Daniel Kudwien (aka sun on drupal.org and tha_sun on IRC) of Unleashed Mind is a prolific Drupal contributed module author, but also Drupal core developer.

He discusses some of the well-known modules that he helped author and maintain, such as WYSIWYG, Admininstration Menu, Image Assist, Inline, and Demonstration Site.

He's taken it upon himself to make sure a lot of the Drupal 7 APIs have been standardized and cleaned up as much as possible, and also rallied a lot of help on tackling Drupal's oldest standing task of "Node 8," which is allowing users to cancel their own accounts. Sun also gave a heroic effort on helping on many of the different exception patches during the code slush period, and fellow developer chx commenting that he's never seen anyone sprint for Drupal.

Some examples of what you can do with the latest Drush

Over the last few years Drush has matured significantly and has seen an incredible uptake in usage. It's become indispensable in the day to day workflow of innumerable Drupal users and has been accepted with open arms by contributed module developers who are finding new and wonderful functionality to expose via its clear command line interface.

What not many people realize is that beneath this simple command line API beats the heart of a far more flexible and powerful beast. Drush was written with re-use and scriptability in mind, with this entire concept deeply ingrained in its design, and this is a large part of what gives it its power and flexibility. This will be even more apparent in Drush 3.0.

Below is a rundown of some useful things you'll be able to do with Drush 3.0.

Remote procedure calling

Each Drush command can be called from within any other Drush command, spawning a new process and returning structured and meaningful information to the calling script. A more accurate terminology would be that Drush commands all operate on a somewhat RESTful API , which is similar to XMLRPC and other RPC mechanisms that you may already be familiar with. Because of how this feature is implemented in Drush it can not only call Drush commands locally, but it can also call Drush commands on a remote server via SSH.

Up until now this functionality has been hidden within the API and only systems such as Aegir really made use of it. For example, in the Aegir hosting system we re-use the drush updatedb command when we do site migration and to run updates, and we have a single drush provision-backup command we can simply call when we need to make a backup.

What about security on remote calls?

Remote Drush calls run over SSH and require you to have your key already added to the remote server's list of authorized keys. Therefore Drush isn't capable of doing anything that you don't have the necessary permissions to log in manually and do on the server itself. It just does what it does best - automate away some of the steps so you get your results quicker.

The City of Athens has launched a new Drupal site to serve as its official website, along with a Drupal-based site at http://www.breathtakingathens.com/ that provides visitor and tourism information.

Athens is a large city (3.5 million residents and 6 million tourists each year), with a large tourism base due in part to its role in the 2004 Olympic Games. To support the city's needs, the site includes a large calendar of city events, a comprehensive map-based index of city services and interactive tools that allow citizens to access city resources. The site builds on Drupal's multilingual capabilities to provide information in both Greek and English.

I'm kicking myself because I've been taking far too narrow an interpretation of "an open source approach". I've been focused on getting people to release data. That's the data analogue of tossing code over the wall, and we know it takes more than a tarball on an FTP server to get the benefits of open source. The same is true of data.

Open source discourages laziness (because everyone can see the corners you've cut), it can get bugs fixed or at least identified much faster (many eyes), it promotes collaboration, and it's a great training ground for skills development. I see no reason why open data shouldn't bring the same opportunities to data projects.

And a lot of data projects need these things.

via radar.oreilly.com

I've been saying for a while that open data is a sort of new frontier. Open source is relatively wide spread and there is a general low hum of understanding about it in many places. For me, I sum it up by saying to people that they need to understand that their "code is worthless".

The next step is coming to understand about open data, and why we should care. Why we should convince people that their "data is worthless".

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In preparation for the Bringing it All Back Home: CMS Communities panel at SXSW, which I'll be speaking at on Saturday, I posed the following question on Twitter and in #drupal:

Which Simpsons character best represents the #Drupal community and why?

And the winner, in terms of number of responses, was...

Lisa Simpson

• Thinks she has all the answers to save the world but is so pathetically naive she never will. Yet you love her anyway. - TheRealCrell
• Underestimated, Intelligent, resourceful. With a wonderful singing voice. - bear_feet
• She is open minded and usually diplomatic :) - JCL324
• Logical, but not so popular. - DaftNinja

And here were the others. Feel free to comment too with your own. :)

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The dark days of Drupal theming are history. Today, it's pretty easy to find a slick design for your site, and if you need to build one from scratch there are great training tools to make the process painless. (Shameless plug: Lullabot's Theming Basics and Advanced Theming DVDs are a great resource!)

