First post here after several days of reading and trying to set up my website only with the help of tutorials...
Completely new to Drupal, as much as I am regarding website design...
I was able to set up my local host to create the website offline, as I knew it would take time for me to be ready to publish the final result.
I felt lost with the install at first but it happened to be straightforward using tutorials.
I also downloaded the modules I thought were needed... but still can't find "Array" that is indicated as missing as well as "Hs_taxonomy"
My website project is all done on paper, pages, content, etc...
Now I want to put that to life. And here I'm confused, not to say lost, beside all the reading/video watching etc... actually the more I read the more I'm lost.
I could figured out some mistakes i did. Like before creating menu I should create content.
But I am not sure what content I should use to create each page I want to display.
My website is about rating and review services like hotels, motels... Users can find a reviewed service based on location (state or/and city or/and zip), offered services, rated (5 stars rating) services (not all services will be rated)... through autocomplete text field, check box, and/or location only...
Users can as well review and rate, existing hotel and add new ones if they are not already in the database.
So I have a :
- "Find Review" page, then a result page for the Find request, result has to come from the database (not sure I use the qualified term here) fed up by the "submit review" page.
- "Submit Review" page, that will feed the database, to be used through the "find review" page, and I need to moderate the review before it goes online.
- "About us" page.
- "Tutorial" page to help people to review and rate,
- "Contact us" page with a contact form
- "user login" page or block within a page,
Again I don't know or not sure about which "create content" option I should go for each page, how I can setup each "content" once the right one is chosen...
I tried some stuff, but I was not successful. For example, I did create a page - "contact us", where I wanted to put a contact form... but I have no clue how to insert the contact form into the page, in case I succeed to set up the contact form itself.
No need to say that I face the same problem for each page...
I did my home work, as much I could find, did watch hours of video tutorials, 100 of pages... and still lost...
I know it sounds asking a lot, and I also know that as soon as I'll be on track I'll find the all process pretty easy, but so far it's like if I was in a new city, with a map where I know to go, but the map don't tell me where I am standing... and without the starting point I don't know which road I should take.
A complex version of what I'd like to achieve would be that http://www.tripadvisor.com/
And more likely something like that : http://www.rvparkreviews.com/
The layout would be different, I prefer the Tab type of navigation.
Anyhow it's not that I'm looking after a complete way to do it, but a little bit of guidance would definitively put me on track...
In case you have a tutorial in mind that I should look at let me know.
Thank you for your help, I found the Drupal.org an amazing tool, I know I am the one missing the way it works and its potential.
Comments
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wow thats a lot of text.
I'd highly suggest a single question per thread in the future to allow those supporting the forums to give you more specificity when answering your questions.
As it stands now the array error, and the other. These should be dealt with first.
Personally, If your install is new. I'd start over and simply get drupal installed. Modules shouldn't be thrown into the mix until the installation is set up and working correctly and then you actually have a need for a specific module.
I'd create a review content type
I'd add the fivestart.module to allow ratings (this is also dependant on the votingapi.module)
The contact form wouldn't be moved, it would be linked to using the path it's already living at.
It is far easier to deal with one want/desire/task at a time when building especially considering the fact that you are new to drupal but more importantly because you are new to web development in general.
I'd also highly suggest using Drupal 6.x. You've tagged this thread as Drupal 5.x and 5.x is due to be unsupported when Drupal 7.x is released which relatively isn't that far away. Thus scrubbing your installation and starting over with D6 would be prudent.
I know that was a massive
I know that was a massive request... thanks already
I first downloaded Drupal 5 as I thought not all modules would be available for drupal 6. I'm not far enough in my process so I will switch to 6.
If I narrow down my question for one page and the involved workflow... what needs to be done in term of step to achieve that example I found that was done under Drupal :
http://www.visitgreatoceanroad.org.au/content/advanced-search
That would be the kind of thing my search page would look like... beside more possible entry.
Let me know if I am already asking too much.
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I wouldn't start with building a search. I'd start with building a content type. Until you physically get content in the database the search won't do much of anything.
Looking at the source code of the page you linked to looks to me like they may have built something custom or did it by hand.
I'd likely use views.module with exposed filters or something of that sort.
You're next question should likely be a new post.
Make sens to start with a
Make sens to start with a content... without it sounds hard to search for it.
So do you suggest I start to built a content type using views with exposed filter?
I'll try that but I'm not even sure what I'm suppose to do... but i'll play around.
thanks
d
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views lists content so you wouldn't start there either.
Start by building your review content type
add cck.module
and any of it's field add on modules you require for your review content type
add votingapi and fivestar.modules to allow for voting on your content type or check out the other voting modules in the downloads area.
Then add your first piece of content ensureing that A) you have all the fields you need and B) that it works.
Check out
Check out http://drupal.org/handbook/customization/tutorials/beginners-cookbook
See if this helps... The
See if this helps...
The first example is a matter of setting up content types for flights, restaurants, etc... and creating content of each of those types. You'll want to use the views module to create a page display with filters based on the criteria the user would search for with exposed filters used for input. Because address seems to be a common criteria, you might want to install the location module and set location up within each of those content types so that you can use those address fields in your filters. You can specify a menu link for each view display... for example you created a view containing all the field criteria pertaining to flights, specify a page path of /flights and your exposed filter fields will appear at the top of the actual page or you can choose to check the exposed form in block option and enable the block to act as your search feature. The contact form is a default drupal form so just enable it in the modules section and go to your menus section and create a primary link called "contact us" with path of /contact.
The second example uses an image map that acts as your search mechanism which when clicking on a state takes you to a view page with filtered down criteria. You'll need to know how to create an image map and enter that code within the home page section somewhere. You would need to specify a url path for the filtered output assigned to each state map link. You might also want to research use of the GMAP module to show content nodes that relate to the filtered down search so if user clicks on a state, a google map would show node markers displaying all content type of restaurant for example in that particular state. There are a number of other ways to do this but this will get you at least thinking of some ideas to get you started. I would advise you to get extremely familiar with the cck (and cck addon modules) and views modules before installing anything else so you are comfortable with creating custom content types and setting up views with filters and arguments to achieve the main goal. Additionally, I'd recommend scrapping drupal 5 and getting a fresh install of the latest drupal 6 release as more of the drupal 5 modules are becoming unsupported and obsolete.
Thanks already for your
Thanks already for your help!
I did switch to d6.
I did setup all my static pages (about, home, 2 contact form...)
I started to take a look at cck. The module is installed, as much as fivestar, and views. Though i have no clue yet how to play with them. It's the following days (weeks more realistically) task.
And once you figure out how to use Drupal, it's pretty simple... afterward.
So I hope I'll be able to say that after I'm close to be done.
Thanks again.
I have another
I have another question...
using cck when it's time to add field there is "label", "field name", "type of data to store" and "Form element to edit the data"... is there a way to have a fivestar rating "type of data to store" and "form element to edit the data"?
Because I would like to have entries to be fivestar rated by users. Ex : customer service : (fivestar rating option)
Thanks.
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no. Five star is a widget enabled in a content type which rates that content type.
To rate "customer service" , customer service would have to be a node.
Sounds like you may multiaxis ratings which aren't available yet in a stable version.
note that it is far better for the community, for you to get answer and for other readers who locate your questions with search if you create a new thread when you have a new question. Otherwise the thread gets muddy really fast with multiple questions in a single thread.