Top 10 Drupal Modules

By DocRPP on 18 Feb 2014 at 15:15 UTC

If somebody ask you, what are the best Drupal modules for any site, in general, what will be your answer? I have compiled a list of 10 Must Have Drupal Modules and I would like to know what the community think as a list of the top 10 modules. I know that this is a wide question and there can be too many answers, and I am looking for exactly that.

Comments

Yes, there are must-have

dan.mantyla commented 19 February 2014 at 18:07

Yes, there are must-have modules that get installed pretty much every time, such as chaos tools and views, but, in addition, some of my favorite modules are CDN, Calendar, Bakery, CKeditor (WYSIWYG is also a really good module), and Image CAPTCHA. I picked these ones because they're well maintained, easy to use, and work well.

I am against Image CAPTCHA. A

DocRPP commented 20 February 2014 at 17:34

I am against Image CAPTCHA. A couple of reasons being:
1. It is ineffective. Spam bots could easily crack them on my site. Making them more complex would mean additional CPU load.
2. Also, it affects user experience.

In my site, I use spamicide with a lot of success. They have the added advantage of not affecting user experience and is mentioned in my list. I do use CK Editor, even though WYSIWYG do provide more flexibility. But it has got issues with not supporting the latest releases of the WYSIWYG clients. I use jQuery update hence there is no need of CDN. I don't have to use bakery since I don't have subdomains to run. The nature of my site does not require calendar as well. In short, I don't use all the four modules you mentioned. But I heavily rely on CTools based modules such as Views and Panels(who doesn't?)

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Everyone's use case is

dan.mantyla commented 20 February 2014 at 18:40

Everyone's use case is different. I simply listed a few modules that fit my use case very well.

Good suggestion with Spamicide, will probably replace CAPTCHA with this.

But I heavily rely on CTools

Jaypan commented 20 February 2014 at 23:40

But I heavily rely on CTools based modules such as Views and Panels(who doesn't?)

Me. I rarely use views and never use panels.

That was interesting to know.

DocRPP commented 21 February 2014 at 07:39

That was interesting to know. Is it because you know a better alternative or is it because of the nature of your projects that you don't have to use them?

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I use Drupal as a framework

Jaypan commented 24 February 2014 at 22:57

I use Drupal as a framework more than a CMS. I build custom themes, so I don't need panels, and I do my own SQL using the Database API, so I don't need Views. The only time I really use Views is when I'm using the Calendar module, which pretty much requires Views to work.

Edit: I've read a bit more on Panels, and the main reason I don't need to use them is that I use view modes for theming content across my sites. You can read more about my method here: http://www.jaypan.com/tutorial/drupal-7-view-modes-consistently-themeing...

Entity View Modes is similar

DocRPP commented 26 February 2014 at 16:50

Entity View Modes is similar in function to Display Suite and so far, I had been using Display Suite or panels. But it seems like Entity View Modes is a more light weight option, and will give it a go. Thanks for pointing out.

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_

WorldFallz commented 26 February 2014 at 20:41

correct... if you just need the view modes without all the other stuff, then entity_view_mode is the way to go.

Or if you want to skip that

Jaypan commented 26 February 2014 at 22:45

Or if you want to skip that module altogether, you can implement hook_entity_info_alter():

function mymodule_entity_info_alter(&$entity_info)
{
  if(isset($entity_info['some_entity_type']))
  {
    $entity_info['some_entity_type']['view modes'][] = 'my_new_view_mode';
  }
}

This is more lightweight, but the entity_view_mode module gives you a UI to do this on the fly without hard coding it.

What about exposed filters on

bryanmanalo commented 24 June 2014 at 03:26

What about exposed filters on views? Do you code the exposed filters as well (using form api + db api)? Doesn't it take a longer time to develop using that?

It depends on what the filter

Jaypan commented 24 June 2014 at 05:07

It depends on what the filter is. If it's something relatively simple, it can be added with ease, though it definitely will take longer than using views. If it's something more complex, trying to figure out how to make that work with views generally ends up being longer than just coding it myself.

