In episode 548 we welcome back JD Leonard to discuss what CRMs are, what problems they solve, and which organizations benefit from them. JD explains why Drupal CRM defines CRM as “Contact Relationship Management,” outlines core expectations like contact and relationship tracking and integrations, and describes Drupal CRM’s Drupal-native architecture using dedicated, fieldable entity types for contacts, relationships, and contact methods. The panel compares Drupal CRM to older Drupal CRM efforts and user-based approaches, covers security considerations for PII and plans for field encryption, and highlights ecosystem projects such as CRM Email, CRM Membership (including Drupal Commerce integration), and event registration needs.

For show notes visit:
https://www.talkingDrupal.com/548

Topics

• Module of the Week: Module of the Week: Social Media Links Block and Fields
• Use Cases and Discussion
• How to Suggest Modules
• What Is a CRM
• CRM Hats and Naming
• Core CRM Features and Users
• Why Drupal CRM Exists
• Drupal CRM Architecture Deep Dive
• Demos and Legacy Alternatives
• Project Origins and Community
• Out of the Box Features
• Security and PII Considerations
• Field Encryption Limits
• Core First Drupal Native
• Search Deprecation Drupal 12
• Choosing Contrib Integrations
• Ecosystem Modules Upstream
• Getting Started
• Evaluating CRM Options
• Common CRM Pitfalls
• Community Sustainability Vision
• Funding Volunteers Sponsors
• Roadmap Toward 1.0
• Ecosystem Membership Events

Resources

Try the latest - https://drupal.org/project/crm
Field encrypt - https://www.drupal.org/project/crm/issues/3558040
Primary entity reference - https://www.drupal.org/project/primary_entity_reference
Member Platform initiative - https://www.drupal.org/project/member
Financial sponsor of Steve Ayers’ time working on Drupal CRM - https://www.govwebworks.com https://www.portlandwebworks.com
CRM ecosystem modules - https://www.drupal.org/project/crm/ecosystem
Drupal Slack #crm channel: - https://drupal.slack.com/archives/C08N90UF9TR

Guests

JD Leonard - modernbizconsulting.com jdleonard

Hosts

Nic Laflin - nLighteneddevelopment.com nicxvan
John Picozzi - epam.com johnpicozzi

Martin Anderson-Clutz - mandclu.com mandclu

Module of the Week

with Martin Anderson-Clutz

Social Media Links Block and Field

The modules provides a configurable block that display links (icons) to your profiles on various popular networking sites.
With this module, a website can be quickly extended with a "Follow us" functionality. Or you make the block available for your site editors, and they can configure the social networks themselves.

In episode #547, guest JD Flynn joins us to discuss why developers don’t choose Drupal, focusing on Drupal adoption, discoverability, and outdated perceptions from Drupal 6/7. JD cites survey data showing low interest among non-Drupal developers, arguing Drupal’s biggest problem is invisibility and that developers often pre-filter it due to PHP stigma and friction getting started.

For show notes visit:
https://www.talkingDrupal.com/547

Topics

• Welcome to Talking Drupal
• Meet JD Flynn
• Co Hosts Introductions
• Module of the Week: Native Observability
• Production Overhead Debate
• AI Patches and Etiquette
• Live Stream and Topic Setup
• Why Developers Skip Drupal
• Invisibility and Discovery
• Perception and Onboarding Friction
• Composer and Leaving the Island
• Perception Gap and PHP Stigma
• PHP Perception Versus Reality
• Why Developers Avoid Drupal
• Selling Drupal to Clients
• Instant Demos With Drupal Forge
• Discoverability in the AI Era
• Content Strategy Beyond Drupal
• PHP Stigma and Performance
• Community Effort and Live Streaming
• Marketing Drupal Out of the Box
• Wrap Up and Where to Connect

Resources

Why Developers Don't Choose Drupal (And What We Can Do About It) - https://www.fldrupal.camp/session/why-developers-dont-choose-drupal-and-what-we-can-do-about-it
JD’s stream - http://twitch.tv/jddoesdev
Drupal is Great! Its Perception Might Not be. -https://picozzi.com/notebook/2025/jan/drupal-great-its-perception-might-not-be
Drupal Forge - https://www.drupalforge.org/

Guests

JD Flynn - Crepdrop dorficus

Hosts

Nic Laflin - nLighteneddevelopment.com nicxvan
John Picozzi - epam.com johnpicozzi
Rod Martin - DrupalHelps.com imrodmartin

Module of the Week

Correspondent

Martin Anderson-Clutz - mandclu.com mandclu

Native Observability brings real observability into Drupal. Trace requests, inspect execution, analyze performance, and explore runtime behavior — directly inside your application.

