Before you can get started synchronizing configuration between instances of your site, you'll need to create a new instance or "clone" of your Drupal site.

By the end of this tutorial, you should know:

• Why it's necessary to clone your site if you want to manage configuration between environments
• How to find your site's universally unique identifier (UUID)
• What to consider when setting up a directory structure for your project
• How to clone a Drupal site

Drupal creates a line of separation between what is content and what is configuration. The line is such that content is stored only in the database, whereas configuration is maintained by the configuration management system. While cached to the database for performance reasons, configuration can be thought of primarily living in the sync directory as a series of flat files.

This sounds like a perfectly clear distinction in theory, but there are several times where interdependencies appear between content and configuration. Understanding the key places where these interface can help prevent confusion and "disappearing" settings due to a lack of understanding.

Modules like Devel or Stage File Proxy offer key advantages when developing locally, but should never be enabled on a production site. This poses a problem for Drupal as which modules are enabled is a configuration. Compounding this problem is the configuration provided by these modules, as well as key configuration that must be set differently locally compared to production.

Fortunately, the Configuration Split module provides a means to accomplish all of these goals. Once set up, configuration can be exported in one or more "splits", enabling you to target different configurations for different environments or situations.

In this tutorial, you'll learn about the two types of configuration data: simple configuration and configuration entities. By the end of this tutorial, you should have a better understanding of which type of configuration to use in your module.

In this tutorial we’re going to walk through the process of creating a custom configuration entity in Drupal in a custom module. We'll be using Drupal Console's generate:entity:config command to create and update the files in our Transcode Profile example module. After Drupal Console has generated and updated the files for our configuration entity, we'll walk through each file and see how they define data structure, metadata, an administrative interface, and menu links for a configuration entity in Drupal.

By the end of this tutorial, you should be able to:

• Use Drupal Console to generate a configuration entity
• Identify files associated with a configuration entity and summarize the purpose and function of the code inside each file
• Find other examples of configuration entities in Drupal core

As we learned in Configuration Data Types, simple configuration is suitable for storing module settings as boolean values, integers, or text strings in one or more key/value pairs. In this tutorial, we'll walk through creating a schema and providing default configuration to store initial settings that a module needs to function.

Drupal's configuration system helps to solve the problem of moving changes in configuration from development to production. It does this in two ways: by providing a unified way to store configuration and by providing a process by which configuration changes can be imported and exported between instances of the same site. The configuration system is the result of work completed within the Configuration Management Initiative (CMI).

In this introduction, we'll provide:

• An overview of Drupal's configuration system
• Key concepts that you should know about

Using Drush to work with the Drupal Configuration System is straightforward when working locally. Navigate to the directory containing your site, then issue whatever Drush command you need.

Things become more complicated when multiple environments become involved. Often, a configuration change will need to be made on the production ("live") site and then need to be persisted to a Git repository later. When this occurs, Drush once more provides a solution in the form of the config-pull subcommand.

Note: Drush 8 and the latest version use different methods and file types for configuration files. This tutorial will demonstrate methods that are compatible with the latest version of Drush with notes related to Drush 8.

There are some administrative UI tools for managing configuration, but some tasks can only be completed with Drush. As a site administrator, you will find Drush an indispensable tool for managing configuration between instances of the same site. Furthermore, Drush includes integration with Git in certain commands, enabling you to create a configuration workflow with Drush that also uses best practices in version control.

By the end of this lesson you should be able to:

• Get the status of a site's configuration
• List configuration on a site
• View configuration objects
• Set values for a specific key inside a configuration object
• Edit a configuration object in active configuration without needing a configuration form
• Integrate a Git workflow with Drush

When working on configuration in a module, whether as part of a migration that uses Migrate Plus configuration entities, or while developing custom configuration entities, you'll often need to re-import the configuration stored in the .yml files of the modules config/install/ or config/optional/ directories. This is tricky though, because Drupal only reads in those default configuration settings when the module is first enabled. So any changes you make to those files after the module has been installed will not be reflected without these workarounds.

Knowing how to do this can improve the developer experience of adding (or debugging) the default configuration that's provided with a module. Or for anyone using Migrate Plus configuration entities as part of a migration.

