Quick notes: Drupal Commons - The Open Source Alternative to Social Business Software 20100812

Drupal Commons Webcast  - Jay Batson 20100812

Recorded version should be available in a few days.

http://acquia.com/resources/recorded_webinars

Drupal Commons - website used for community http://commons.acquia.com/home

Websites like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, are based on user feedback

Social business software, creates loyal customers, passionate employees, business leverage

Can use pre packaged (proprietary) or SAS solutions

Often these bring you into a closed, limited system

If want added API, no can do

• Often cant’ get data out of system
• Software license fees
• Regimented way they want communities to work

Drupal Commons, open source

Blogs, wiki, friend, relations etc

• Freedom of assembly, can be whatever you want
• Freedom of tech limits
• Freedom from license fees

http://commons.acquia.com/home is example of Acquia using Drupal to build a community site

Listeners invited to create your own account and join in

Drupal Commons app homepage is very customizable

Stock photography allowed, can adapt default simple theme, add your own branding

Everything is organized around groups

Features:

• Shout box
• Recent group content
• Recent group activity
• Upcoming group events
• Document creation - Wysiwyg editor - Can attach images
• Blog posts
• Discussions
• Wiki - Any member of a group can edit that group wiki content
• Calendar - shows items from all the groups you’re a member of
• Polls (didn’t demo)

Menu:   Home - Dashboard - Community - My Stuff

Not just about content, but about people - Users can have avatars, see who is in groups

Can send friend requests, then you can see their activity

Dashboard page brings together all content on the site that is important to user

(group summary, recent items, list of unread items, list of friends, events happening)

Community manager has the right to promote content to top

Point system for most active users

Analytics of different groups, how many joined, how many used on given day

Commons uses Google chart API

Drupal Commons Benefits:

• Lowers risk of experimenting with social web
• Makes everyone in org a marketer
• Stay ahead of your competitors
• Serve your community

Drupal Commons was built in a matter of months

Functionality was defined by a few key customers

  -http://commons.acquia.com/home

Acquia offers Community Round Table

Partner thought leader,

Acquia provides assistance setting up social community

Training, hosting and support

Q&A

Advanced features?

Drupal can incorporate an alfresco integration module allows to go beyond Commons capabilities

[interruption ... ]

Can you have a group of groups?

This is among most requested feature, yes there is a sub group technology,

Didn’t bundle it into commons, but it does exist, organic groups

Don’t have to wait for next version, can install on your own

Quant is name of analytics module

Can set up Drupal Commons with a login page showing up first

Initiate moderator approval

Can control which partners see which groups

Module called Features, allows multiple modules together

If you over ride items in a module during upgrade, Features will let you know

Next week webinar on Drupal search