What's still relatively uncommon, though, is support for user-friendly customization by non-designers. Drupal 5 shipped with the re-colorable Garland theme, and a handful of themes support the same feature via Color module. The Nitobe theme offers a choice of header images; Development Seed's Singular theme lets administrators upload a custom background image for a site; and TopNotchThemes' Fusion theme allows administrators to choose fonts and switch from fixed-width to liquid layout using a settings screen.

Adding these kinds of customization options to a theme can make a huge difference in usability for end users and administrators. In this article, we'll learn how to add a "header image" setting to a theme, allowing a site manager to change the site's header from the administration screen!

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Wolfgang Ziegler (aka "fago") talks about the Rules module, and how it can be used by non-programmers to set up a series of events that are executed after certain conditional triggers happen. Fago claims that this is a more robust solution that Drupal's core trigger module functionality.

The Rules module in Drupal 6 is an evolution from the Workflow-NG module in Drupal 5, but renamed to reflect that it can do much more than just workflow.

There was also a Summer of Code project by klausi that integrated into the Rules package as the Rules Forms module.

Fago also talks about the future of Rules and how he plans on improving the APIs so that it's more extensible to add in loops and new features, and to have Features module integration with rules so that it's possible to and re-use rules.

DAI using Open Atrium to help their GIS teams in Pakistan communicate

Development Alternatives Inc. (DAI), one of the leading international development contractors, has deployed Open Atrium to help its GIS team in Islamabad communicate with its office in Peshawar and headquarters back in Bethesda on a capacity building project. In addition to improving team communications, they decided to use Open Atrium to boost the project's transparency for USAID and to get a sustainability win by using open source software that can stay behind with the local team in Pakistan long after the mapping project is completed.

Below is a short Q&A I had with Andrew Ross from DAI's GIS office about his work and how Open Atrium is helping.

Q: Can you tell us about your project and your team in Pakistan?

A: We are working on a capacity building project to assist organizations in Peshawar and develop capacity in many areas. Specifically our project currently has four GIS staff based in Peshawar, and we also have an office in Islamabad. We produce GIS products for a number of clients and share development statistics with other organizations. We are also developing systems to help share this data. Workflows are difficult to establish as our staff are frequently move between offices.

I'm fascinated by tools and experiences that let us "DIY". Whether it's using blogging tools to easily put content online, or cooking things from scratch, I like the fact that many things that seem hard or specialized are in fact things that anyone can do. With the Espresso Book Printing Machine, publishing a printed copy of a book has just joined that list.

Oscar's Art Books in Vancouver is one of only a handful of places in Canada that has an "EBM". The Espresso is made by a company called On Demand Books. They're looking to sell the machines to bookstores, universities, and other places where "like minded" people gather.

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Lullabot is looking for an experienced project manager. Responsibilities include: managing scope, deliverables, schedules, and team resources for Lullabot client and internal projects. Daily tasks would include leading daily 15 minute check-in calls for each project, tending the ticket queue and managing task lists, communicating (email/phone) with clients, and basically keeping projects on track and moving forward. Lullabot is a distributed company without a central office, so like all Lullabot jobs, this is a telecommuting position and may involve travel.

Additional responsibilities include helping to write and assemble new project proposals and statements of work, though we tend to focus on bigger projects and don't take on too many projects at once. You'd be responsible for estimating and staffing projects, meeting with clients, pursuing and growing development partnerships, and coordinating the delivery of various projects.

If this sounds like a lot, it is. But Lullabot is a very collaborative company so you won't be working in isolation. You'll be working with a team of highly experienced Drupal consultants and developers with excellent communication skills and a passion for their work.

Ideal candidates should:

• have 2 years or more of experience managing large web projects
• be generally familiar with the Drupal platform
• be a great communicator with good writing skills
• be comfortable managing and organizing remote virtual teams
• be based in the U.S.
• have a sense of humor

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At DrupalCon Paris, Doug Green of CivicActions shared some insights doing big Multilingual sites. He talks about some of the pain points faced with doing the site, and working with the i18n module.

Other references mentioned:

• Locale module in Drupal 6
• Properly the t() function
• i18nSync module included within i18n
• Amnesty Report Site
• Amnesty International site

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Lightning talks on the Boxes module and a new Drupal site and its data migration

The March Washington, DC Drupal meetup will be tonight (3/8) at 7:00 pm at Stetson's. After missing last month's meetup due to the snowmaggedons, it will be great to catch up with everyone.

