Posted by topdillon on April 20, 2011 at 2:32pm
Well I did it. I finally published my first Drupal site. I am fishing for some reassurance that it is not bad for a rookie. I am not a PHP coder, but understand it some since I can code a bit in VBA and ASP.
Roughly 160 modules (!), including Ubercart.Hosted on Hot Drupal. This is a low volume site for my in-laws family business--very niche. Yes rock gardening fanatics readily buy their plants online/mailorder and have them shipped in a box.
Fusion subtheme
One blog is a feed.
Product pages use Display Suite
Comments
Happy Easter everyone!
Clearly I spend too much time staring into a computer when I am at home. I'm still fishing for some comments on my first Drupal site.
Launching any project is a
Launching any project is a success in my books. Everything looks in order to me but the real test of a site is whether or not it is accomplishing the goals you set out.
My first reaction was "160 modules!!!" - that can be quite a strain but it looks like you have everything all cached up so I trust performance isn't an issue?
You many also consider adding in the "nodewords" module to help you get some meta data like keywords and description in to your page content. While keywords aren't really important any more to google, accurate description and page titles can be of some use.
The "add to cart" button at the bottom of this page seems a long way off if you are at the top of the page - but may be a necessary evil for that long order form.
http://www.wrightmanalpines.com/catalog/multiple_plant_order
Some fancy css/js could make that float on the right and be always present.
Thanks Andrew
I think a high number of modules = lack of php programming ability a lot of the time. It is certainly a factor in my case. Thanks for the nodewords tip. I started with it, but dropped it out when I found it could be procrastinated. I really tried to reduce module count. But I had a list of functionality that needed and a list of functionality that would be helpful. Multiple plant order is from vbo and uc_views_bulk_operations. I had a similar page on my old site, but each plant had a quantity box beside it. Know anybody who can wrangle that sort of thing? People actually liked the mpo page on the old site, so I would like to recreate it completely.
Looks Great
I agree with Andrew, any launch is a good thing, especially an ecom site as your first!
My first thought was also 160!!! Holy moly! But if it works, it works. As long as it's not bogged down and caching properly.
Did you use a free theme?
Otherwise. the functionality is definitely all there! Great first website.
Brandon
I used Fusion for a theme and
I used Fusion for a theme and just created a stock subtheme. Then I messed a bit in page.tpl.php to align the header elements. Everything else is standard Drupal theming...modules, a bit of custom modular stuff, css, even 3 module hacks (documented).
I had started out on my own vps at Linode for 6 months during development. Great plan, great education, but beyond my skill level in sooo many ways. Performance is an issue at 160 modules, so since I am not a sysadmin type, I moved to a hybrid (shared) vps at Hot Drupal so I could rely on someone who knows that stuff. They have been extremely helpful.