The Drupal core Media Library module provides an enhanced user interface for locating Media entities and attaching them to an article. It's a drop-in replacement for the default entity reference widget which uses a not very intuitive autocomplete field. Using the Drupal core Media Library module requires minimal configuration.
If you want to provide content creators with a gallery-like library of Media entities that they can browse through in order to find the ones they want to add to their content, the Media Library is the easiest way to do it. It can be configured to work with both Media fields and the CKEditor powered WYSIWYG editor commonly used for editing the body field of Drupal nodes. There's really no reason not to use it.
In addition to providing a better UI for locating existing Media entities, the Media Library provides a way to create new Media entities right from the content creation form. This prevents an otherwise confusing requirement where Media entities need to be created, via a different set of forms, before they can be used.
In this tutorial we'll:
- Install and configure the Media Library module to work with Media fields
- Use the user interface provided by the Media Library to improve the experience of finding and selecting Media entities to associate with a piece of content
By the end of this tutorial you'll know how to replace the default entity reference widget used for selecting Media entities with the much improved Media Library UI.
Media entities, like any content entity, work great with all the different features Drupal provides for changing the way things are displayed: view modes, Layout Builder, theme templates, and more. We're big fans of using view modes to create a component-like design system where entity types have view modes representing the different context in which they're displayed. Then we theme the view modes. This works great for displaying Media entities associated with a page and for changing the way that Media assets are displayed within the Media Library browser.
In this tutorial we'll:
- Create Hero and Sidebar view modes for Media entities
- Configure the Image Media type to use the new view modes and style each one differently
- Use the new view modes to render Image Media assets within a Layout
- Update the Media library view mode that's used by the Media Library browser to display additional information alongside the thumbnails used when selecting Media to attach to a page
By the end of this tutorial you should be able to change the way that Media assets are displayed by using view modes and display formatters in a Drupal site.
It's not uncommon to patch, or customize, contributed modules during the lifetime of a site. It's important to know if you've done so when planning for a migration since you'll want to be sure that you don't lose any customizations when you start using an updated version of a module.
In this tutorial we will walk through using the Hacked! module to check for any alterations to your Drupal code base.
The Drupal-to-Drupal migration system is still a work in progress. As such, there are a few things that simply don't work, and a few others that still have kinks to be ironed out. In this tutorial, we'll look at some of the common hang-ups that we've encountered, the status of resolving those issues, and what your options are in the meantime.
In Drupal, there are 3 modules in core related to migration that you'll want to know about. These modules can help you import data into Drupal from disparate sources, or upgrade from a previous version of Drupal.
In this tutorial we'll look at what each of these core migration modules do, and talk about when you'll need to use them.
In this tutorial we will run a site migration using Drush, and understand how to deal with any failures that occur.
The Migrate Drupal UI module allows you to execute a migration from older versions of Drupal to the latest version of Drupal. In this tutorial we'll:
- Run a full Drupal 6 to latest-Drupal (Drupal 8 or 9) Migration from the UI
- Explore the user interface as it exists
- Understand how we can deal with the output from our migration
Whether you're updating from Drupal 6 or Drupal 7, or importing data from some other source, you need to know about the migrate system in the latest version of Drupal. This tutorial provides an overview and links to additional tutorials where you can learn more about how all the individual parts work.
By the end of this tutorial you should have a better understanding of what the migration system is capable of and know where to find more information about how to use it.
To follow along with the rest of the migration tutorials you'll want to make sure you understand the following concepts and terms as they relate to Drupal migrations.
In this tutorial, we'll take look at the basic components of a migration and familiarize ourselves with some of the concepts and terminology needed to understand how the system works. We'll cover:
- What is a migration?
- Migration templates
- The extract, transform, load process
- Destinations and sources
- Additional Drupalisms
By the end of this tutorial you should be able to identify the various components that a migration is composed of, and explain at a basic level what each is responsible for.
There's a whole ecosystem of contributed modules that build on the Migrate API in Drupal core. They do things like provide Drush commands for working with migrations, add new sources (CSV, JSON, etc.), add new destinations, provide code examples, and fill in other gaps. Think of these as the tools of the trade you’ll use to do your work. In most cases you’ll use these to do the migration, but then once the migration is complete you can remove them from your project.
Then there are the contributed modules that add features to your site. Like Flag, Paragraphs, or Webform. These modules often contain migration-related code that is intended to help make it easier to handle data specific to these modules. There is code in the Flag module, for example, that can help with knowing how to extract flagging records from Drupal 7, and for transforming that data into the format the module expects it to be in for Drupal 10. You might end up having to tweak it a bit, but at least you’re not starting from scratch.
In this tutorial we'll:
- Look at some of the most commonly used toolset modules.
- Explain what you can expect to find in standard contributed modules related to migrations.
By the end of this tutorial you should have a better sense of the various tools available to you for authoring a migration.
