Last month we wrapped up DrupalVolCon in Antwerp: it was an awesome community event with interesting sessions, lots of informal networking & learning, and loads of Drupal geekery. Most of the VolCon sessions were pretty advanced, aimed at experienced Drupal developers & themers.
One of the sessions that definitely sparked an interest among many of us, was the presentation on code driven development by Antonio De Marco of Nuvole. Not too long after Antonio's presentation, it became clear that there was sufficient interest in a follow-up event, specifically aimed at code driven development for Drupal.
As an immediate response, Krimson organized a session on the subject.
When: Thursday, 27th of May, 19u30 - 22u30
Where: Krimson office, Zénobe Grammestraat 34, 2018 Antwerp
How to participate/present: sign up on the Drupal.be website
What is code driven development?
In short, code driven development aims at having stuff that can live in your database, in code. This 'stuff' can be configuration options, but also views, panels, content type definitions, ... One of the great advantages of having these things in code is that they become reusable components that can be deployed across different sites. Code driven development can make a developer's workflow more maintainable, solid and scalable.
How does code driven development work in Drupal?
The Drupal world has seen the emergence of code driven development techniques through a number of projects, such as Features (http://drupal.org/project/features) and Chaos tool suite (http://drupal.org/project/ctools). A lot still depends on how these tools are actually used: good code conventions (see the Kit project: http://drupal.org/project/kit), well defined features boundaries and other best practices can really make the difference at the end of the day.
During this session we would like to:
- Present real use cases of code driven development, covering, for each of them:
* Development workflow: features' creation, update/revert process, tools (eg. Drush - http://drupal.org/project/drush).
* Features' design: boundaries, what goes where, ...
* Reusability of code: feature templates, extendable features, ... - Share best practices.
- Talk about current limitations of code driven development in Drupal and brainstorm about possible enhancements.
Please note:
* This event will be mainly English-spoken.
* A basic understanding of features (http://drupal.org/project/features) is advised.
* Follow #codepower on Twitter for updates & info on (Drupal) code driven development.
Hope to see you in Antwerp on May 27th!