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Project: Building a forum with drupal


The following are some notes from a project to build a multi-lang forum in Autumn 2009.

Key features: 4 languages, bookmarks, lots of views (member lits, posts sorted in different ways), improved navigation, solr search, notify users when thread change, mark comments as solutions.

Difficulties: multi-lang. Mark comments as solutions. Getting a pretty layout.

Hacks:

One should not hack core, but I was not always able to find alternatives..

New Modules:

  • "Solve Thread": should be released to the community by Tobi soon, hopefullly.
    Allows marking specific comments to a topic / thread, as the 'solution' which also marks the whole thread as solved. The idea is to make the key replies to a question more visible. The number of solutions posted by a user can also be used in rating.

Modules enabled:

 Name                   Enabled  Description                                   
 ACL (acl)              Enabled  Access control list API. Has no features on   
 Administration menu    Enabled  Provides a dropdown menu to most              
 Advanced Forum         Enabled  Enables the look and feel of other popular    
 Advanced Forum More    Enabled  Additional Advanced Forum Styles              
 Advanced help          Enabled  Allow advanced help and documentation.        
 Aggregator             Enabled  Aggregates syndicated content (RSS, RDF, and  
 Apache Solr framework  Enabled  Framework for searching with Solr             
 Apache Solr search     Enabled  Search with Solr                              
 Author Pane            Enabled  Gathers information from user related contrib 
 Backup and Migrate     Enabled  Backup or migrate the Drupal Database quickly 
 Block (block)          Enabled  Controls the boxes that are displayed around  
 Color (color)          Enabled  Allows the user to change the color scheme of 
 Comment (comment)      Enabled  Allows users to comment on and discuss        
 Comment upload         Enabled  Enables file attachments on comments          
 Content (content)      Enabled  Allows administrators to define new content   
 Content Copy           Enabled  Enables ability to import/export field        
 Content Permissions    Enabled  Set field-level permissions for CCK fields.   
 Custom Search Box      Enabled  This module allows a user with admin page     
 Database logging       Enabled  Logs and records system events to the         
 Devel (devel)          Enabled  Various blocks, pages, and functions for      
 Devel node access      Enabled  Developer block and page illustrating relevant
 Diff (diff)            Enabled  Show difference between node revisions.        
 Drupal for Firebug     Enabled  A helper extension for the Drupal for Firebug 
 FCKeditor (fckeditor)  Enabled  Enables the usage of FCKeditor (WYSIWYG)      
 Filter (filter)        Enabled  Handles the filtering of content in           
 Flag (flag)            Enabled  Create customized flags that users can set on 
 Flag actions           Enabled  Execute actions on Flag events.               
 Forum (forum)          Enabled  Enables threaded discussions about general    
 Forum Access           Enabled  Allows forums to be set private and allows    
 Help (help)            Enabled  Manages the display of online help.           
 Internationalization   Enabled  Extends Drupal support for multilingual       
 Block translation      Enabled  Enables multilingual blocks and block         
 Content type           Enabled  Translates content type related strings: name,
 Menu translation       Enabled  Supports translatable custom menu items.      
 Profile translation    Enabled  Enables multilingual profile fields.          
 String translation     Enabled  Provides support for translation of user      
 Synchronize            Enabled  Synchronizes taxonomy and fields accross      
 Taxonomy translation   Enabled  Enables multilingual taxonomy.                
 Views translation      Enabled  Translation of views strings and content      
 Image (image)          Enabled  Allows uploading, resizing and viewing of     
 ImageAPI (imageapi)    Enabled  ImageAPI supporting multiple toolkits.        
 ImageAPI GD2           Enabled  Uses PHP's built-in GD2 image processing      
 ImageCache             Enabled  Dynamic image manipulator and cache.          
 ImageCache UI          Enabled  ImageCache User Interface.                    
 Locale (locale)        Enabled  Adds language handling functionality and      
 Menu (menu)            Enabled  Allows administrators to customize the site   
 Messaging (messaging)  Enabled  Messaging system. This is the base module for 
 Simple Mail            Enabled  Mail Sending Method: Integration with Drupal  
 Messaging Privatemsg   Enabled  Sending Method: Integration with Privatemsg   
 Node (node)            Enabled  Allows content to be submitted to the site and
 Notifications          Enabled  The basic notifications framework             
 Notifications          Enabled  Provides automatic notifications.             
 Content Notifications  Enabled  Allows users to subscribe to content related  
 Taxonomy               Enabled  Allows users to subscribe to taxonomy terms.  
 Notifications UI       Enabled  Provides an UI to notifications               
 Path (path)            Enabled  Allows users to rename URLs.                  
 Pathauto (pathauto)    Enabled  Provides a mechanism for modules to           
 Persistent Login       Enabled  Provides a 'Remember Me' checkbox in the login
 Block user messages    Enabled  Allows users to block other users from sending
 Privatemsg Email       Enabled  Notifies users about new Private Messages via 
 Private messages       Enabled  Allow private messages between users.         
 Privatemsg filter      Enabled  Allow users to filter messages using tags or  
 Profile (profile)      Enabled  Supports configurable user profiles.          
 Search (search)        Enabled  Enables site-wide keyword searching.          
 Solve Thread           Enabled  Allows marking specific comments to a topic / 
 Statistics             Enabled  Logs access statistics for your site.         
 String Overrides       Enabled  Provides a quick and easy way of replacing    
 Syslog (syslog)        Enabled  Logs and records system events to syslog.     
 System (system)        Enabled  Handles general site configuration for        
 Taxonomy (taxonomy)    Enabled  Enables the categorization of content.        
 Text (text)            Enabled  Defines simple text field types.              
 Token (token)          Enabled  Provides a shared API for replacement of      
 Content translation    Enabled  Allows content to be translated into different
 Translation helpers    Enabled  Provides methods for other modules to use with
 Translation overview   Enabled  Provides an overview of the translation status
 Translation table      Enabled  UI for quick translation of taxonomy, menu and
 Update status          Enabled  Checks the status of available updates for    
 Upload (upload)        Enabled  Allows users to upload and attach files to    
 User (user)            Enabled  Manages the user registration and login       
 User badges            Enabled  Enables assignment of graphical badges to     
 User registration      Enabled  Notifies administrator of new user            
 UR-Blocks              Enabled  Blocks that can be used with User             
 UR-Defaults            Enabled  Allows admins to specify relationships that   
 UR-Elaborations        Enabled  Allow users to elaborate on their             
 UR-Implications        Enabled  Lets admins create implied relationships. For 
 UR-Mailer              Enabled  Gives the option to mail users when about     
 UR Migrate Buddylist2  Enabled  Allows admins to migrate buddylist2           
 UR-Node Access         Enabled  Provides per node access control based on     
 UR-Views               Enabled  Integrates User Relationships with Views      
 UR-API                 Enabled  API for User Relationships. This will only    
 UR-UI                  Enabled  User Relationships UI. This enables basic UI  
 Views (views)          Enabled  Create customized lists and queries from your 
 Views exporter         Enabled  Allows exporting multiple views at once.      
 Views UI (views_ui)    Enabled  Administrative interface to views. Without    
 Voting API             Enabled  Provides a shared voting API for other        
 

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