New Drupal Book: Learning Drupal 6 Module Development
Developing new modules for Drupal 6? Porting older modules? Packt Publishing has just released a new book, Learning Drupal 6 Module Development, by Matt Butcher. This book is targeted toward PHP programmers interested in Drupal 6 module development.
The book takes a hands-on approach. Each chapter walks through the development of a module, theme, or installation profile. As the reader progresses through the book, she or he will be able to create increasingly sophisticated Drupal modules.
If you're new to Drupal development (but have PHP development experience), this book will get you developing modules right away. Are you a more seasoned Drupal developer just looking to get some modules updated? This book focuses on many of the new features, changes, and improvements made in Drupal 6. Check out the sample chapter Creating Our First Module (1.3M PDF) to get a feel for how the book is written.
The book deals with numerous topics, and introduces the prominent Drupal APIs. Here are some of the major topics covered:
- Creating new modules from scratch.
- Using Drupal's JavaScript library and jQuery to add AJAX functionality.
- Creating custom content types.
- Working with hooks.
- Handling forms with the Forms API.
- Making use of common core Drupal functions.
- Using the Drupal 6 menu subsystem.
- Working with the database APIs (including the new Schema API).
- Using the Theme API to add default theming into your modules.
- Sending mail using the improved Drupal 6 mail API.
- Using the Node API.
- Working with actions and triggers.
- Creating a custom installation profile to package your own Drupal suite.
Check out the book's main page for a more in-depth description of the book's contents.
The book is available in both softcover and downloadable eBook format. You can get it straight from Packt, or from Amazon and other tech book vendors.
Thanks to those I met at DrupalCon. This book was heavily influenced by conversations I had there. And a huge thanks (again) to those of you who were technical reviewers on the book. Your insights and suggestions were tremendous.
Best,
Matt Butcher
Book: http://www.packtpub.com/drupal-6-module-development/book
Author Profile: http://www.packtpub.com/author_view_profile/id/4
My copy arrived two days
My copy arrived two days ago.
___________________________
Steven Taylor
http://prime357.org
Good intro to Drupal 6 development
I was one of the Technical Reviewers for this book, so I've had a (digital) copy for a while. Lots of good material in there, definitely worth picking up if you want to learn module development.
Update: I'm holding a contest where you can win a free copy of this book!
--
John Forsythe
Need reliable Drupal hosting?
I usually use online
I usually read online tutorials but I have to buy this book.
Marcel
Drupal Themes
PrewrittenContent.com
Writing Schedule
*purchased*
*purchased* - May 23, 2008 - 02:50
*received outside of the US* - April 2, 2008
Congratulations on the
Congratulations on the publication, Matt! Thanks for your time spent putting it all together.
----------------------
Drupal by Wombats | Current Drupal project: http://www.ubercart.org
Looks interesting...
Disclaimer: I haven't read this book yet, but a copy ended up in my mailbox for some reason (thanks, mystery kind person who keeps sending me Packt books! :)).
Flipping through, this book looks like it nicely fills a current gap in Drupal knowledge: while Pro Drupal Development is an invaluable "top-down" reference guide to Drupal and provides in-depth knowledge into Drupal's various sub-systems, this book fills a "bottom-up" need for people who want information about how to actually leverage that knowledge to do stuff in Drupal. Sort of like our existing Module developer's guide on steroids.
I don't know when I'll get a chance to actually read this, since I'm not traveling for awhile, but definitely looks worth checking out.
Who's Matt Butcher?
Who's Matt Butcher? There's a bio that mentions "Matt" (Butcher I'm assuming), but still doesn't say "who he is". Clicking on his un doesn't help either. I'm definitely interested in learning more about Drupal 6 module development, but I've never heard of Matt Butcher.
One of my professors always warned that "anyone can write a book". Before I buy this, I'd like to know that Matt Butcher isn't just anyone.
Matt's a busy bee when it
Matt's a busy bee when it comes to technical writing and more. You can peruse a list of some of his works on the front page of his site - including several other books published through Packt. While I don't have a copy of this book yet myself, I'm sure we'll grab one for the office when Ubercart makes the leap to D6.
Matt also came to an Ubercart dinner at Drupalcon Boston, and I enjoyed his company. : )
----------------------
Drupal by Wombats | Current Drupal project: http://www.ubercart.org
this is his bio from the sample chapter
So he doesn't sound like just anybody nor a nobody.
--Kyle Mathews
Not everyone can write a book
It's harder than I ever imagined. I think it's awesome that Packt has found four Drupal authors and pushed such an ambitious product pipeline forward. Thanks Packt!
- Robert Douglass
-----
my Drupal book
Lol, no, anyone can write a
Lol, no, anyone can write a book. Will it be a good, informative book? That's the question. I've read some bad books in my day.
I asked the questions I did, because I didn't see any record of any activity in the Drupal community - at all, and I've never heard the name before.
Ryan (Ubercart rocks!) vouched for him, so that's good enough for me.