Before you begin a Drupal 6 or 7 (source) to Drupal 9 or 10 (destination) migration there are a number of things you should consider. Taking the time to plan your migration will help to ensure that you're successful. In this tutorial we'll take a high-level look at:
- Evaluating your existing Drupal 6/7 site for migration feasibility
- Preparing your source Drupal 6/7 site for a migration
- Preparing the destination Drupal site you're migrating to
By the end of this tutorial you should be ready to start assessing the feasibility of performing a successful migration, and begin making a migration plan.
Planning for a migration is essential. In our collective experience we've never once seen someone sit down and execute a migration flawlessly on their first attempt. Migrations involve preparing and analyzing your source data, building a new website that data can be migrated into, and lots of testing, rolling back, and testing again, in order to get everything right. By the end of this tutorial you should be ready to start planning for your own Drupal migration project, and have a better understanding of the challenges of migrating from one system to another.
When preparing to migrate from an older version of Drupal (Drupal 7 or previous) to the latest version of Drupal (Drupal 8 or later) you'll need to determine if the contributed modules you use are ready to go. The Upgrade Status module can give you a list of all the modules installed on your site, and information about the availability of a latest Drupal version. It's not perfect, and will still require some manual research for some modules, but it is a great start towards helping you plan for your migration.
In this tutorial we'll:
- Install the Upgrade Status module and use it to generate a status report
- Review the generated report
- Talk about using the Contrib Tracker project, and other methods for getting more details about the status of upgrades for any module
By the end of this tutorial you should be able to evaluate all the installed modules on your existing Drupal site and determine the status of a module release that is compatible with the latest version of Drupal.
As new major versions of Drupal are released, contributed modules need to be updated for compatibility. As of right now (October 2021) there are a lot of contributed modules with a Drupal 8 release and a patch in the queue to make them work with Drupal 9. However, there's no official Drupal 9 compatible release for the module, so the module can't be installed with Composer. This creates a circular problem where you can't composer require
the module if you don't patch it, but you can't patch it until after it's been downloaded by Composer.
To help solve this common issue, Drupal.org provides a lenient Composer endpoint that publishes all modules as compatible with Drupal 9 regardless of whether that's true or not. By using it, you can composer require
the module and then use cweagans/composer-patches
to apply any necessary patches.
In this tutorial we'll:
- Add the lenient Composer endpoint to our project's composer.json file
-
composer require
a non-Drupal 9 compatible module - Use Composer to download and apply a patch that makes the module Drupal 9 compatible
By the end of this tutorial you should be able to use contributed modules that require a patch to be compatible with Drupal 9.
Layout Builder is one of many different approaches to handling editorial layouts in Drupal. Now that it's stable, and part of Drupal core, we expect to see it become the dominant approach over time. However, as with most things in Drupal, there are multiple ways to solve the problem of creating component based flexible layouts that can be administered via the user interface.
It's a good idea to understand the different approaches and know what's available.
When it comes to component based design and ability to construct flexible layouts, it is important to understand the benefits and risks of the most popular techniques: Paragraphs, Bricks, entities and view modes, and Layout Builder. Understanding which approach fits the needs of your project best can be critical for its success in the future.
In this tutorial we'll look at some common approaches to administering layouts in a way that gives content editors controls including:
- Drupal core's Layout Builder
- Using core's entity reference fields and view modes
- The contributed Paragraphs module
- The contributed Bricks module
By the end of this tutorial you should have a broad overview of the different popular approaches to creating editor-controlled layouts.
In their simplest form layout plugins in Drupal Layout Builder define the part of the content output that can't be changed. For example a three column layout will consist of three equal columns every time an editor decides to use it as the layout section. The editor can place whatever they want into the three columns. But they can not change the overall layout. This restricts editorial capabilities of using layout plugins since in real life a three column layout may need to consist of a wider middle column and narrower side columns, allow for column headings, or other customizations.
This flexibility is accomplished by creating, and exposing, configuration options for layout plugins in Drupal's Layout Builder. In more advanced cases, the we can take this flexibility further by exposing an interface editors to dynamically define layout plugins.
In this tutorial we'll:
- Learn how to use custom PHP classes in the layout plugin annotation
- Learn what annotations properties can be used for custom layout declaration
- Define the concept of derivatives and outline scenarios for using them
- How to declare static single layouts using YAML format
By the end of this tutorial you'll learn advanced ways of declaring configurable custom layout plugins.
A new favorite page-building and design module in Drupal's core software, Layout Builder makes it possible to create content-type-specific layouts. All nodes of the associated content type will display their content using the defined layout. This allows site builders to display a page's content in two columns, or three, or two columns with a full-width banner image, etc. Then you can place the content type's fields and Drupal blocks into the sections of the defined layout, all via the Drupal UI.
In this tutorial we'll:
- Enable the Drupal Layout Builder and Layout Discover modules
- Create a new two-column flexible layout via the user interface
- Update the Basic page content type so that all nodes use the new two-column layout
By the end of this tutorial you should know how to create a new flexible layout, and apply it to one or more content types.