1. NOTE:
This presentation is a Work in Progress. The
current copy shared is intended only for
review purposes by the DCD panel.

2. How “N O T”
to build Drupal
Sites
Tanay Sai
Technical Account Manager
Acquia

3. Do “NOT” code too much
● Do not program too much
● When you have a hammer
everything looks like a nail
● Don't be in a rush to become
a Drupal "Programmer"
● Do not try to solve the
Problem by Programming

4. Do “NOT” custom code too much
● Hard to Maintain
● Leverage existing good
contrib modules
● You are just re-inventing the
wheel
● Contrib code tested and
reviewed by many

5. Do “NOT” hack core
● Why?
● Use Hooks, APIs from core
and contrib

6. Do “NOT” be too generic
●
●
●
●
●
hook_init, hook_boot
form_alters without check for
form if
Including JS, CSS through these
init hook
403 - Use Drupal's permissions
system instead
Overriding other module’s
behaviour - Use
hook_menu_alter,
hook_form_alter etc instead of
hook_init

7. Do “NOT” get into trouble
●
●
●
hook_init
hook_boot
hook_exit()
●
●
●
hook_node_access()
hook_node_access_records()
hook_node_access_alter()
●
●
hook_node_grants()
hook_node_grants_alter()

8. Do “NOT” put code in database
● PHP Filter
● Views PHP module
● Why?
● Common Scenarios
● Alternative better approaches

9. Do “NOT” clutter your site
● Dozens of unused modules,
content types, vocabularies
● Be a miser

10. Do “NOT” Content Typify Everything
● Use Custom Entities
wherever Appropriate

11. Do “NOT” just MYISAM
● InnoDB vs MyISAM

12. Do “NOT” default PERMISSIONS
●
●
●
Do not leave any permission
checked or unchecked by default
Uncheck all and start checking
one by one after putting some
thought
Whenever is new module is
added check the permissions
added and see the roles that
these permissions were granted
to

13. Do “NOT” default your FILTERS
● Input Formats
● Filters

14. Do “NOT” leave out CACHING
●
●
●
●
●
●
●
Block Caching
Page Caching
Views Caching
Entity Cache module
Boost/Varnish
Memcache
APC
●
●
●
Set appropriate cache lifetimes
Page Compression
CSS/JS Aggregation

15. Do “NOT” Log Everything Everywhere
●
●
●
Disable DB Log
Enable Syslog
Disable Statistics, Use GA or
similar

16. Do “NOT” leave UI modules enabled
● UI Modules
● Simpletest
● Migrate
● Migrate Extras
● Coder
● Devel

17. Do “NOT” Use them. Stay Away!
● Statistics
● ..
● ..
●

18. Do “NOT” Leave behind 404
● Use Fast 404
● Prevent Bootstrap and
Database operations for that
favicon which is always
missing

19. Do “NOT”