Where to start!

By allanmayberry on 11 Feb 2009 at 11:14 UTC

Hi everyone,
First off, I'll start by saying how easy I have found it so far to pick up Drupal! Just started a new job recently and hadn't even heard of it but have already started work on a number of client sites with great sucess!! :D

The problem I have is that we have an existing holiday website http://totalholidayexperience.com (note the hurrendous load times, we are having problems with the server host, this is in the process of being resolved) built on Wordpress, but it has outgrown Wordpress and the amount of content etc is too much to be based on a simple blog (not trying to start an arguement about drupal vs wordpress, they both have their own merits from what I have seen!). Anyway, the powers at be want to re-build this site using drupal in to compare load times/ease of use etc and look to continue the development of the site using drupal in the future.

I really am not sure where to start with this, in terms of how the existing site has "teasers" on the main page and also the sub-categories i.e. "cruises". The teaser posts that are displayed on these pages also have a full dedicated page providing full holiday details. I've had a look at the 'Node Teaser' module, but don't understand how to properly utilise it...

Can anyone suggest any plan of action?

Cheers

Comments

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WorldFallz commented 11 February 2009 at 20:23

I only took a quick look, but I would think you could rebuild that site in drupal with cck, views, and the panels or composite modules.

Teasers themselves are built-in to drupal. Any page 'promoted to front' will automatically show as a teaser by default. However, if you use views you can get more control over how that front page looks. You should be able to get pretty close to the existing layout pretty easily.

_{===

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Thanks for the quick reply,

allanmayberry commented 12 February 2009 at 08:44

Thanks for the quick reply, I'll have a go at that over the next week or so and come back if I cant figure anything out! Much appreciated!

Just an update, I think I've

allanmayberry commented 12 February 2009 at 12:24

Just an update, I think I've figured it out...in the simplest form right enough but I've got the general idea now so Im pretty chuffed...and it didn't take very long at all to get the basic function in place. Once I knew what I was looking for a quick Google Search brought up this guide which was brilliant!

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WorldFallz commented 12 February 2009 at 12:53

Excellent-- and welcome aboard!

Thanks! Having another issue

allanmayberry commented 12 February 2009 at 15:16

Thanks! Having another issue now though. I'm creating a view to display all the 'cruise' holidays (within this there are sub-categories depending on tour operator etc) so I've tried selecting all taxonomys relating to cruises (i.e. each tour operator) in the "filters" tab but nothing is displaying on the page that I am creating the view in, as if the page is not being created at all...

I thought this could be the problem, but tried creating a page with the same name as I entered when creating the view, and got the "path already in use" message which would suggest that the page has been created by the view, but when i try to access it using the URL I get a "Page not Found" error...

Is there something obvious that I am missing? I was able to create a view to display "most recent 3 posts" based on the tutorial i followed earlier, and I was under the impression that it would be the same process, except that in the "filters" section i would define the specific Taxonomy terms that I wanted to display?

Again, I much appreciate any help you can give a noob!

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WorldFallz commented 12 February 2009 at 15:52

There's nothing obvious I can see from what you described. I would try removing the filters and testing the page-- if it works, then add the filters back, one at time, and see if you can see where the problem starts.

Thanks again for your help,

allanmayberry commented 12 February 2009 at 16:16

Thanks again for your help, I've tried what you said above, but no luck...its as if the page with the view isn't being generated, but it must be if I can't create another page with the same name while the view exists? I've tried working through the original tutorial again and now this isn't working either, even though I have followed it exactly as I did previously!?

I'm so confused! :'-( This really doesn't make any sense to me as I haven't changed anything else at all? It wouldn't have anything to do with the fact that the steps mentioned in the tutorial were to develop a view for a home page, as surely the only difference is pointing the default home page setting to the newly created view page wouldn't it.

http://www.totalholidayexperience.com

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WorldFallz commented 12 February 2009 at 17:29

When you say nothing is displaying-- do you mean nothing at all? As in a blank white page? Or just no view? Try completely deleting the view and starting over.

It's not that "nothing" is

allanmayberry commented 13 February 2009 at 09:50

It's not that "nothing" is displaying, in the sense that the theme is displaying, but the content section, where the view is supposed to display is empty, and instead of getting the page title at the top of the browser I'm getting a "Page Not Found" in its place, which is what makes me think that it is not being created at all. I've tried deleting the view and creating from scratch a few times but as of yet no luck. The boss is out the office today so I'm going to have a play about with it until I get it working without worrying about extra work being piled on top!

I'll get back with any progress!

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http://www.totalholidayexperience.com
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I think I've established

allanmayberry commented 13 February 2009 at 10:13

I think I've established where the problems start anyway...it seems that when im creating the post I need to select the filter "Node: Front Page" and it seems to work doing it this way. What I have noticed however is that if I try to remove this filter, the view fails and I get the problem mentioned previously. Also if I try to re-apply the view, this does not resolve the problem which seems strange to me?

It seems that if i set "Node: Front Page" = "No" then I can get the appropriate pages to display, I'm guessing this is the best work-around to use?

Ideas/suggestions are welcomed! Cheers!

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http://www.totalholidayexperience.com
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WorldFallz commented 13 February 2009 at 12:52

If you have a workaround, by all means use it. But this sounds like a bug so I would create an issue in the views issue queue (if there isn't a similar there already).