Ordered the ebook and the dead trees version
I'll update this comment when I've read a bit more. Great to have all the info in 1 place !
I just bought the
I just bought the ebook+hardcover bundle and it looks really promising.
Good job!
Great book!
I think it's great for those that learns best with the hands-on approach. The book is concise and strikes a nice balance between basic vs. advanced topics. After the first couple of chapters, you'll immediately learn the basics of being a Drupal Developer.
yes
this is a great book
Looks interesting
This book looks interesting, I ordered my copy :-)
Based on "sample chapter",
Based on "sample chapter", it's be great book.
---
Drupal Theme Garden
I don't know much about the
I don't know much about the e-book market. But shouldn't it supposed to be much more cheaper when you order a digital copy?
The printed copy costs €27.89, but the e-book version costs €21.24.
so, does 310 pages of printed paper cost €6.65? Maybe I'm thinking it the wrong way...
Amazing Book!
I've read through chapters 1 - 5 already since buying the ebook / print two days ago. It's an amazing book! Very clear and step by step process just makes it so easy to follow.
must buy!
Great
"Must have" book
A review
I've just done up a review at http://drupalib.interoperating.info/node/130.
Another book for the Drupal community!
This is great, I'll have to add this to my list of books to read. From reading the sample chapter, it seems good, accurate and simple to follow. I can't comment on the remaining chapters although I'm interested to see how advanced it goes into the power of D6.
---
Dee
iScene Interactive :: iScene.eu
"Thanks for posting"
Thanks. Useful.
index
Can you please post the index for this book?
One of the reasons for this question is to know if/where all the hooks are covered. Chapter 2 is supposed to cover module creation but it only implements two hooks: hook_block and hook_help; the latter is quite trivial.
Thank you.
Great also for noobs
I'm a noob and reading the digital copy right now. wooo it's great.
thanks Matt & Packtpub
This is another good book for an introduction to drupal
http://www.packtpub.com/drupal-6-create-powerful-websites/book
It's written by David Mercer. Anyway,personally, I prefer Matt's style
I bought and I am happy!
I bought and I am happy! Recommend to each!
Earnest requset
can anyone please share this books' e-version with me cause i cannot afford to buy it for 29 pounds i.e. almost Rs 2200.
It would be very kind of you if any one of you could share the book with me.
Just for the record... that
Just for the record... that sort of "sharing" is illegal. : P
----------------------
Drupal by Wombats | Current Drupal project: http://www.ubercart.org
Sorry
sorry to have offended you
Not offended, just making it
Not offended, just making it clear. I think there are people who share things illegally who don't realize it. I found an e-book posted on another document sharing site and had to contact them to remove it there, too.
----------------------
Drupal by Wombats | Current Drupal project: http://www.ubercart.org
i'll buy it for you
I'm asking to packtpub how to gift you the ebook. Ebooks from packtpub have an ownership note printed on them. So it should be your ownership note. I think it should be possible but don't know how. Please send me an email at dam at venturin dot net , so we don't bother the community with this ;-)
cheers
I've had this book for a
I've had this book for a while now, but haven't used it much until I just started working on our company's first D6-powered sites this week. Content-wise, I think it's a nice at-hand guide to have, but I have some gripes about presentation. The body text is in Palatino (or a look-alike), which isn't terrible but isn't a serif that really works well for large chunks of text -- it's more of a fancy headline serif, in my opinion. On the other hand, the headings and all the sans-serif work, including the title on the front of the book, are all in Arial. Barf! It's also frustrating that the ink on the page has a strange "shiny" reflectiveness which makes it difficult to read in direct light, which is typically the best light to read in…
So all due credit for content, but whoever's doing the design/layout work at Packt could do well to take a refresher lesson in some of the basics (like never use Arial for anything ever). Maybe I should have bought the electronic edition, h4x0red it to change the typefaces, then printed it out myself with non-shiny ink with the office's old LaserWriter.
Packt overcharges for their
Packt overcharges for their ebooks. It really feels like they are gouging us. Their pricing policy needs review by someone who understands the economics involved as well as the positive impact on the company that more books in distribution would bring.
The reason I haven't purchased this one is the high cost of the ebook and fact I purchased another Drupal ebook from them that wasn't worth the money.
I have to agree with Road Runner
I was about to respond to you with the typical supply/demand pay for it if it's worth it, or don't it's your choice type of reply but you have a point.
The ebook is only 8.80 cents cheaper than the physical book. Sure, you also have to consider the shipping costs, but dang man, if I'm going to spend 27 dollars on an ebook why wouldn't I pay the extra 8 bucks to have it physically in my hand?
Maybe that's what they want, I don't know, but 27 dollars is too much for en ebook when you can buy a physical copy. I was gonna buy it just to see what had changed but I figured the ebook would be like 12 bucks...
(my 3 sites formerly on drupal now on wordpress and/or joomla because I just never could figure it out and my forum bridge broke)
Travel Nursing
Hunting Forum
Online Nursing Degree
I have to agree as well
I just bought this book, as an ebook, and I can't say I am that impressed with the ebook aspects of it. It is very expensive compared to the paper version, considering the ebook has no physical production costs.
