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.
Render API Overview
FreeThe Render API consists of two parts: structured arrays that provide data and hints about how that data should be rendered, and a rendering pipeline that can be used to render these arrays into various output formats. Understanding at least the basics of how the Render API works, the difference between elements and properties, and the concept of callback functions is an integral part of learning Drupal.
In this tutorial we'll:
- Look at the fundamentals of the Drupal Render API
- Point to additional material to provide more detail about the inner workings of the Render API and how content is output in Drupal
The core structure of Drupal's Render API is the render array, which is a hierarchical associative array containing data to be rendered and properties describing how the data should be rendered. As a module developer you'll use render arrays to describe the content your module controls in order to output it on a page as HTML, or as part of a response in another format like JSON. As a theme developer, you'll manipulate render arrays in order to affect the way content is output on the page.
In this tutorial we'll learn:
- What render arrays are and why they exist
- The basic format of a render array
- What "properties" and "elements" signify in the context of a render array
- Where to find more information about how to create a render array to describe your own content
By the end of this tutorial you should be able to understand when you need to use a render array, recognize one when you see it, and know where to get more detailed information about render array formatting specifics.
One of the central components of Drupal's Render API is render elements. You can think of them as prepackaged render arrays or shortcuts you can use to describe common things, like tables, links, and form elements, in a consistent way. In this tutorial we'll take a more in-depth look at the use of the #type
property in render arrays in order to answer questions like:
- What are render elements, and what is their use case?
- Where can I find more information about available element types?
By the end of this tutorial you should be able to identify individual render element types within a larger render array, find the relevant documentation for specific types of render elements, and explain the use case for render elements.
In this tutorial we'll look at how you can use the #theme
property of a render array to define custom HTML. With this information, module developers can use render arrays to define content, and theme developers can understand how elements in a render array are converted to HTML and which templates they can override to change the output for a specific element.
Learn how to:
- Use
hook_theme()
to define a new theme hook and define default values for variables - Create a corresponding Twig template file that outputs the variables and any custom HTML markup
- Use a preprocess function to add additional variables for the Twig template file you created
- Use the new theme hook in conjunction with a
#theme
property in a render array to link your Twig template file to actual content
By the end of this tutorial you should know how to define new templates to output content as HTML. You should also have a better understanding of how Twig template files are linked to elements in a render array.
As a theme developer you can extend an existing asset library to include custom CSS and/or JavaScript from your theme. This is useful when you want to add styles or behaviors to components provided by Drupal core or another module.
Sometimes there are CSS or JavaScript asset libraries attached to the page by Drupal core, a contributed module, or another theme, that do something you don't like, and you want to change it or even exclude it all together. There are a couple of different ways that themes can override, alter, or extend, an existing asset library in order to modify the CSS and JavaScript that get attached the page by other code belonging to another theme or module.
In this tutorial we'll learn how to:
- Extend an existing asset library using
libraries-extend
, so that our custom CSS and JavaScript is included whenever that library is used. - Override an existing asset library using
libraries-override
, to alter the definition of the library, and replace or exclude individual assets (or the entire library).
By the end of this tutorial you should be able to use your custom theme to override, extend, or alter any of the asset libraries added to the page by another theme or module.
Drupal core is built with performance and scalability in mind. It is Fast by Default. But performance is often a by-product of your specific application, and depending on how you're using Drupal, you can further optimize your site using contributed modules. These modules range from debugging utilities to cache-related modules.
It's worthwhile to have a general idea of what's available in the contributed module space. And, when you need to address your site's unique performance needs, it helps if you already know about existing solutions.
In this tutorial we'll:
- Look at a few popular contributed modules that improve Drupal's performance
- Learn about the benefits these modules may provide to your site
- Provide tips on how to configure these modules
By the end of this tutorial you should be able to list some popular performance related Drupal modules and describe their use case.
The performance optimization settings and modules provided by Drupal core are intended to work for the broadest possible set of use cases. From an administrator's perspective they provide minimal configuration options, and are designed to just work by being enabled. But behind that simplicity are some powerful features that will help speed up any Drupal-powered application.
The core Dynamic Page Cache and Internal Page Cache modules are designed to provide a base cache setup for any site. These modules are responsible for the static page cache, dynamic page cache, and lazy loading optimizations.
For developers, Drupal provides a complete and well-designed Cache API. You can, and should, integrate it into your custom code. This integration includes defining the cacheability of any content your module outputs so that Drupal can be smart about how that affects how and when a page that incorporates the output can be cached -- as well as storing and retrieving the results of complex or long-running operations. The API also helps with setting appropriate HTTP headers for the responses Drupal generates for each request so that the user's browser and other layers in the stack can appropriately cache the output.
The entire system is flexible, and there are many contributed modules that can aid in making the default caching system even faster for specific use cases.
In this tutorial, we'll:
- Learn about the caching-related modules in Drupal core
- Review the Drupal core performance settings and recommended values
By the end of this tutorial you should be familiar with the Drupal core modules responsible for caching, their settings, and recommended values.
There's no magical set of right tools to use to monitor a Drupal site's performance and health. While thinking about performance monitoring, you need to optimize your approach depending on the number of applications you manage, their complexity, business needs, and the skill-set of your team. Based on these factors, you may choose to use one of the core or contributed modules, go with third-party solutions and services, or some combination of both.
Drupal core comes with a couple of modules that allow you to monitor the health and performance of the site including Syslog, Database Logging, and the status reports provided by the System module. There are also numerous community-contributed modules, a sampling of which we'll cover here.
In this tutorial, we'll:
- List some contributed modules that are commonly used for monitoring a Drupal site
- Provide an overview of what each module does
By the end of this tutorial you should be able to list a few contributed modules that might be useful for monitoring your Drupal application and define what each one does.
No one likes to wait for a slow site to load. Not me, not you, and definitely not search engines. And the effect of site load times on things like SEO, user bounce rates, purchase intent, and overall satisfaction are only going to become more pronounced over time.
Drupal is a modern web framework that is capable of serving millions of users. But every site is unique, and while Drupal tries hard to be fast out of the box, you'll need to develop a performance profile, caching strategy, and scaling plan that are specific to your use case in order to be truly blazing fast.
Drupal site performance depends on multiple components, from hardware setup and caching system configuration to contributed modules, front-end page weight, and CDNs. Experienced Drupal developers looking to optimize their applications know where to start looking for potential savings. They can manipulate settings and combinations of these components to achieve the desired results. Our goal with this set of tutorials is to help explain the process and provide you with the insight that comes with experience.
In this tutorial we'll:
- Introduce high-level performance concepts for Drupal that we'll then cover in more detail elsewhere
- Provide an overview of the main Drupal performance components.
By the end of this tutorial, you should understand what components around your Drupal application are responsible for site performance.