I just saw this after 8 months

bryanmanalo commented 5 February 2015 at 08:32

Hahaha sometimes (a lot of times actually) it is really hard to make Drupal do what you want to do specifically. I have been working with Drupal for 2.5 years and it feels like there is still a whole lot to learn.

Here is my Top Favorite 10

eddiemayan commented 4 March 2014 at 13:55

Here is my Top Favorite 10 modules and seriously my site is incomplete without these Modules:

Token
Pathauto
Google Analytics
WYSIWYG
CKEditor
ShareThis
Disqus
Media
Backup and Migrate

Which one do you prefer?

DocRPP commented 5 March 2014 at 17:36

Which one do you prefer? WYSIWYG or CK Editor? Considering the fact that CK Editor can be configured to use with the WYSIWYG module, which approach do you go for? Using CK Editor module or using the CK Editor libraries with WYSIWYG?

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CK Editor libraries with

eddiemayan commented 10 March 2014 at 14:42

CK Editor libraries with WYSIWYG

I am asking out of mere

DocRPP commented 10 March 2014 at 16:09

I am asking out of mere curiosity, is there any specific advantage for that approach?

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10 Best Modules for me

markwilston commented 24 April 2014 at 07:08

10 my favourite and must to use drupal modules.

WYSIWYG
CKEditor
ShareThis
Disqus
Token
Pathauto
Google Analytics
Media
Backup and Migrate

It's very enough for me,

mesut10 commented 14 May 2014 at 14:58

It's very enough for me, thank you for your post, and would you like to suggest me what's good modules for Seo website Drupal?. I just newbie Drupal

i would like to use WYSIWYG

johngreenwoods commented 29 May 2014 at 11:05

i would like to use WYSIWYG for my site.

the bare minimum

rajmataj commented 19 January 2015 at 00:33

As written in Essential Modules to Install with Drupal 7. Note that each project will have special circumstances where semantics, seo, and/or media will play a strong role but what's listed here are what Pure Web Media considers essential.

Top 10 Modules for any Drupal 7 Site

Admin Menu - it's hard to live without this gem because nobody wants to click 3 times to get to an often used submenu. It's important to note, however, that the module is demanding on resources so if you don't need to give this to your users, use the built-in shortcut menu
Chaos Tools - a set of APIs and tools to improve the developer experience. It also contains a module called the Page Manager whose job is to manage pages.
Backup Migrate - Although a hosting server might make daily backups, this is handy for making hourly backups for quick rollbacks to a previous save. Just make sure you're only keep a reasonable amount of the backup files.
Libraries - Many modules make use of external libraries for things like CKEditor, MailChimp, Superfish. This gives a central place to store those libraries.
Link - this should've been in core but is in Drupal 8.
Superfish - I've wavered between this and Nice Menus, but either is a good choice.
Pathauto - automatically generates URL/path aliases for various kinds of content (nodes, taxonomy terms, users) without requiring the user to manually specify the path alias.
Token - small bits of text that can be placed into larger documents via simple placeholders, like %site-name or [user]
Views - we all know this is a given and is now part of Drupal 8 core.
WYSIWYG - combined with CKEditor, this is also a given on any modern website. TinyMCE deserves second place as an alternative.

It turns out that WYSIWYG is

DocRPP commented 22 January 2015 at 18:11

It turns out that WYSIWYG is no longer the way to achieve that functionality in drupal. That's is one of the reasons why d8 favoured the direct CKEditor approach. So I stopped recommending WYSIWYG to people. It contains numerous bugs to successfully work, and is no longer the recommended way.

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CKEditor approach

ReChardGoomez commented 4 March 2015 at 09:54

I'd been looking for open-source web development platform, I'd tested other cms but they are not that powerful as drupal. I love drupal eversince. I love their updates that may somehow fit my needs then.

Admin Menu

ReChardGoomez commented 5 March 2015 at 18:15

I like "Admin Menu" module too. :)

Among the listed top modules,

Nekky Black commented 6 March 2015 at 02:54

Among the listed top modules, the XML Sitemap is undoubtedly most needed one. It allows a well-organized and readable in-site structure for the Drupal sites, helping search engines crawl and index the site effectively.Besides, WYSIWYG is also a critical one, especially for newbies.