As usual there will be a round of lightning talk where anyone can take the floor and talk - for five minutes or less - on a Drupal related topic. So far two people have volunteered:

• Jeff will talk about the Boxes module, which produces exportable and Spaces-friendly blocks

• StevenC has volunteered to talk about a website he built for a local construction firm that included a data migration from a legacy MS SQL database and some complex back-end programming.

If you'd like to give a talk, post about it in the comments here and come ready to talk. More details on the meetup are in the Washington DC Drupal group. Hope to see you tonight!

Drupal, dot gov, and a data challenge this week in Washington, DC

After a positively beautiful weekend here in Washington, DC, we're set to have even warmer weather through most of the week. Dare I say that spring is finally here? While it will be tempting to be outdoors as much as possible this week, there are some interesting technology events scheduled that may just convince you to head into a bar. Below are the events that caught our eye, and you can find a full like at DC Tech Events. Have a great week!

March 8

7:00 - 9:00 pm

DC Drupal Meetup: Interested in learning more about Drupal - the increasingly popular open source framework - or want to geek out with other Drupal developers? Then come out to tonight's meetup for good conversations about the content management system and how it's being used by developers in town. We'll be there :)

Wednesday, March 10

5:30

New Tech Happy Hour: This networking event brings together people working in new technology and ICT4D to talk and share ideas, and usually draws a big group.

6:00 pm

Developers Roundtable + AppShare: This meetup is an opportunity to pick the brains of other local technologists, with topics of technology, marketing, and operations all on the table. Also, there will be pizza and beer.

MySQL, the open source database product that puts the "M" in LAMP, was created by MySQL AB, a company founded in 1995 in Sweden. In 2008, MySQL AB announced that it had agreed to be acquired by Sun Microsystems for approximately $1 billion.

The story of MySQL AB is pretty amazing, so I unleashed my "inner academic", did some research and compiled a timeline of MySQL AB's history. This timeline is assembled based on different resources online, such as MySQL press releases (example 1) and interviews with MySQL AB executives (example 2, example 3), etc.

Things to add? Let me know in the comments and I'll update the post.

1995

• MySQL AB founded by Michael Widenius (Monty), David Axmark and Allan Larsson in Sweden.

2000

• MySQL goes Open Source and releases software under the terms of the GPL. Revenues dropped 80% as a result, and it took a year to make up for it.

2001

• Mårten Mickos elected CEO at age 38. Mårten was the CEO of a number of Nordic companies before joining MySQL, and comes with a sales and marketing background.
• 2 million active installations.
• Raised series A with undisclosed amount from Scandinavian venture capitalists. Estimated to be around $1 to $2 million.

2002

• MySQL launched US headquarters in addition to Swedish headquarters.
• 3 million active users.
• Ended the year with $6.5 million in revenue with 1,000 paying customers.

2003

• Raised a $19.5 million series B from Benchmark Capital and Index Ventures.
• 4 million active installations and over 30,000 downloads per day.
• Ended the year with $12 million in revenue.

2004

• With the main revenue coming from the OEM dual-licensing model, MySQL decides to move more into the enterprise market and to focus more on recurring revenue from end users rather than one-time licensing fees from their OEM partners.
• Ended the year with $20 million in revenue.

2005

• MySQL launched the MySQL Network modeled after the RedHat Network. The MySQL Network is a subscription service targeted at end users that provides updates, alerts, notifications, and product-level support designed to make it easier for companies to manage hundreds of MySQL servers.
• MySQL 5 ships and includes many new features to go after enterprise users (e.g. stored procedures, triggers, views, cursors, distributed transactions, federated storage engines, etc.)
• Oracle buys Innobase, the 4-person Finnish company behind MySQL's InnoDB storage backend.
• Ended the year with $34 million in revenue based on 3400 customers.

2006

• Mårten Mickos confirms that Oracle tried to buy MySQL. Oracle' CEO Larry Ellison commented: "We've spoken to them, in fact we've spoken to almost everyone. Are we interested? It's a tiny company. I think the revenues from MySQL are between $30 million and $40 million. Oracle's revenue next year is $15 billion."
• Oracle buys Sleepycat, the company that provides MySQL with the Berkeley DB transactional storage engine.
• Mårten Mickos announces that they are making MySQL ready for an IPO in 2008 on an projected $100 million in revenues.
• 8 million active installations.
• MySQL has 320 employees in 25 countries, 70 percent of whom work from home.
• Raised a $18 million Series C based on a rumored valuation north of $300 million.
• MySQL is estimated to have a 33% market share measured in install base and 0.2% market share measured in revenue (the database market was a $15 billion market in 2006).
• Ended the year with $50 million in revenue.

2007

• Ended the year with $75 million in revenue.

