Files located on server are changed rarer than database. So system administrator should make changes in both server and local copy. Then local copy with the applied changes should be packed and stored with other backup copies. .

These are the files which are often changed on server:

• file in ../files (for Drupa 5) and ../sites/default/files (for Drupal 6)

Revision Control

It is a good idea to make revision control. For example, list what changes for what files were made in a text file.

You can use any revision control version (CVS, SVN etc.). All these systems allow to log changes.

Modules list by folders names

If you have access to the site folders, a short cut to get know what modules are available on your site is to view them in the following folders::

• /root/sites/all/modules (additional modules should be here) and
• /root/modules (system default modules only should be here).

But you will not be able to get know if these modules are installed or no…

Modules list through site web-interface

You can view the list of installed and non-installed modules at:
http://you_site/admin/build/modules

If you see a blank page instead of the modules list, please read this article: Modules page doesn’t open.
If it doesn’t help, there is another way to get list of modules…

Modules list in database

If the site is not available or you have database dump only, you can view the list of modules directly in the database.

This request will show the list of installed modules:

SELECT name FROM system WHERE type=’module’ AND status=1

This request will show the list of all (installed or no) modules:

SELECT name FROM system WHERE type=’module’

Have fun!

So, you need to create custom Contact Us form, for example like this:

Let’s start!

First of all, enable Contact module. It is core Drupal module. It enables the use of personal and site-wide contact forms. The standard form created with Contact would contains the following fields: subject, name, email, message.

You can get know how to enable module here.

Then create custom module (for example, my_contact). You can get know more about creating custom modules from our articles or from Drupal documentation.

Place the following code into your new module:

function mycontact_theme() {

return array (‘mycontact’ => array (‘arguments’ => array (‘data’ => NULL ), ‘template’ => ‘tpl/mycontact’ ),

‘message’ => array (‘arguments’ => array (‘data’ => NULL ), ‘template’ => ‘tpl/message’ ) ); // Template file without extension.

}

function mycontact_form_alter(&$form, &$form_state, $form_id) {

if ($form_id === ‘contact_mail_page’) {

// pr($form);

unset ( $form ['subject'] );

$i == 0;

$form ['contact_information'] = array (‘#value’ => theme ( ‘mycontact’ ), ‘#weight’ => $i );$i++;

$form ['name'] = array (‘#type’ => ‘textfield’, ‘#title’ => t ( ‘Name’ ), ‘#maxlength’ => 255, ‘#required’ => TRUE, ‘#weight’ => $i );$i++;

$form ['company'] = array (‘#type’ => ‘textfield’, ‘#title’ => t ( ‘Company’ ), ‘#maxlength’ => 255, ‘#weight’ => $i);$i++;

$form ['phone'] = array (‘#type’ => ‘textfield’, ‘#title’ => t ( ‘Phone’ ), ‘#maxlength’ => 255, ‘#weight’ => $i);$i++;

$form ['mail'] = array (‘#type’ => ‘textfield’, ‘#title’ => t ( ‘Email’ ), ‘#maxlength’ => 255, ‘#required’ => TRUE, ‘#weight’ => $i );$i++;

$form ['sqft'] = array (‘#type’ => ‘textfield’, ‘#title’ => t ( ‘How much Space are you looking for Sq.Ft?’ ), ‘#maxlength’ => 255, ‘#weight’ => $i );$i++;

$form ['monthly-budget'] = array (‘#type’ => ‘textfield’, ‘#title’ => t ( ‘What is your monthly budget ?’ ), ‘#maxlength’ => 255, ‘#weight’ => $i );$i++;

$form ['business'] = array (‘#type’ => ‘textfield’, ‘#title’ => t ( ‘What type of business are you in ?’ ), ‘#maxlength’ => 255, ‘#weight’ => $i );$i++;

$form['message'] = array(‘#type’ => ‘textarea’,'#title’ => t(‘How can we help you ?’),’#weight’ => $i);$i++;

if($form['copy']){

$form['copy']['#weight'] = $i;$i++;

}

$form['submit']['#weight'] = $i;$i++;

$form['#submit'][0] = ‘mycontact_form_submit’;