No core patches. No external dependencies required to get started.
Just install, enable, and start seeing what actually happens inside your system.

Live from DrupalCon Chicago, Nic Laflin is joined by Tim Plunkett, Steve Wirt, Martin Anderson-Clutz, and John Picozzi to discuss the event’s tone, Dries Notes and key themes including Drupal Canvas, Drupal AI, and new site templates/marketplace progress and more.

For show notes visit:
https://www.talkingDrupal.com/546

Topics

• Reconnecting With Community
• Must See Sessions
• Vibe And Starshot
• Attendance And Venue
• Community Party Returns
• Dries Note and AI Debate
• Roadmap And Templates
• Recipes And Exports
• AI In Engineering Workflows
• Keynote Style Takeaways
• Dries Note Takeaways
• Canvas Content Templates
• View Modes Roadmap
• Translation Plans Explained
• Gala Highlights
• Commemorative Tokens
• Future Excitement Roundtable
• DrupalCon Orlando Tease
• Wrap Up and Contacts

Guests

Martin Anderson-Clutz - mandclu.com mandclu

John Picozzi - epam.com johnpicozzi

Tim Plunkett - timplunkett

Hosts

Nic Laflin - nLighteneddevelopment.com nicxvan

Steve Wirt - civicactions.com Swirt

Today we are talking about the open data platform DKAN, what it’s used for, and how it applies to Drupal with guests Liz Tupper & Dan Feder. We’ll also cover Modern Drupal Dashboard as our module of the week.

For show notes visit:
https://www.talkingDrupal.com/545

Topics

• What Is DKAN
• Who Uses Open Data
• 20:08 DKAN Origin Story
• Why Drupal Fits DKAN
• From Distribution to Module
• DKAN 2 Rebuild and JSON Shift
• Async Jobs and API First
• How Teams Publish Data
• What a Dataset Really Is
• Metadata vs Data Access
• Why DKAN Left Drupal Org
• Migration Path to DKAN Four
• Harvesting and Data Store ETL
• APIs Visualizations and Bots
• Roadmap Data Store and AI
• Contributing and Where to File Issues

Resources

• DKAN
• DKAN Drupal Module
• DKAN on GitHub
• Public sites using DKAN 2
• DKAN channel on Drupal Slack
• JSON Form Widget

Guests

Liz Tupper - civicactions.com etupper
Dan Feder - getdkan.org dafeder

Hosts

Nic Laflin - nLighteneddevelopment.com nicxvan
John Picozzi - epam.com johnpicozzi
Steve Wirt - civicactions.com Swirt

MOTW

Correspondent

Martin Anderson-Clutz - mandclu.com mandclu

• Brief description:
  • Have you ever wanted to have your Drupal site admins start with a fast, widget-based interface that surfaces key site metrics, system health, and operational insights? There’s a module for that.
• Module name/project name:
  • Modern Drupal Dashboard
• Brief history
  • How old: created in Feb 2026 by Gaurav Kapoor (gaurav.kapoor) of werk21 in Berlin
  • Versions available: 1.0.5, which works with Drupal core 10.3 and 11
• Maintainership
  • Actively maintained
  • Security coverage
  • Number of open issues: no open issues
• Usage stats:
  • 4 sites
• Module features and usage
  • With the module installed, site visitors with the new “Access modern dashboard” permission can access a React-based dashboard with widgets to provide insights on topics like:
  • Content overview: total content count, published vs unpublished, and per content type breakdown.
  • Users overview: user count per role (users with multiple roles are counted in each role), plus pie chart visualization.
  • Additional Content (Entity overview): lists all entity types (content + configuration), shows counts, and provides direct “Manage” links.
  • Modules overview: installed modules summary, including enabled/disabled and core/contrib breakdown.
  • System & status: key environment details such as Drupal core version, PHP version, and database information.
  • Health checks: displays Drupal requirement checks grouped by status (pass/warning/error) with a dedicated detail view.
  • Each widget can be clicked to open a detail view of the extended data, making it easy for admins to dig into any area
  • The widget-based architecture should also help to pull in data from other sources, potentially including things like analytics

Today we are talking about World Cancer Day, how they use Drupal, and why Drupal was the right choice with our guests Charles Andrew Revkin & Diego Costa. We’ll also cover PDFa11y as our module of the week.

