This!

php -d memory_limit=128M my_script.php

This is how easy it is to download a module:

drush dl <module_name>

And this is how easy it is to install that module:

drush en <module_name>

What used to take me at least 2 minutes (download the module, unpack it, upload it to sites/all/modules, enable it), now takes literally 10 seconds.  It’s developer heaven.

But wait, it gets better - I just performed my first update of all of my site’s modules to their latest versions.  It took 1 minute.  Here is what I did:

drush pm-update

That’s it.  Are you kidding me!??!  The 1 minute was spent waiting for drush to do it’s thing (gather modules that needed updates, updating them, and then running the database update script).  AMAZING!

I <3 Drush!

Here is the situation: I’ve got a page in Drupal that I am rendering from code for some reason (in my current case, I’m using theme files to alter the output of a View, and I want to include another View within each row). It sure would be nice to know how to load up and display a View within my code. Here is how:


$view_args = array(); // place any arguments here
$display_id = 'panel_pane_1'; // the name of the display to load
$view = views_get_view('view_name'); // get our view
if (!empty($view)) {
$content = $view->execute_display($display_id, $view_args);
print $content['content'];
}
?>


Nice! Now the view will show up just where I want it! If you have questions, post a comment!

For some reason (probably legacy code), Drupal makes the assumption that you would only want to show your mission statement on the front page of your website.  So, the PHP Template engine removes the $mission variable from your page.tpl.php file if the front page is not being displayed.  But… fear not!  I’ve found a solution courtesy of Kineta Systems blog:


// populate the $mission variable on every page so we can use it universally
// don't check , it’s already handled in phptemplate.engine

if (!$vars['is_front']) {
$vars['mission'] = filter_xss_admin(theme_get_setting(’mission’));
}
?>


But first, what is a grouped list?  Let’s pretend that you want to have… oh I don’t know… a schedule of upcoming events that people can register for on your website.  One easy and Drupal-friendly way to create this is to just make a View, and have it list the content on your site that represents the Events.  Straight forward enough, and anyone who has any Drupal experience can do that quickly.

Now your client wants to be able to customize the display a bit, and they want to show a list of the month like this:

March 2010

• This is my event for March 2010.  3/12/10 - 3/14/10
• This is my second event for March 2010. 3/22/10 - 3/24/10

April 2010

• April Fools Day.  4/1/10
• etc.

Until today, I thought I was going to have to rewrite the output of the View and do this the hard way.  Now, I know that Drupal can do the heavy lifting for me… I love me some Drupal!

Without further ado: Create a Views event list grouped by months

That’s what being a Web Developer is all about.  So, in this post I’m going to catalogue useful links that I run into while solving problems.  Enjoy!

1. A good guide to cron.  You know you forget how to do it manually, it’s ok to admit it.

1. How to quickly add curved corners to a photo.

So, just yesterday I wrote my first job description for my own business.  I’m looking for a part time web developer/designer (or two) that have the desire to learn by doing.  I’ve got an ad running (I think) at the University of Maryland.  Here is what I wrote:

Web Development Internship

What is it?

Work part-time from home as a Web Developer!  You will work on both large, on-going projects (such as professionalbaseballtraining.com), and small-scale, quick turnaround projects.  You will have the chance to learn both how the web business works, and the skills necessary to succeed in a competitive environment.  Technical skills are necessary, but the desire to learn on the job is most important.  We will meet in person several times a month (we are located in Silver Spring), although most communication will be done online (email, IM, etc).

  

Required Skills:

• Intermediate knowledge of CSS/XHTML (Can you turn a web design into a web page?)
• Intermediate knowledge of PHP (Can you make a contact form send me an email?)
• Basic knowledge of MySQL (Can you fetch some data?)
• Basic computer skills (Can you slice up a PSD?  Can you un-tar a file?  Upload a file via ftp?)

Bonus Skills:

• Any Photoshop/Illustrator skills are a huge bonus, but definitely NOT required.
• Server admin skills - can you SSH into a Linux server, wget a file, and untar it?  Good!
• Javascript frameworks - do you know what jQuery is?  Do you love it so much that sometimes you lie awake at night thinking about it?
• Experience working with Drupal is a BIG plus (most of our large sites are Drupal based).
• Wordpress experience is also a plus, even just having your own Wordpress-based blog would be beneficial.

Pay will usually done on an hourly basis, although for some work you will be paid on a per-project basis.  Your rate will be based on your ability - the less that we have to fix, the more you are worth.

We encourage people who want to learn, as well as those that think they have some serious skills.

Now unzip the file that you just downloaded, and put pdftk.exe into c:\windows\system32.  I know, it seems shady, but its not.  We do this so that at the command prompt (yes, the command prompt, that dark and scary place) you can just type “pdftk” and something will happen.  Just trust me on this one.

Finally, open up the command prompt (Start -> Run -> command) and type “pdftk –help”.  This will spit out a bunch of help text, including some great examples.  I put all of the pdf files I wanted to in a folder, and named them 01.pdf, 02.pdf, etc, then I typed “pdftk *.pdf cat output combined.pdf” (minus the quotes, of course).  After a few seconds, I had combined.pdf created!  Huzzah!

Anyone out there got a better method?