}

}

function mycontact_form_submit($form, &$form_state){

$form_state['values']['subject'] = ‘Metro Manhattan Office Space – Contact Us’;

$form_state['values']['message'] = theme(‘message’, $form_state['values']);

contact_mail_page_submit($form, $form_state);

}

Functions mycontact_form_alter, mycontact_form_submit, mycontact_theme are standard and you can read about them in Drupal documentation. Please search for:

• drupal hook_form_alter
• drupal hook_form_submit
• drupal hook_theme

mycontact_form_alter catch the form and make the following changes there:

• Removes Subject field:

unset ( $form ['subject'] );

• Adds new fields to the form:

$form ['contact_information'] = array (‘#value’ => theme ( ‘mycontact’ ), ‘#weight’ => $i );$i++;

$form ['name'] = array (‘#type’ => ‘textfield’, ‘#title’ => t ( ‘Name’ ), ‘#maxlength’ => 255, ‘#required’ => TRUE, ‘#weight’ => $i );$i++;

etc.

mycontact_form_submit is my processor of the form. Once the user clicks Submit, form control is passed to my_contact module. My subject & message are added to the form. Then the form is passed to the standard control.

I also used two .tpl files for this form: one contains email template and the other – header for Contact Us form. Nevertheless, you can insert these directly to the module code.

Good luck!

Note: Keep in mind many of the tactics listed below are things that should be done from the get go. If you plan on implementing these tactics with a site that is already fully built, indexed and aged, then you are going to want to take different steps to ensure SERP disaster doesn’t ensue.

• First thing is first, turn on clean URLs (which is the same thing as entering /%postname%/ in the permalink structure section in WordPress) Navigate to Home > Administration > Site Configuration > Clean URL’s. You need to make sure your server accepts mod_rewrite or this is not going to work.
• Go download the Drupal page title module. It is going to take some tinkering to get this to work, but in the end gives you the flexibility of having different page titles than your headings.
• To make this work you need to make sure your theme has a template.php If it doesn’t then you will need to create one (the page title module has an example one you can use). These lines need to be added to the ‘page’ hook of the _phptemplate_variables function.
• if (module_exists(‘page_title’)) {
  $vars['head_title'] = page_title_page_get_title();
  }
• Next, go download the global redirect module. This will take care of the duplicate content issues that arise from having a directory and a page with the same exact content. Eg., www.example.com/duplicate & www.example.com/duplicate/ This module will automatically redirect the “/” version of the page to the non “/” version, thus creating one version. You can also do this on your own by modifying your .htaccess file, but this is an easier solution.
• You will also want to alleviate any canonicalization issues that your site might see from backlinks that point to non www versions or www versions. Use the following code in your .htaccess file to ensure this is taken care of.
• RewriteCond %{HTTP_HOST} ^site\.com$ [NC]
  RewriteRule ^(.*)$ http://www.site.com/$1 [R=301,L]
• Drupal also creates duplicate content, similar to the directory issue noted above, in the /node/ section of your site. This is a very simple fix as well. Go into your robots.txt folder and block this section of your site with the following code:
• Disallow: /node$
• Make sure you also download the Drupal Meta Tag module, this allows you to insert meta tags and description tags for each page/article you post on the site.

Before we go any further, let me just say that I love how this software performs. Everything is snappy and intuitive. The drag and drop functionality is really accurate, and page composition is extremely easy. Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, shall we? Eden Platform is a SaaS model content management system created by the same company that originally invented iContact. It’s attractively priced, with packages starting at just $10.00 per month, and a free 15 day trial is available (no credit card required). As a proprietary platform should be, it’s packed with functionality. Twenty minutes into my trial, I was able to change my template, which Preation refers to as a theme, and add my content.

The highs:

This CMS had lots of great things about it…too many for me to list in this review. I’ve collected a list of my favorites, but I encourage any interested party to create their own free trial to learn more.

Page Tree – I was particularly impressed with Eden Platform’s intuitive page tree. Unlike any other CMS I’ve used, this one gives you a graphical outline of your website’s page hierarchy. Everything is represented in the style of a flow chart, which is really easy to understand. I used this interface to organize the structure of website, before I started adding content. Normally, I have to go through this important step of building a website by drawing it out on paper.

