Current advice for developing a newspaper or magazine site with Drupal

The Livingstone site is impressive! I notice some of your previous posts where you have mentioned other work you've done, hopefully we can create something as good one day.

At this point, we are looking for information about Drupal, capabilities, and advice on possible approaches. These are all questions I need answers to before working with anyone or any company, so bear with me while I chase down answers :)

Best regards, and thanks!
Chris

Thanks RAS, thunder hasn't appeared on my radar before, I appreciate the heads up.

I've been hesitant about distributions in the past, though there are obvious benefits to getting moving quickly. On a related note, I'm also a bit surprised how quickly Drupal 8 has gained traction, especially seeing something as apparently matured as thunder.

Cheers,
Chris

Hello,

Am enjoying this thread so I figured I'd chime in. Actually check out thunderdemo.com to get a provisioned site on platform.sh, from some integrator in Suisse I think. The Thunder distribution is maintained by Burda, a major EU publisher. They've done a good job curating a drupal 8 configuration that would work well for a publisher. I'm looking to put together a pilot myself in the next month or two.

As for themes, there are a few premium themes from 3rd party front end developers that tout utility in news and magazine settings. Here's one as an example: http://bit.ly/2GLu2lE. - caveat, I have NOT tested this or any other pre-made theme, although part of my experimentation would be to see how I can get one to work with Thunder.

Otherwise, if this strategy doesn't work, I agree with @akempler's post regarding building your theme from scratch starting from Bootstrap, although of course you'll need a front end developer to help you with that. With regard to Thunder, you could always just look at their configuration and model it yourself - I've never been a fan of distributions myself but I'm liking what Burda has done and am going to give it a go in 2018.

Finally, you DEFINITELY want to get on the drupal 8.5 party train, with moderation and media in core, there is some really powerful mojo coming the way of publishers under the hood! :-)

Hi Adam,

Just reading through everyone's posts, it's becoming obvious that I'll need to follow your closing advice: develop a proof of concept. I don't know what I don't know, and even with just one post more and more questions are coming up.

As I noted to Joe (above), I am happily surprised by the support for Drupal 8.x. When I last worked on public content sites for clients (Drupal 4/5), we would usually only recommend platforms/tech that was at least a generation old.

You mention Bootstrap 4 - is that with a Drupal installation?

While we are looking forward to writing content ourselves, the reality is that we will be working with a variety of contributors, so having a smooth/easy pathway and interface for writers, and effective content management/workflow will be a must.

This will certainly be a learning curve!

All the best,
Chris

Hi Joe, mind if I DM you to find out how things went at Nashville?

Cheers,
Chris

I appreciate your input Steve, thanks!

I saw another post (may have been yours in fact??) that mentioned common standards - I sensed a tone of resignation about them. I will check them out to make sure we are compatible. I was also reading up about ad servers (I left advertising before they invented the internet - seriously!).

I don't think scalability will be an issue, we'll be pretty much a Ma and Pa operation....at least for a while. I'm not one for owning the world, just making the most of our little part of it.

I had brief experience with Views and Panels a few years ago; undoubtedly they have improved over time. Queues I don't know....back to the research pile.

I have some trepidation over Drupal versions, for exactly the reason you mention: some modules are compatible, others still catching up. But it was ever the case with open source. Luckily we don't need the kind of integration you mention for the foreseeable future.

Are you still neck deep in the digital news realm and Drupal, or have you found things have become more settled as the industry has matured?

Thanks again,
Chris

The examples above should provide a glimpse into the types of sites powered by Thunder. Ideally stakeholders and community members could influence the roadmap and collaborate on additional targeted child distributions, installation profiles and themes. That would enable smaller publishers and independent media to deliver powerful sites within their budget.