And who might you be?

Hey guys, Nick Sergeant here. I'm a native Canandaiguian down there in the Finger Lakes region. Currently residing in Webster, also working for GateHouse Media with that Pete guy above :).

I blog, too: http://nicksergeant.com

So I've used Drupal for quite a few things since I first discovered it about 7-8 months ago. Actually, scratch that, I discovered Drupal a couple years ago. However, my first look at it a couple years ago resulted in me saying "I'd rather write my own CMS". That was the stupid me.

About 7-8 months ago, however, we (GateHouse Media, collectively) started taking a closer look at Drupal. We decided to put forth efforts to build all of our special projects with Drupal.

So I read half of the Pro Drupal book and started building stuff. I did up http://bellascena.com with a Drupal backend as a personal project, and put together a multi-person blogging installation profile to be used to launch blog communities at the flip of a switch.

Currently, we're working on a few Drupal related projects, with one slated to launch early next month.

I work at RIT's Open Publishing Lab, a group which is developing interesting and innovative technologies which relate to print media. The lab's website, of course Drupal based, is http://opl.rit.edu/

I am currently involved in two projects with the lab, both of which involve Drupal. The first is, as I have mentioned, the Lab's website. The other project which I contribute to is "Innovation News". When completed, Innovation News will be a rapidly-produced, web-driven newspaper which will be utilized at RIT's Imagine RIT innovation festival. Writers covering the event will be able to easily publish their work using Drupal's interface. The data which they contribute will be taken from the website and (in a mostly-automated process) be printed and distributed in real time at the event. We are also looking into expanding this project to allow for mobile submissions and user-contributed content.

Both websites run Drupal 6 and make use of the many great themes and modules which have been contributed to the Drupal project.

I play one at RIT... or rather employ them at RIT

I'm one of the Directors of RIT's Open Publishing Lab -- where John works. I've also had the chance to work with Chris during some research at the D&C. And I know Andy from years back.

I'm a huge fan of Drupal and very interested in sharing some of the work we're (and by we I'm mean John and our other developers) doing here at RIT. John's done a great job of describing our most exciting Drupal project. We're also using it to create a Guide for Self Publishing.

I look forward to participating with the community! Thanks again for setting this up Andy.

• Matt

--
Matthew Bernius
Visiting Professor
School of Print Media, Rochester Institute of Technology
Co Director and Researcher
The Open Publishing Lab at RIT
69 Lomb Memorial Drive Rochester, NY 14623

     e. mbernius@mail.rit.edu 
   p. 585.475.5679
  f. 585.475.5336

Hello all, I'm glad I came across this today.

I'm a library technologies specialist with the Genesee Valley BOCES in Le Roy, NY but live in Rochester. Although I am trained as a K-12 library media specialist, I now find myself in a position of spending much of my time developing websites with Drupal. I have been using Drupal since 4.5 and have learned to code from dissecting the code in Drupal. Recently I finished a Library Technologies Report, with Christopher Harris (schoolof.info/) about using Drupal as a platform for library websites. As well, I have recently started maintaining a couple library-specific modules for Drupal: marc and isbn.

A couple of our websites (theming is not our strength):
http://sls.gvboces.org
http://fish4info.org

I'm looking forward to meeting up with local Drupal users.

I'd feel guilty if I didn't introduce myself, since I've joined the group, even though I'm not in the Rochester area at the moment. I grew up in Rochester, but I'm living in Wichita, Kansas now (long story, grad school, married now, etc). I still have family and friends in the area, and I thought I'd keep a finger on the pulse there just in case local events coincide with a visit.

Currently I'm working for a company called ESSDACK (Educational Services and Staff Development Association of Central Kansas) building sites like crazy using Drupal. The majority of the work I'm doing focuses on educational agencies -- a lot of work with small school districts that need inexpensive but highly functional web sites, educational agencies, professional learning communities, and so on.

-john jones

Hello All,

I just found this group, so I thought I would add to this discussion after joining. I work in the Rush Rhees Library and we are currently doing a website refresh with Drupal as our back-end. I have been working with Drupal since November, and have been very happy with it.

I also have a personal website at http://www.sitemech.com.

-- Bill Gavett

Hello all. Just wanted to introduce myself. I'm the web developer for Freetime Magazine (www.freetime.com). We launched the new drupal 5.5 site a couple months ago, though still working out some bugs.

Nice to see you again Nick.

Kelly

Hi, I'm actually an analog circuit designer and I do web development for fun as a hobby. I'm working on a couple of sites for friends and myself. I may be interested in some part time Drupal work in the future.

Can we setup a meeting according to the poll results? IMHO, we won't get everyone for the first meeting, but it doesn't matter anyway because everyone can eventually make subsequent meetings.

JSG, Here's my 2 cents on your question:

Lullabot.com is a good place for tutorials. A great place to find cutting edge info and fresh tutorials is drupal.org/planet. This is a news aggregator of drupal sites. I have read only one book, but it was excellent. Pro drupal development. Geared towards programmers, but the book helps you understand drupal by great insights into how it works internally.

-Imre

I am a High school teacher (Chemistry/Physics) and an amateur astronomer. The Astronomy club has an existing web site that needs to be re-written, which I hope to do in Drupal. I was a software developer for many years before switching careers, so coding is not a problem.

I have been very frustrated with the lack of documentation, in particular with Panels and Views (seems like these should be core!).

I am interested in meeting other users, and learning about their usage patterns and tools, and learning how to use things in Drupal.

Robert Brewington
East Rochester High School

Hi folks -

I have lived in Brighton since 2000. I crunch numbers and maintain databases for producers of Broadway shows....

My 'claim to fame' is that back in the late 1970s, I was the first to introduce computers to the producers and general managers....

My goal, with Drupal, is to push the theatre offices forward in their use of technology. I imagine a site for producers and managers to use - some info is open and shared for all of them (such as a forum where they can discuss problems they encountered at specific road venues), but then private sections for each particular office:

• structured databases (ie, when did ShowX play Boston, and who were the stars and how much did we make)
• centralized calendar for managing their staff (ie, Set Designer Y cannot be in Japan on April 3rd for Show 1 because he's still in London for Show 2)
• document management (how many musicians do we need for Show #10, license agreements, actor contracts, etc)
• tools (currency exchange widget)

So, I guess it's a hybrid of internet and intranet, but I don't really know what I'm talking about or if it's possible for me to create this or if I need to hire someone....

Marion in Rochester NY