By yogi_sydbma on

several quirky things happening ... well questions anyway.

I am the novice but main admin of a community based website for the Sydney bike messengers association.

My drupal installation is sorta up to date but.... I have the following problems.

1.I cant seem to find a light weight WYSIWYG editor that suits constant upgrding of the core. I cant use tinyMCE cause its not evolving as fast as the security releases. I am a relative novice to community websites and CMS's so does anyone have any advice on a basic WYSIWYG editor. It needs to be able to edit text and pictures (both link or upload)and align them, and bold text and hyper link in a new window (or not).

will this work? http://drupal.org/project/editor

2.the forum layout is kinda nice, but when you have a lot of comments but it kinda sucks if I have 44 replys to one comment. Those on smaller screens complain that the words are bunched over on the right Toooo much.

check out what I mean here (please ignore the slap talk)
http://sydbma.org/bikes/node/207

Is there a plug in that will let the forums look like a traditional forum not the drupal BLOG hybrid.

Be it known I am using Drupal 6.1

3.I am also being asked if I can have a seperate URL refer and run on the same database but with a different THEME?

4. Some one also spoke of a community builder too.. but I really have a hard time finding working examples of drupal in this situation.

---
summary
1. WYSIWYG editor
2. Forum look
3. second look(theme) same site
4. community builder plug in.

thanks in advance .. as this is a big one..but all help will solve my hair falling out.

going bald
yogi

⋅ Categories: Drupal 6.x

Comments

WorldFallz’s picture

WorldFallz commented

1.I cant seem to find a light weight WYSIWYG editor that suits constant upgrding of the core. I cant use tinyMCE cause its not evolving as fast as the security releases. I am a relative novice to community websites and CMS's so does anyone have any advice on a basic WYSIWYG editor. It needs to be able to edit text and pictures (both link or upload)and align them, and bold text and hyper link in a new window (or not).

Unfortunately, there's no easy answer here yet. The only thing you can do is try them out and see which you think fits best.

will this work? http://drupal.org/project/editor

The very first sentence on the project page:

Very early prototype, do not use on a production site

So i would say certainly not-- not yet.

2.the forum layout is kinda nice, but when you have a lot of comments but it kinda sucks if I have 44 replys to one comment. Those on smaller screens complain that the words are bunched over on the right Toooo much.

Use flat comments-- setting is at admin/content/node-type/forum

Is there a plug in that will let the forums look like a traditional forum not the drupal BLOG hybrid.

Checkout http://drupal.org/project/advanced_forum (no d6 version yet, but you'll want it once it's ready)

3.I am also being asked if I can have a seperate URL refer and run on the same database but with a different THEME?

What do you mean by separate URL? A single page? Another site? Depending on what exactly you want, you can probably use http://drupal.org/project/sections

4. Some one also spoke of a community builder too.. but I really have a hard time finding working examples of drupal in this situation.

Not sure what you mean by "community builder"-- are you talking about the joomla extension community builder? Drupal is often used to create community sites-- http://teamsugar.com, http://myplay.com, http://socnet.shellmultimedia.com, etc. For more examples enter "community category:25" into the search box above.

Hope that helps...

===
"Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day.
Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime." -- Lao Tzu
"God helps those who help themselves." -- Benjamin Franklin
"Search is your best friend." -- Worldfallz

yogi_sydbma’s picture

yogi_sydbma commented

Although drupal 6x has been out for a while there aint to many mods and plug-ins yet that have grown with it.. I guess time over matter.

Ok to answer your confuzzeled look while trying to help me

We are loking to use our forums as a national one.. not just our city.

If someone goes to url "X" that get re-directed to our forums.. is it possible to have them looking at the forum with a different theme template?

and thanks for the how to on changing the look of our forums I have changed it already

Cheers HEAPS

a quick learn teacher is hard to find

WorldFallz’s picture

WorldFallz commented

Although drupal 6x has been out for a while there aint to many mods and plug-ins yet that have grown with it.. I guess time over matter.

There's usually a lag between major version releases and module updates. I think the lag is longer this time because some of the major contributed modules are also using this opportunity to do a major rewrite (as opposed to simply an update to work with D6). And since many of the contribs also work with those major modules, they are in limbo also waiting for the biggies to finish. Like a domino effect. There's a huge amount of discussion on this-- my own personal opinion is that it gives us all a better product in the long run.

