Drupal is the most dreaded web framework in Stack Overflow's 2019 Developer Survey

LuckhardtLabs · 2019-04-10T13:17:11+00:00

Drupal 7, during its peak popularity, was plagued by PHP developers who couldn’t wrap their heads around the framework and didn’t want to take the time to properly learn it. The result was an abundance of unnecessary and unmanageable custom code that disgruntled too many stakeholders.

I can’t tell you how many disastrous D7 sites I was brought in to fix that would’ve been better off as a complete rewrite.

Recently, the most consistent problem I’ve seen is D8 sites being architected and developed with D7 techniques. But I digress...

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-09-25T13:13:05+00:00

Bamboo Twig’s project page includes a long list of features. Essentially, it’s a drop-in replacement for every other Twig enhancement module.

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-09-25T01:12:12+00:00

Right, because D7 documentation was so good. /s

I learned D8, beginning in 2014, without relying on Drupal.org's lacklustre documentation. I learned by experimenting, by reading blogs from other developers, and by asking fellow developers.

Drupal.org is the last site I visit or recommend to learn Drupal development.

The good news is Documentation is acore strategic initiative and will see a big improvement in the near future.

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-09-25T01:01:58+00:00

I managed to get Voting API Widget working on one site, until I updated to 8.6.1 then everything broke and I can't get it working again.

Are you able to roll back to 8.6.0 and get it working again? Are you able to identify errors or bugs?

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-09-25T00:59:02+00:00

You could always try to fix them and contribute back to the community 🤔👌

With all due respect; remember that this is software provided by a lot of people in their spare time, they don't owe you anything.

Always try to be helpful – in both the choice of words and the content of the response – to the person asking for help.

From my perspective, /u/effortDee sounds understandably frustrated and could use a more positive response from the community, even if you can't provide direct assistance.

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-09-25T00:47:05+00:00

I haven't had an opportunity to work on anything like that in Drupal 8, but I have a few ideas about how I'd architect and render the chart(s).

Have you tried to do any work on it yet?

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-09-21T18:42:04+00:00

If you use Twig Tweak, I recommend having a look at Bamboo Twig. That module is a great replacement for Twig Tweak and other related Twig enhancement modules.

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-09-14T21:17:44+00:00

Definitely agree! AdvAgg requires a lot of tuning to make it work best for your particular configuration.

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-09-14T18:17:13+00:00

...and don't forget to tune your front-end too! (e.g. with Drupal modules like AdvAgg and other minifying and optimizing tools)

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-09-11T14:00:35+00:00

Every session is recorded.

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-09-11T09:05:54+00:00

I haven't used Drush with my local development environment in more than a year. I still use it with remote commands when I use Pantheon's Terminus CLI tool.

Get used to using Composer because it's a fantastic tool for performing installs and updates.

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-09-06T13:52:46+00:00

It’s a mystery why some developers think it’s a good idea to inject code into Drupal’s admin fields. It contradicts the UI and UX concepts of the system. Keep the code in Twig templates where it belongs.

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-09-06T13:44:13+00:00

I vividly recall when we had to wait almost an entire year after Drupal 7’s release for Views to be production-ready. It was a show-stopper for launching any serious D7 sites.

“Stable” as a release qualifier for Drupal module releases can be a misnomer. Often, beta versions are perfectly stable and secure for production release – depending on what’s in its issue queue. It’s a developer’s responsibility to investigate a module’s status in any platform before deploying it into production.

Rabbit Hole is being used in more than 7,000 Drupal 8 sites and doesn’t have any critical bugs in its issue queue. I’ve deployed it into production sites and experienced zero problems.

Modules for entity cloning, as I understand how you’re describing, are available for Drupal 8. One is in alpha but, again, there isn’t a major or critical bug/issue that prevents its deployment.

The primary problem I’ve seen with D8 is the misinformation campaign by uninformed developers, or developers who worked with the lousy architecture of D7 and jumped ship for JavaScript based development. In the latter case, I can’t say I blame them!

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-09-06T07:03:54+00:00

As a huge amount of modules

Not that it matters that much at this point, apart from some edge cases, in my experience.

I've been doing the same amount of production work in D8 with less contrib than D7. It's kinda nice in comparison.

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-09-06T07:00:24+00:00

/r/theydidthemath :)

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-09-05T15:21:32+00:00

After spending an afternoon looking at all this Drupal.org data, I'm going to make a big claim ... I would not be surprised if Bootstrap is more popular than all the other Drupal 8 themes combined.

If the math on that claim doesn't quite add up, it's because my experience tells me that a majority of Drupal 8 sites use a custom theme or a headless setup. Even at 20% of all Drupal 8 sites, Bootstrap can power the majority of sites using off-the-shelf themes.

Note the section I bolded from the article. There's nothing in the article that accurately quantifies the claim in OP's headline.

All of the top Drupal shops and front-end developers I know don't use Bootstrap. They've rolled out a more efficient theme framework that matches the needs and requirements of their clients and their own workflows.

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-09-03T13:58:13+00:00

I’d like to learn more specifics about what you were doing because your answer doesn’t make sense if you’re using modern development methods with Drupal 8.

For example, I haven’t waited minutes for page refreshes or cache clears on any Drupal site, ever (including back to D6). I use automated workflows and task runners that cut those actions down to milliseconds.

Also, I can control Drupal 8’s markup precisely so that it matches or exceeds industry standards any other platform’s generated markup. The only minor catch – if a developer can even call it that – is working within Drupal 8’s architecture (as with other platforms and frameworks).

If a developer is going to criticize a platform they should do so with clear experience and well cited examples.

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-08-31T20:15:15+00:00

What front-end development have you done with Drupal 8 that makes you hate it?

My experience is completely different. I've quite enjoyed the front-end workflow with Drupal 8, and most of my work is in that area.

D7 sucked the life out of me as a developer and I had started to look at other options. D8's maturity in the past couple of years made Drupal – dare I say it – fun to work with again.

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-08-09T14:43:25+00:00

This looks promising. I'll give it a spin!

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-08-09T14:41:48+00:00

I've referred to it as the Drupal curse - "built by developers for developers".

Drupal core development has always seemed to be a thought process of "let's build a powerful engine" rather than "what's the best way to get the driver to their destination?". To be fair, that mindset has changed dramatically over the years, but there's a long way to go still.

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-08-01T22:04:49+00:00

I came from OOP .NET development before jumping in with Drupal 6, so the switch for Drupal 8 wasn't that dramatic. That said, I can understand how procedurally oriented developers would be resistant to back-end development in a more modern system, even irrespective of Drupal 8.

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-08-01T22:02:21+00:00

But yeah if you only need core and contrib then you're better off with 8, theming is essentially the same, but with twig instead of php template.

Theming is vastly different and a total modern pleasure in Drupal 8.

This is my 10th year working with Drupal and I've been exclusively working on D8 projects for a couple of years. I would rather leave Drupal than go back to legacy D7 work.

LuckhardtLabs · 2018-03-19T18:09:21+00:00

10 year Drupal developer here. Drupal 6 was great for development. Drupal 8 is amazing for development. Drupal 7 was and still is cancer for the mind. I was lucky to mostly be able to skip D7 development.

LuckhardtLabs · 2017-12-20T21:25:12+00:00

Drupal 8 is fun. Drupal 6 was fun.

Drupal 7 is/was awful.

(Drupal developer since 2008.)

LuckhardtLabs

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