This is made worse in the UK, because books are exempt from VAT (sales tax), but eBooks ARE NOT! So the eBook costs almost as much as the paper book.
They have also gone overboard on the security - I have to type in my email address every time I want to open the book, and I can't cut and paste from it. It has my name and address on every single page, and I am apparantly not allowed to sell it on/give it away when I am done with it. Packt obviously regard us as thieves first, customers second.
The book itself is reasonably good as a start, it got me up and running with simple Drupal modules fairly quickly. But it does include quite a lot of "for more information visit drupal.org". That is quite lazy, for a book which is only 300 pages long but costs as much as a full sized book (it is also a bit annoying that you can't even cut and paste the links into your browser). He could have done a couple of hundred more pages covering some of these topics, because it is often useful to see something explained twice in different ways.
So I would recommend it, but probably not in electronic form, Packt have taken away too many of the potential advantages of eBooks.
I had time to browse it and
I had time to browse it and I must say it's good starting point and really a must have to understand and write clean code modules.
I have a copy of the book and it is a must have.
If you are new to drupal development this it the 1st book you should read. Then get pro drupal development for a refernce but this book will teach you how pro drupal is a great reference once you know how.
A must have to start/get into Drupal 6 as a PHP Developer
If you want to learn the lot about how to use your own PHP knowledge and connect it with Drupal 6, you should not wait another day and get this book. You might only have already little knowledge and practice with Drupal 6, eventually read the Drupal 6 title "Building powerfull and robust website with Drupal 6" by David Mercer (a good read as well), you can with no fear get this title to learn "the more" you need to know to start rocking with drupal 6. You get a very smooth and well made move inside all the necessary things like Menus, Hooks, Themes, Modules etc., even Installation Profiles.
It is very well made, each chapter continues on the other and you learn the stuff you want to learn and you need to learn to understand the more specific stuff until the last chapter. It is for PHP Programmers, and if you are a programmer and new to Drupal 6 I only can only warmly suggest to start with this book. It would have saved me a lot of headaches ;) and after reading it I understand a lot more.
And another nice thing: Part of the money you pay for the book is going to Drupal. This is a service by the Publisher, Packt Books.
my review on Amazon.com is up
I reviewed this book for Packt Publishing and was honored to do so. I gave it 5 stars and the review was published at http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1847194443/ .
Consistency issue
Bought the book, and I really want to get some good solid results. However, I just finished building the first module in Chapter 2 and it didn't work as expected. The block is there, but it's not displaying the feed. I've compared it with the errata sheet from Packt, and it addresses some code changes but doesn't explain how or why the changes implemented, in the kind of depth the book does. After I plugged in the changed code as best as I could figure, it still didn't output any results. If and/or when code is changed, it's nice to have a visual of the entire new code so I can line-by-line compare where I've messed it up.
So I figured I'd see the correct changes in the module code examples, for download on Packt's site, but the Chapter 2 module code has a lot of alterations and discrepancies between the book's code and what's in the errata list.
View the errata and download the example code for Chapter 2 here (and get the .PDF which is linked to, above) and you'll see.
I met Matt in Chicago. Very knowledgeable and can present well, but as far as the book, I would love to see the consistency issues addressed. Matt gave a good informative Javascript/jQuery talk at DCC: http://drupalcampchicago.org/day2-session5a
Download Free copy of this book
i found free copy of this book so you may download soft-copy of this book at following url:
[Link removed by moderator. We do not condone piracy.]
This book is really cool and good, i am loving this book!
My link may help someone who can't purchase a Hard copy of this copy but is in seek of good learning on Drupal.
that is my only intention to give this link.
Thanks
This is not a "free copy"
AFAIK, the author and publisher want people to pay for a copy of this book. Unless they have made the book available freely, this copy is pirated and is not a legal way to obtain the book.
i thought this is a free book
Sorry for it,
i thought this is a free book as i downloaded it for free.
.
Just because someone steals something and gives it away doesn't make it free. There are a lot of illegal things available on the internet. If you haven't already taken the link down, please do so as you are just furthering the theft by passing it along.
Michelle
--------------------------------------
See my Drupal articles and tutorials or come check out life in the Coulee Region.
Yeah, as far as I know,
Yeah, as far as I know, sharing the book in this way violates copyright law. I highly recommend removing that from your blog.
----------------------
Drupal by Wombats | Current Drupal project: http://www.ubercart.org
Just ordered it
Hoping to write some modules :-)
- Victor
Search Drupal.org | Lamingo | Tax India | Drupal Jobs | FPGA
download the code
I wish the book showed each script in its entirety, somewhere. But anyway, if you purchase the book from Packt, you can always download the code from their website. Yes, it has changed since the book was printed! I was having a tough time with Chapter 5, checking my code against the examples line-by-line, still didn't work. After downloading the code from the Packt website, I got it working in 30 minutes. You paid for it, go grab it!