don't use Workflow, what do people prefer?
Subir Ghosh
www.newswatch.in
www.write2kill.in
Subir Ghosh
www.newswatch.in
www.write2kill.in
Workflow and Rules
Great suggestion – of course the Workflow module should be on the list.
An alternative is the Rules module, which could be described as Workflow on steroids.
I'll update the wiki when I get time (I'm on my non-Drupal work now), but if anyone beats me to it I'll be more than happy.
Cheers!
//Johan Falk, Sweden
Exactly!
I just came to wonder why the Workflow module isn't included, to find Subir already pointing that out.
If you're wondering what use case(s) the module may be used for in newspaper websites, the most apparent one is mimicking traditional editorial cycle of print newspapers. For example, an article may run through the following workflows:
HTHs.
Added!
Great suggestion. I added Workflow, along with Rules and an explicit reference to Views Bulk Operations – these now go into the section Workflow and automating.
Feel free to edit the list if something should be updated!
Cheers,
//Johan Falk, NodeOne, Sweden
Awesome list! Helped me a
Awesome list!
Helped me a lot.