News aggregator

Alright, so the first (annual?) DrupalCamp Atlanta is over and done. A success all around, and most (if not all) of the credit goes to the Atlanta Drupal Users Group and especially Dave Terry and the team at Mediacurrent. Great venue, free food and some surprise guests from out of town.

Addison Berry came down as the keynote speaker. It was fun for me to finally see her talk, since she is traveling on a Knight Drupal Initiative grant. Her mission is to improve Drupal’s documentation, but her message is that everyone is part of the Drupal community and can add value to the product and the process of sustaining Drupal.

Josh Brauer came from out West to represent Acquia and discuss Gardens and Drupal 7. Jakob Perry [japerry] even came from Seattle to see what we were up to. There was also a large group of folks from Nashville, including Jamie Meredith.

Ben Finklea from Volacci came from Austain to discuss SEO, marketing strategies and Drupal. His talk, “I have seen the future of marketing and it is Drupal blue,” reinforced some lessons about site architecture, content and (believe it or not) honesty in marketing that made for a good refresher, and a break from a day of code-speak.

The best talk I went to all day, actually, was by my former co-worker (I quit, not him), Cameron Guill. Cameron is the MySQL DBA at Morris Digital Works and is responsible for keeping large sites like SavannahNow and Jacksonville.com running smoothly. He discussed the use of Squid and Squirm as a front-side cache; the advantages (and limitations) of running Drupal with memcached; a whole boatload of MySQL performance tunes; the importance of performance monitoring and query logging; and, well, a bunch of stuff that went right over my head. If I had to summarize his advice, it would be: make sure you write to memory instead of to disk, whenever and wherever possible. Disk swap can cripple your site. Oh, and if you aren’t running a dedicated database server (and don’t have a real DBA) you’re kidding yourself if you try to scale Drupal.

I presented on Domain Access, and how it might change your Drupal life. And the talk was well-received, though I could have used another 20 minutes for questions.

In all, a very successful day of Drupaling. The rain dampened spirits a bit (and I think kept us from hitting our 250 attendee capacity). But it was worth getting up early and making the (sometimes harrowing) drive through the rain to get there and back. Next time, I’m staying the night so I can go to the afterparty.

My wife Amy and I are sitting in the Charlotte, NC, airport, waiting for our plane to Paris and DrupalCON 2009. This will be the third year we’ve gone to DrupalCON Europe, and after great trips to Barcelona and Szeged/Budapest, we’re very excited about Paris. And my wife is probably more excited than I am.

Why? Well, let me tell you a little story…

Back in 2007, at DrupalCON Barcelona, I still wasn’t a full time Drupaler. I had a day job that involved some Drupal, and worked on a few modules, but wasn’t deep in the community. Still, when Barcelona was announced as the location, I knew we had to go. So one of my missions for that confernce was to introduce my wife to other people, so that she could have fun while I was off geeking out.

I wasn’t alone. The night before DC Barcelona, we had a meetup for Drupalers and their partners at Moshe Weitzman’s apartment. As I recall, there were about 6 or 8 people there when we arrived. There was some wine, some introductions, and a chance to meet a few people.

During Barcelona, Amy spent some time with a few of these folks, and we met a few more people one night at the Place Royale (people we would run into again in Szeged, as it turns out.)

In Szeged, there were a few more fellow travelers, and more ad hoc meetups. Szeged, unlike Barcelona (or Paris) was small enough that people could easily meet at the venue, and then plan a day wandering around, haging out, and generally having a good time.

Starting in Szeged, the idaea was hatched to start a more formal group, one which could help coordinate events, activities and introductions for people travelling to but not attending DrupalCON. And thus the Drupalgängers group was born. Their mission is simple:

The primary goal of the Drupalgängers, defined as friends, partners, spouses, and other associates of Drupal community members, is to have a contingency of awesome individuals with whom we may enjoy the “con” – without ever having to participate in the geekdom of the event – by traveling around the town or city together.

For Paris, they have gone all out. There was an activity survey (with over 25 responses), some serious planning, and an effort to be as inclusive and casual as possible. From all that work has come the non-attendee track for DrupalCON Paris, which is dedicated to providing social opportunities in the heart of Paris.

A few extra words about the makup of the Drupalgängers, and the kinds of interaction you can expect. In true Drupal fashion, they are best described as a Birds of a Feather (BoF) group; an ad hoc collection of individuals who are committed to making the most of their time together. While the group has some scheduled events, there are always opportunities to just hang around a cafe, or to suggest alternative trips or side excursions, or to just stop and have an ice cream in the park.

In essence, the group’s character will be defined by the people who attend the events. You don’t have to know anyone, know anything about Drupal, or pass any membership tests. Just be yourself, come on over, and be open to meet some new friends.

Ben, Erik, Stephen, Andrew, and Walker discuss the ins and outs of Google Local and how to optimize a website for it. We give step by step instructions for getting listed and moving up in the local listings.

My name is Andrew and I confess, I have never blogged. I might be the only person in the office to have never blogged before now. You can understand that I feel a certain amount of pressure to do a good job, though I doubt there's a standard by which blog posts are measured. I used to play golf with a guy who, before every shot, would say, "Here's hoping." So in that same spirit of not knowing where this is going, here's hoping.

About three weeks ago our resident computer whisperer, Roger, came to me with a challenge, to submit an entry to the 2008 Drupalcon Logo Contest. Drupalcon, he explained, is a conference held twice a year for companies and individuals like us to get together and learn about what is new in the world of Drupal, the content management system Digett uses. This year, a couple of our team members will attend the conference in Boston, MA.

Every conference needs a T-shirt and every T-shirt needs a logo, common knowledge, yes? Enter the 2008 Drupalcon Logo Contest. Requirements concentrate on the logo working well on a black, white and colored background. So my toolbox included a set of colors, Drupalcon 2008 and the city of Boston.

I think what I've come up with is simple and says what it needs to at a glance, which is what a logo should do. Its simplicity and versatility is what sets it apart from the others. It has an advantage, I feel.

Check it out if you have the time here. The judges will take into consideration voting from the public. I would tell you to vote for my logo, but in the interest of fairness I ask that you look through all the designs first and then vote for my logo. And keep an eye out for another logo entry I have in the works, it should be unveiled in the near future, I'll keep you posted.