In this tutorial we'll:

• Learn about the Configuration Development module
• Look at how you can use Drush to perform a partial configuration import
• Write an implementation of hook_uninstall() to remove a module's configuration when it's uninstalled

By the end of this tutorial you should be able to re-import the configuration provided by a module without having to uninstall and then reinstall the module.

Now that we have some default simple configuration stored in a settings YAML file, let's utilize it in a form that our site administrators can use to update those values. We'll make use of some services and methods in Drupal's Configuration API in order to retrieve, update, and save simple configuration values with a form.

The Configuration Manager module gives you as an administrator the ability to import and export configuration items on different instances of a Drupal site using a graphical user interface. In this tutorial, we'll take a tour of the Configuration Manager and the administrative interface it provides.

By the end of this lesson you will be able to:

• Access administrative pages for Import, Export, and Synchronize
• Find and configure permissions for Configuration Manager
• Identify the 3 primary actions of configuration management and how to perform them using the UI

While the administrative UI for Configuration synchronization certainly provides a simple and effective means to export and import configuration, it is by no means the preferred method. The Drush command line utility provides the same functionality without the need for a web interface or the need to log in.

The real power of the Workflows module is the fact that you can define your own custom workflows. Creating a new custom workflow requires adding a new workflow, and configuring the states and transitions that workflow will use.

In this tutorial we'll:

• Create and configure a new workflow
• Define and configure a set of states and transitions for the workflow
• Understand some best practices to keep in mind when defining workflows

By the end of this tutorial you'll be able to define your own custom workflows for any use-case.

The Content Moderation module exposes data about a content item's moderation state to Views. That allows us to use that information when building custom views. The data includes a moderation state field, filter, and a relationship to the moderation state entity.

In this tutorial we'll:

• Build a new view that uses the moderation state field and lists all revisions for a content item
• Display that view as a block which can be shown on any content page

By the end of this tutorial you'll know how to use the moderation state field in a view.

The Content Moderation module allows you to apply an editorial workflow to your content. Doing so changes some of the ways that content managers will mark an item as published, archive an item, or create new revisions.

In this tutorial we'll:

• Look at the changes to the content editing form that happen when you apply an editorial workflow
• Learn how to edit a piece of content to change its state, and transition it through the editorial workflow

By the end of this tutorial you'll know how to create, and manage, content in an editorial workflow.

Many sites are built around their content, especially Drupal sites. To manage this content, a strict editorial workflow is often highly desirable to make sure the content is drafted, reviewed, published, updated, and archived when ready.

In this tutorial we'll:

• Discuss the various components you'll need to define before you can start building a custom editorial workflow
• Provide an example editorial workflow plan

By the end of this tutorial you will better understand the use case for content moderation, and be able to create an editorial workflow plan for your use-case.

In order to enforce that an editorial workflow is applied to a specific content type you need to update the workflow's configuration. Then, depending on your needs, you may also need to configure new user roles, giving them permission to transition a content item from one state to another.

This process works for any Content Moderation type workflow -- including the Editorial workflow that Drupal provides and any custom workflows you've created.

In this tutorial we'll:

• Update a workflow so that its rules are applied to a content type
• Review the list of permissions provided by a workflow and see how we can set things up to restrict certain users to only perform specific transitions

By the end of this tutorial you will be able to configure a workflow so that it applies to one or more content types, and configure permissions so only users in a specific role can transition content items from one state to another.

When building views of moderated content there are some important things to be aware of. One is the difference between choosing Content or Content revisions as the base for your view. You should also know about some fields and filters added by the Content Moderation module.

In this tutorial we'll:

• Understand when, and why, to choose Content revisions as the base for your view instead of Content
• Learn about the fields, and filters, added by the Content Moderation module
• Learn how to update the view at admin/content/moderate that comes with the Content Moderation module to make it work with any workflow.

By the end of this tutorial you should understand the important concepts necessary to create views of moderated content.

Drupal has had revisions for a long, long time. However, they have often been under-utilized. Understanding how revisions work and how the Content Moderation module works with them is important to for being able to take full advantage of the systems features.

In this tutorial we'll:

• Explain what the different types of revisions are
• Understand when, and how, revisions are created

By the end of this tutorial you should have an understanding of what each type of revision is, how they're created, and how to work with them.