If someone goes to url "X" that get re-directed to our forums.. is it possible to have them looking at the forum with a different theme template?

Ah now I get what you're after. Yes, I would think you could use the pathauto module to set your forum URLs appropriately, then use the sections module to use those URL aliases to theme them how you like. Should be pretty straightforward.

cheers back at ya ;-)

===
"Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day.
Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime." -- Lao Tzu
"God helps those who help themselves." -- Benjamin Franklin
"Search is your best friend." -- Worldfallz

yogi_sydbma’s picture

yogi_sydbma commented

yeah.. I have used community builder once b4 but it is also what was the security HOLE too. I was using mambo and CB was .. very holey indeed...

What is the Drupal verson if here is one?

is there a drupal facebook mimic tool? sounds almost like swearing already...

WorldFallz’s picture

WorldFallz commented

What is the Drupal verson if here is one?

There isn't one module that replicates what community builder does (fyi I came to drupal right around the time i was also doing a site with joomla & community builder). Drupal is much more of a framework then joomla is. Once I saw somewhere someone say drupal is like a cross between django and joomla-- that's exactly it.

Drupal can replicate that functionality, but it's going to be a combination of modules. Core, of course, plus CCK, Views, Panels, one of the users-as-nodes modules (bio, nodeprofile, etc.), one of the friend/buddylist modules, a pm module, and some others probably. The socnet link above is pretty much a drupal version of community builder and Michelle provides some very nice tutorials on how she did it and what modules she used.

Same with facebook. I'm pretty convinced Drupal can be made to emulate most any style of site-- that's one of it's great strengths.

Yes, at first it is definitely overwhelming and frustrating-- no question. However, once you grok drupal you have all the tools you need to create any style of site. You don't have to learn a new tool or framework for each style of site you wish to do.

Hope that makes sense.

===
"Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day.
Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime." -- Lao Tzu
"God helps those who help themselves." -- Benjamin Franklin
"Search is your best friend." -- Worldfallz

yogi_sydbma’s picture

yogi_sydbma commented

nothing makes sence at all... Except your usage of a word born in "Stranger In A Strange Land".. I will grok on it. AND i am using 6.1

I was smashed by exploits with mambo/CB.. it was the busy sites demise.

That same site is now a Drupal one.

I have seen Michelle's Various posts and I have seen advanced forums too. I really like BUEDITOR (Michelle uses it on her site) as it seems very simple. instead of other WYSIWYG editors as it does not take up the text fields space .. it needs a few more buttons but im working on that

I dont actually wanna make it like facebook, but I sure would like my members the opportunity to use the website like it is their community. So i have to offer the games and toys and bells and whistles. Is it Possible to get a COMMUNITY version of Drupal pre ziped with all the needed mods and add-ons. This would be like a pack and promote for ease of use for n00bians like myself. (just an idea).

Now lastly.. is there a tool to help me create templates? .. I know DEVEL has someting but that plugin seems a tad.. beyond me .. and actually seems like it can eat a site real quick including spitting out a mashed mess of a site.. So im leaving it alone for now.

Anyway I appreciate your help.

Yogi
http://sydbma.org/bikes/

a quick learn teacher is hard to find

WorldFallz’s picture

WorldFallz commented

Is it Possible to get a COMMUNITY version of Drupal pre ziped with all the needed mods and add-ons.

There are "installation profiles" available at http://drupal.org/project/Installation+profiles but currently there isn't one for a social networking site. Michelle offers a tarball of all of her modules, but I'm not sure how up to date that is. Might be good to start with hers, and update it.

There's also a handbook dedicated to site recipes

Now lastly.. is there a tool to help me create templates?

see this recent comment of mine on the best way to learn theming. Its actually not that difficult.

In addition to devel, you're going to want to use Firefox with the Firebug, web developer toolbar, and view source chart plugins. I can't imagine doing theming without them.

===
"Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day.
Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime." -- Lao Tzu
"God helps those who help themselves." -- Benjamin Franklin
"Search is your best friend." -- Worldfallz