Introduction to Module Development (Drupal 7)

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by April Sides

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April Sides

Assessment Web Developer

North Carolina Institute of Climate Studies (NCICS)North Carolina State University

National Centers for Environmental Information (NCEI)

Drupal ID: weekbeforenext

Asheville Drupal User Group Member

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• Tools - what you need to develop a module• API/Hooks - how to get Drupal to run your code• Anatomy - what files you need and what code

should be included in those files• Resources - where to find the right hooks• Example - how to modify an existing form, etc.

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• Some PHP coding experience• Plain text editor

Mac: Sublime Text - http://www.sublimetext.com

PC: Notepad++ - https://notepad-plus-plus.org

• A working Drupal site Acquia Dev Desktop - https://www.acquia.com/downloads

• Troubleshooting /research resources Devel module - https://www.drupal.org/project/devel

Internet access

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• What is an API? An application programming interface (API) expresses a

software component in terms of its operations, inputs, outputs and underlying types.

Drupal core modules contain MODULE_NAME.api.php files defining functions that other modules can “hook” into.

Well documented at http://api.drupal.org

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• What is a hook? Hooks are how modules can interact with the core code

of Drupal. A hook can be thought of as an event listener in the sense

that an event triggers an action. Ex. hook_delete Some hooks let you alter things that have been generated

just before they're processed. Ex. hook_form_alter Other hooks allow you to add or register new content

items. Ex. hook_block_info

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Drupal

sites

all

modules

block_example

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block_example.module

block_exampleblock_example.info block_example.test

block_example.install

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block_example.info

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block_example.module

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block_example.install

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• I want to modify the contact form

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• I want to modify the contact form: Enable “Send yourself a copy.” checkbox by default Change the title of the form to “AWESOME Contact

Form” Change the field label “Your name” to “Your AWESOME

name” Add help text to the Subject field with suggestions Change the text of the submit button to “Send your

AWESOME message”

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my_module.info

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my_module.module

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api.drupal.org – hook_form_alter

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api.drupal.org – Form API Reference

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api.drupal.org – drupal_set_title

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api.drupal.org – Form API Reference

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api.drupal.org – Form API Reference

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api.drupal.org – Form API Reference

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api.drupal.org – Form API Reference

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api.drupal.org – Form API Reference

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• I want to add a non-node page: The page should be accessible by anyone who can see

published content at: mysite.com/awesome-page The title of the page should be “I can make a page!” Include the following paragraph on the page: “I am so

awesome that I can create my own page in a custom module.”

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…

api.drupal.org – hook_menu

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api.drupal.org – hook_menu

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api.drupal.org – hook_menu

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api.drupal.org – hook_menu

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FLUSH THE CACHE

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• I want the following to happen when an author creates a new article: Change the author to me, so it looks like I’m doing more

work than I am. Make sure that all new articles are set to publish by

default, so my boss will see “my” work.

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api.drupal.org – Node API Hooks

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api.drupal.org – hook_node_insert

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node/add/article

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node/15/edit

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• Examples for Developers - https://www.drupal.org/project/examples

• Drupal API reference - https://api.drupal.org

• DrupalContrib API reference - http://www.drupalcontrib.org

• Drupal Answers - http://drupal.stackexchange.com