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Created May 23, 2013 17:56
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My notes from the second day of presentations at Drupalcon Portland 2013
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drupalcon-wednesday-notes.md

#Notes from Drupalcon Portland, Wednesday May 22, 2013

##General Drupal

##The Old And The New Field API In Drupal8

  • Field config and instances written to yaml files, do not need features to deploy
  • Field definitions missing widget and display
  • "Don't hack core." replaced by "Don't hack your active config." - Alex Pott
    • Instead import from development/staging into active if you edit config by hand
    • Sometimes it may work and for other configs it will probably work, but in the case of Field API your stored data can be impacted by a config change
  • Field API uses Entity API, $field = entity_create('field_entity', array(...));, $field->save();, entity_create('field_instance', array(...))->save();
  • Still a lot about this API is up in the air / to be determined. Slides are confusing as the examples are out of context
  • Symfony2/Doctrine style Annotations replace hook_field_info()
  • Field widgets exist as plugin clases that extend WidgetBase, makes sense
  • Field formatters work the same way, extending FormatBase
  • Field types are currently in progress
  • Every entity property on an entity is a "field"
  • Base fields
    • $node->nid
    • $node->title
    • $node->uuid
  • Configurable fields
    • $node->body
    • $user->field_custom...
  • Field values are objects
    • $node->field_tags instanceof FieldInterface
    • $node->field_tags[0] instance of FieldItemInterface
  • Computed fields
    • FieldNewValue computes on access, something like $comment->is_new->value;
  • Do not have to use language constants. Just get $node->body->value or $node->body[0]->value
    • Translation accessible through helper, $trans = $node->getTranslation('de');
    • $node instance of NodeInterface
    • $trans instanceof Nodeinterface - [WIP]
  • Entity validation decoupled from form validation
    • Builds on Symfony2 validator
    • Constraints are discoverable through Drupal 8 plugin system
  • Hidden form field included in core. It is not a hidden input type. What?
  • Placeholders are available for applicable field types
  • Multiple upload property for file and image fields.
  • Drag and drop files and images is a work in progress
  • User picture is a field
  • More granular permissions on Field UI

##Make Drupal The Best REST Server For Single Page Apps

  • Backend developer becoming more concerned with building backend apis, a lot of application logic moved to the front end.
  • nodejs + express approach = "Here's your interface, what would you like to pass through it?"
    • Pull data from multiple sources
  • Drupal
    • Assumes your data is in one place
  • Drupal (web services) HAL nests dependent resources (node references)
    • Incomplete, not finished implementing Files and Users
    • URIs not usable by the client
  • REST things that would be nice
    • Batch/Queue: Support HTTP 202 (Accepted) and POST callback
  • Drupal needs better caching
    • Entities to define their own caching structures
    • Varnish vcl for Drupal 8 would be helpful
  • No reason links to resources in the JSON needs to point back to the same service.
    • Link to service at another port and get back JSON

##REST For Web Developers

  • Allow PUT to create resource when client is allowed to set the uri, new records should probably come through POST
  • HTTP Status Codes
    • 204 when resource successfully deleted
    • 4** when the client did something wrong
  • Can set preference for encoding in HTTP header using q parameter
  • Authorization token as header instead of in body
  • Prefix any "invented" headers with X-
  • Always set Content-Type when returning data
  • Hypermedia are hyperlinks for APIs
    • Clients can find related data
    • Relying on following links means URLs can change
    • Returning ids instead of uris can lead to people concatenating their own urls and getting them wrong.
  • GET to retrieve a record before you PUT to update it.
  • PUT with an incomplete record should reject the resource unless you want your logic to allow optional fields
  • PATCH is like doing a diff. Supposed to be used to update a small part of a resource instead of PUT which deals with the entire resource
    • Response from PATCH contains the full resource, not just the updated field
  • OAuth
    • Handles the relationship between
      • user
      • user's data stored on a provider
      • consumer wanting to access user's data
    • Tokens are easily revoked for each service without needing to update other consuming services
    • Use OAuth2 over HTTPS
  • When to use REST
    • Data driven applications
    • Where REST is (or can be) understood
  • Consider the failure case
  • Split data into subresources
  • Allow more/less verbose representations

##Managing Drupal And Subsites with Puppet

  • Infrastucture as code: executable documentation
    • Code is meant to be legible
    • Everyone using VM has the same environment.
    • Can spin up local environment similar to eventual production env
  • Declarative model: describe the state you want
  • You shouldn't think of coding Puppet as if you were writing a shell script. Just tell Puppet what you need done and let it happen.
  • Puppet Resources
    • Unit of configuration, combine to make large components
    • Model the expected state of your system
    • Resource abstraction layer
      • Shouldn't need to know the package manager in use. Package will use apt, yum, etc on it's own depending on system
  • Modules are containers for configuration
    • hierarchy convention that enabes:
      • auto-loading of classes
      • file serving for templates/files
      • auto-delivery of extensions
      • easy sharing (Puppetforge)
  • Multiple clsses are declared together to represent a "node"
  • Some resources
  • Managing Drupal with Puppet
    • Drupal install consists of:
      • web server
      • database
      • packages: services, php, extensions, drupal, drush
      • configuration: docroot, settings.php, php.ini, sites/*
    • Keep core and module versions consistant
    • Manage modules (install, enable, disable, update*) through Puppet manifest
      • Currently with binford2k/drupal, you cannot ensure => latest on Drupal modules, but if you change the version specified then it can potentially update
      • If you disable a module in Drupal, you will want to remove ensure => enabled as well or the next time the Puppet agent runs, it will enabled it.
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