How to understand a module so you can document it
Last modified: April 6, 2008 - 03:40
- Get modules and install them.
- Experiment with module to discover how to administer it and how to create something with it.
- Look under administer >> module name.
- Look under administer >> settings >> module name.
- Look under administer >> blocks to see if it has any custom blocks associated with it.
- Look under administer >> access control to see if the module has access permissions. Enable the permissions for your user role.
- Look under create content.
- Discover if the module has other modules that it is dependent on. Read the INSTALL.txt, README, or UPDATE text files associated with the module in the package you downloaded. In general these files are your best source of information from the developer for writing documentation.
- If the module depends on or uses another module, be sure to provide a link to the administration help page for that module.
- [Optional for programmers]If all else fails, read the code. You don't have to be a PHP programmer to read the code file and get some ideas of what the module does. Programmers leave comments in files, and _help text messages are a good source of documentation hints for what the module can do. Drupal uses a hook system that maps to URLs so if you see a function like admin_help then chances are http://www.example.com/admin/help is going to have something worth looking at. If nothing else, the module programer will appreciate your valiant effort at reading their code, and be more willing to help you.
- Now that you have done module research it's time to start thinking about writing the administration help documentation.