2008

• Sun Microsystems acquired MySQL AB for approximately $1 billion.
• Michael Widenius (Monty) and David Axmark, two of MySQL AB's co-founders, begin to criticize Sun publicly and leave Sun shortly after.

2009

• Mårten Mickos leaves Sun and becomes entrepreneur-in-residence at Benchmark Capital. Sun has now lost the business and spiritual leaders that turned MySQL into a success.
• Sun Microsystems and Oracle announced that they have entered into a definitive agreement under which Oracle will acquire Sun common stock for $9.50 per share in cash. The transaction is valued at approximately $7.4 billion.

This video shows how to use the Multiple Image Upload, Views and Views Bulk Operations modules to create a "multiple image upload and tag" tool. The View used in this video is attached as a text file which can be imported into your site using the Views import tool.

Bulk Uploading/Tagging images in Drupal - Imagex + VBO from Greg Knaddison on Vimeo.

Length:  6 minutes

Date:  Sat, 27/03/2010 - 09:00 - 18:00

A day of Drupal demonstrations, workshops & talks.

Pizza & beer provided by SiftGroups (event sponsor).

Further details will be posted as soon as I know more or follow us @ http://twitter.com/SiftGroupsLabs

Where Location:  SiftGroups, Bridge House, 48-52 Baldwin Street, Bristol, BS1 1QB. Map:  http://bit.ly/bYFtUd

Date:  Mon, 29/03/2010 - 19:00 - 23:00

The regular Drupal, beer and chat returns this month, with a bit of a special addition. I'm very happy to announce that Dries will be dropping in to sample some of our real ales and see what is happening with Drupal in London and the UK.

We will be making a slight exception to our usual strict "no presentations" rule and invite Dries to give a short talk.

Please note there is a new venue for this month! We will be in Dogget's Bar, near to Southwark and Waterloo stations, on Southbank. This provides a larger venue, a lovely view of the twinkling London skyline, and a great selection of real ales and proper pies.

RSVP quick on this one as there will be a lot of interest, there is a strict capacity of 140 people, so I have disabled 'maybe' replies for this event. One final thing, there is a minimum of £800 bar spend or else I get charged for the rental of the place, so each and every one of you has a duty to drink up, I'm sure we can manage it.

Website:  http://www.meetup.com/London-Drupal-Pub-Meet/calendar/12792369/ Where Location:  Dogget's Bar

• Drupal London

To better tag content in multilingual versions of Managing News

We just added support for Yahoo! Placemaker's geo-recognition service to Managing News. This is an optional replacement for the default place-term lookup feature and can be enabled and configured in the administration section of Managing News. For those new to automatic geotagging services, Placemaker is a free API that leverages Yahoo's GeoPlanet location database to identify where in the world a particular piece of content is relevant.

Here is a look at Managing News using Placemaker to tag content in Chinese:

There are a few reasons we wanted to do this. The first is that we've been working on multilingual versions of Managing News and found that the core geotagger is not able to correctly identify word breaks in languages like Chinese and Arabic. The Placemaker API is able to receive and parse content in 21 languages and return place names in the language you request. This flexibility greatly extends the accessibility of Managing News to non-English users.

Second, it's not always easy to find a list of location terms with latitude and longitude for the places for which we want to track news. Will White has a great post about customizing maps on Managing News, but we wanted to make it even easier for end-users to download the software and get going.

To get set up using Placemaker geotagging with Managing News check out the DRUPAL-6--1 branch of the Managing News profile on Drupal.org. The included makefile will let you build all the necessary components from source. This feature will be included in the next release of the project from ManagingNews.com, but we wanted to let folks who couldn't wait access it now.

Nate Haug, Jeff Eaton, Addi Berry, Karen Stevenson, Jerad Bitner, and Dave Burns join Jeff Robbins to talk about the latest Drupal news and try to figure out how to pronounce certain Old Norse words.

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NOTE: This Drupal Voices podcast was recorded at DrupalCon Paris back in September of 2009. Now that our latest training video on Drupal Module Development is out the door, then I should have more time to put out the remaining Drupal Voices interviews.

George DeMet is the founder and co-owner of Palantir.net. At DrupalCon Paris, DeMet led a panel discussion talking about converting Foreign Affairs magazine over to Drupal. DeMet touches on some of the highlights of functionality for the site and the Palantir team that built it. Palantir also took the time to write up a very comprehensive case study over on Drupal.org back in August that goes into a lot more detail. Finally, DeMet talks about how they transitioned from a regular development shop that produced their own CMS to working much more closely with Drupal.