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Book Review: Drush User's Guide

It never fails - regardless of the skill level of the Drupal workshop that I'm teaching on any given day, the topic of Drush always sneaks its way into the conversation. Normally, it's because I have to quickly download a module to demonstrate something that has come up in class. Rather than navigating to the module's project page, I just quickly jump to the command line and do a "drush dl whatever" and hope that no one notices the witchcraft I just invoked - this inevitably results in the nerdiest student in the class perking up and wanting to know what the magic is that they just saw...

Book Review: Drupal 7 Views Cookbook

As the explosive growth of Drupal continues, so does the eco-system of vendors and products around it. Included is the plethora of Drupal books that continues at a somewhat unbelievable pace. It seems that there are at least two to three new releases each month. Unfortunately, in the rush to quench the tech community's thrist for Drupal knowledge, sometimes less-than-stellar books are being served up before they're fully baked (cooking pun #1).

Florida DrupalCamp 2012 Wrapup

Florida DrupalCamp 2012 , held on the truly scenic Rollins College campus in Winter Park, Florida was another great gathering of the growing, and ever enthusiastic Florida Drupal Community . Rather than the typical blog post of all the great sessions (of which there were many), or the great networking (which there was), this post will focus on the some of the planning, logistics, and lessons learned from the organizers’ viewpoint. This was central Florida's fourth annual camp, which has grown sequentially in size and scope, with more than 300 people, 40 volunteers, and 7 tracks of sessions (thanks Don Vandemark ). A few highlights included our full-day beginner track, which proved extremely popular (thanks Gaelan Adams ) with more than 60 attendees. Building on the experiences we’ve gained from past years, we once again held Coding for a Cause day where we attempted to build three sites for local non-profit organizations. Our partner in the event, the Central Florida Computer Society ( CFCS.org ) was as always instrumental in our success, acting as our fiscal agent as well as providing numerous volunteers throughout the day.

Drupal’s Experience Gap, Part 2

In part 1 of this post I shared how I got started on the line of thinking that we as a community are planting a lot of seeds, spreading the fertilizer, but not doing much tending to the Talent crops. In the second part of this post, I’ll share just how some of the numbers support the ideas behind why newbie developers are having some issues crossing the gap, or, to go with the opening theme for this second post, blooming...

Drupal as a Workforce Program - Status Report

The workshop portion of the Drupal Career Starter Program wrapped up in mid-December, just in time for participants to catch their breath and enjoy the holidays before embarking on the second phase of the DCSP. 15 of the 18 students are currently beginning internships with organizations around the United States in an effort to further their education and training to the point where they can begin careers in Drupal. Conception and Funding Anello Consulting (parent company of DrupalEasy ) conceived, designed, and implemented the DCSP as a way to help Brevard County, Florida (home of NASA's Kennedy Space Center) retain

Florida DrupalCamp 2012 Fast Approaching

The fourth edition of Florida DrupalCamp is rapidly approaching - Drupalists from Florida and beyond will be descending on Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida on February 11 and 12, 2012 for the largest Drupal event Florida has ever seen. Registration is currently open at fldrupalcamp.org at the low cost of $20 per person - the cost will be going to up $25 on January 11, so be sure to register soon to get the lowest possible price. Admission will include a t-shirt, drinks, snacks, and lunch and access to the entire session program. Session proposals are still being accepted as well - the deadline for submitting a session is January 12, so if you're interested in sharing some of your Drupal knowledge, be sure to submit your proposal soon.

Drupal as a Workforce Program - Midterm Report 1

Just about a month ago, the pilot edition of the Drupal Career Starter Program (DSCP) began with eighteen students eager to dive into Drupal. We're in the middle of the fourth (of ten) weeks and we're just finishing up the core concepts portion of the course - where we covered users, content types, and taxonomy - and gearing up for the next few weeks which will focus on Views , module development, and theming. All of our students have made extrodinary progress and are rapidly learning how to succeed in building Drupal sites, and just as importantly, learning how to

Drupal As A Workforce Program

Anello Consulting is proud to announce the start of the first session of our Drupal Career Starter Program (DCSP) . This Drupal training and internship program is designed to teach the basics of Drupal, including a strong foundation on community involvement and practical experience. The DCSP kicks off on October 4 on Florida’s Space Coast to give laid-off IT-savvy Space Shuttle workers an opportunity at new careers. Brevard Workforce , the local workforce development board funded by the state of Florida, is using federal grant funds to provide scholarships, and potentially paid internships, for the 19 carefully selected participants. The

Anello Consulting Expertise Tapped for Aerospace Workforce Retraining

Brevard Workforce, the agency coordinating state and federal programs to help mitigate layoffs in Florida due to Shuttle retirement, is partnering with Anello Consulting to present the Drupal Career Starter Program for aerospace workers seeking new, stable careers. Presented by Drupal expert Michael Anello, the 10 week course and follow-on internship program is designed to give IT-savvy members of the workforce skills and practical experience in Drupal. The growing adoption of the Drupal Content Management System among government and commercial organizations has led to tremendous opportunities for those with Drupal skills seeking stable full-time, part-time and contracting positions, especially in

Announcing the Drupal Event Organizing Guide, Version 2

Over the past few months since DrupalCon Chicago, I've spent some time working with other members (bhosmer, greggles, coltrane, christefano, lisarex, marguerite) of the community in reorganizing and rewriting the first version of the Drupal Camp Organizing Guide. Along with a new title (signifying the inclusion of other types of events such as sprints, summits, and hackfests), the guide is greatly enhanced with a lot of new information.

Cornell Entrepreneur Podcast features Michael and Gwendolyn Anello

The latest episode of 10GoodMinutes, a weekly series of 10-minute interviews that provides career strategies and advice to young professionals features Michael and Gwendolyn Anello with tips for aspiring entrepreneurs on balancing life and work. The ACI principals contributed to the 10GM Career Advice series, "Not in the Back of the Book," which focuses on entrepreneur journeys and is hosted by Jacie Stivers, an entrepreneur and adjunct at Cornell University. The podcast series was created at Cornell University to provide short, important, audio content dealing with career development and entrepreneurship. The episode featuring Michael and Gwendolyn can be accessed at

Evaluating Drupal for the Enterprise Slide Deck

A few weeks ago I was invited to speak to a technology committee of a large organization that was considering standardizing their various web sites on Drupal. They requested a presentation and then some Q&A time - unfortunately, I didn't have any slides ready to go, so I had to scramble a bit. I decided to spend a couple of days (and evenings) creating a generic slidedeck that I could use for other potential clients as well as share with the rest of the Drupal community.