Page Editing – The drag and drop functionality works great. As with a few other CMSs, you build a page by dragging different content elements into predetermined zones. What makes Eden particularly different is that there is no need for a preview screen. While you edit, you’re actually editing within your website’s design. Purely WYSIWYG..

Search Engine Optimization – The built in SEO component of Eden Platform is really well thought through. As I added content to my page, Eden analyzed my content and compared to against my target keywords. If my SEO score was low, it made suggestions on how I could approve it. Eden even went so far as at tell me how to implement the suggestions it made. On the whole, it’s a very SEO friendly platform. You’ve got full control over your URL structure, page titles, meta data, and everything is XHTML Strict.

File Storage – I couldn’t find any mention of disk space limitations anywhere on the Preation site, so I assume there is no limit (their pricing structure is based on the number of pageviews your Eden Platform website receives.) Adding files to the site without having to use an FTP program was great. I was able to add and organize my files through my browser.

Web Form – It was really easy for me to create my own online forms using Eden’s built in Forms Module. I could easily specify the type of field I wanted, and all of the submitted data was stored within my site. What’s especially impressive is the fact that I could create email handlers that would email form data to an address of my choice or redirect my visitors to a specific “thank you” page.

Personalized Support – Soon after creating my free trial account, I was called by a Preation support representative. He offered to give me a walkthrough of the platform’s functionality, which was quite informative. The software is pretty easy to use, so I didn’t really need the walkthrough, but I wanted to evaluate their level of support. My representative was able to answer all of my questions, and went on to explain that a full training is provided, should I decide to upgrade to a full account.

The lows:

Ok, I’m really nitpicking here. These lows didn’t get in my way, but to be fair, I need to mention them as short comings.

Templates – At the time of this review, there were only five templates, or themes as they call then, to chose from. They all looked and performed wonderfully, but there should have been more.

File Size Limitation – Because you don’t use and FTP program to upload your files, you can’t upload especially large files.

Conclusion:

Eden Platform is one of the best content management systems I’ve ever used. If you own a small business and want to stop paying your web designer’s extravagant rates, look no further.

First thing is first, turn on clean URLs (which is the same thing as entering /%postname%/ in the permalink structure section in WordPress) Navigate to Home > Administration > Site Configuration > Clean URL’s. Clean URLs are necessary for the pathauto module, mentioned below. You also need to make sure your server accepts mod_rewrite or this is not going to work.

Install the pathauto module and enable it

The Pathauto module automatically generates path aliases for various kinds of content (nodes, categories, users) without requiring the user to manually specify the path alias. This allows you to get aliases like /category/my-node-title.html instead of /node/123. The aliases are based upon a "pattern" system which the administrator can control.

The pathauto module is highly recommended. Pathauto will automatically make nice customized URLs based on things like title, taxonomy, content type, and username. You also have to enable the path module for pathauto to work.

Think carefully about how you want your URLs to look. It takes some experience with Drupal to get the exact URL paths that you might want. The URLs are controlled by a combination of taxonomy and pathauto, and I hope to cover that in another tutorial. You can also use the path module to write custom URLs for each page, but that might become tedious and inconsistent on a large site.

At the very least, enable the path module and install the pathauto module. It will generate nice-looking URLs for you without much configuration.

Caution: The above advice is directed towards new Drupal sites. If you have an existing Drupal site be very careful that you don’t rename your previously existing URLs with the pathauto module. It is generally a very bad idea to change existing URLs because the search engines will no longer be able to find those pages.

Here are some pathauto settings to watch out for:

For update action choose "Do nothing. Leave the old alias intact." Otherwise the URLs of nodes will change every time you change the title of your post, causing problems with search engines:

To be continued…

Joomla Sites Showcase

BlogFullBliss

Created by Adrian Balkwill. This design is one of the best that I have seen so far and you should really go and take a look at its side bar navigation as well as the carefully designed footer.

I am seriously considering Adrian for my next project =)

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VJ Templates

Keep up the good work, Joomla Based!