Hi everyone. I have been doing a lot of research into using drupal as a system whereby students are able to create their own portfolios and send them to potential employers (as part of my phD). I am using Drupal 7. I am quite advanced in most web based languages, but I have never used Drupal before. My research has led me to this website and this fantastic group.
I have been doing a lot of tutorials, and I like to think I can now create a basic webpage in Drupal. However, this is only a webpage which displays information to the user, not getting them to input their own information. I also discovered today that Drupal development can also involve editing a modules php code, which looks like an interesting challenge.
At this point I have come to a bit of a standstill. I know what I want to do, but I am finding very little information on how to do it (especially with Drupal 7). Hopefully I will be able to get help from you guys.
My first issue is that I wanted to create a profile page. I am aiming to get it like a tabbed pane within the profile page. The tabs will be like About me, Contact Info, Education etc. So, what I done was install the Profile2 Module as Profile has depreciated. I then created a Profile2 for each of these tabs. Now, I have several individual profiles which are displayed within my top navigation. I was wondering if anyone knew how I could take all these seperate profiles and turn them into a tabbed display?
Many thanks
Nick
Comments
Needs will vary based on several criteria
Hello, Nick,
The needs of your site will vary based on how the portfolios are created by your site members, and the format they will use to send them to anyone who needs to access them.
We've done a fair amount of work with portfolios in the past (going back to the olden days of 4.7 :) ) - these two screencasts show a couple alternatives in D6, and how the possibilities have shifted over time.
This screencast is from 2008: http://funnymonkey.com/drupal-as-portfolio-platform - a lot has changed since then.
This is more recent, from January 2011: http://funnymonkey.com/open-content-where-you-want-it - while the focus is on an open content platform, the functionality is very similar/nearly identical to what you'd need for a portfolio.
In D7, we'll be eliminating the use of the book module, as it has some issues that make it less than ideal.
FunnyMonkey
FunnyMonkey is actually one
FunnyMonkey is actually one of the websites I have been following very closely, infact, I think its the best website I have come across. I have explored using Drupal as an E-Portfolio platform and it was very helpful. I tried doing it in Drupal 7 but as I am sure you are aware, some of the modules are not functional in this version. I will take a look at the other link you provided as this looks really helpful. Out of interest, do you have any plans of producing a Drupal 7 screencast of something similar to using Drupal as a Portfolio Platform?
Cheers
Nick
When we build this out in D7,
When we build this out in D7, we'll likely create it as an install profile, with some screencasts to document some of the features and the config.
Cheers,
Bill
FunnyMonkey
Kool. Can I quickly ask
Kool. Can I quickly ask something. Should I be looking into using existing modules, or is the best approach to develop my own? I have a lot of programming knowledge, so it shouldnt be difficult to do. I dont know what the best approach is though. As I say, at the moment I am using the Profile2 Module to create a users profile page. I have several different profile pages at the moment (About me, Contact, Education etc) and I want to bring them all into one location, on the same page. It appears that the module doesnt work well with other modules, so doing this is challenging. I was thinking that if I develop my own module, I can create a page which has tabs, each tab representing a category for the profile. Then within each tag are the fields which the user can enter their info. I dont know if this is possible to do, but it would be confienient if I could do this.
Cheers
Nick
Use existing modules, and use wireframes
Before you get too far into execution, create a series of wireframes that show what you want your site members to do.
Focus just on the experience you want them to have, and what they will need to do.
Then, once that is right, start looking at the code that will allow you to execute. But with that said, there is a lot of code out there, and the theming layer is incredibly flexible, so an understanding of what should be done via code and what should be done via theming is another decision to make (albeit one that can be nailed down until later in the design/build process).
Also, if this is your first foray into Drupal, I'd recommend building an initial proof of concept to help refine your idea and get familiar with Drupal.
Then, once you have your concept nailed down, and a greater familiarity with Drupal, you can rebuild from the ground up. This will help eliminate any architectural shortcomings of an initial build.
FunnyMonkey