For show notes visit:
https://www.talkingDrupal.com/544

Topics

• What Is World Cancer Day
• Why UICC Uses Drupal
• Diego Joins the Project
• Multilingual Strategy at Scale
• Drupal Architecture and AI Tools
• Vetting AI Moderation and Summaries
• AI Disclosure and Review
• Traffic Spikes and Scaling
• Drupal Stack and React Apps
• Campaign Theme United by Unique
• Yearly Content and Three Year Cycle
• Drupal Community and Open Access
• Custom AI Modules and Azure
• Future Improvements and AI Tagging
• Story Submission Formats
• Prevention PSA and Wrap Up

Resources

• World Cancer Day
• Union for International Cancer Control

Guests

Diego Costa - 1xinternet.com diegofcosta
Charles Andrew Revkin - worldcancerday.org revkin

Hosts

Nic Laflin - nLighteneddevelopment.com nicxvan
John Picozzi - epam.com johnpicozzi
Steve Wirt - civicactions.com Swirt

MOTW

Correspondent

Martin Anderson-Clutz - mandclu.com mandclu

• Brief description:
  • Have you ever wanted to check PDF files for accessibility, as they’re uploaded to your Drupal site? There’s a module for that.
• Module name/project name:
  • PDFa11y
• Brief history
  • How old: created in Feb 2026 by Joshua Mitchell (joshuami), a friend of this podcast
  • Versions available: 1.0.1, which works with Drupal 10.2 and 11
• Maintainership
  • Actively maintained
  • Security coverage in process
  • Test coverage
  • Number of open issues: none
• Usage stats:
  • 0 sites
• Module features and usage
  • With the PDFa11y module installed, you can set its configuration, including whether to enable or disable automatic checking on upload, whether to block uploads that fail checks or just show warnings, a minimum PDF version requirement, and which accessibility checks to run
  • The module also sets creates three new permissions, Administer PDF accessibility settings, Run PDF accessibility checks, and View PDF accessibility report
  • Each PDF media item has an "Accessibility" tab where anyone with the necessary permissions can view the check results
  • Under the hood PDFa11y uses the smalot/pdfparser library to extract data from PDF files
  • Many sites rely on PDFs to make available content that they aren’t able to migrate directly into Drupal content, so making sure that doesn’t introduce its own accessibility regressions is an important step

Today we are talking about The Good and the Bad of AI , How our panel feels about AI , and you guessed it more AI with guest Scott Falconer. We’ll also cover Field Widget Actions as our module of the week.

For show notes visit:
https://www.talkingDrupal.com/542

Topics

• AI and Social Isolation
• How We Use AI
• Friction and Independence
• Stack Overflow Debate
• Collaboration and Team Culture
• Is AI Inevitable
• AI Hype Meets Costs
• Adoption Cooling Signals
• Pricing Inequality Risks
• Open Source and PRs
• Requirements and LLMs
• Easy Tools Not Always Right
• Juniors Learning and Patterns
• Human Value and Ambiguity
• Losing Cognitive Endurance
• AI vs Social Media
• Uniquely Human Skills

Resources

• Stack overflow

Guests

Scott Falconer - managing-ai.com scott-falconer

Hosts

Nic Laflin - nLighteneddevelopment.com nicxvan
John Picozzi - epam.com johnpicozzi
Catherine Tsiboukas - mindcraftgroup.com bletch

MOTW

Correspondent

Martin Anderson-Clutz - mandclu.com mandclu

• Brief description:
  • Have you ever wanted to enhance the Drupal content editing experience by allowing site builders to attach actionable buttons directly to field widgets on entity forms? There’s a module for that.
• Module name/project name:
  • Field Widget Actions
• Brief history
  • How old: created in Oct 2025 by Artem Dmitriiev (a.dmitriiev) of 1x Internet, a founding member of the AI Initiative
  • Versions available: 1.0.0-alpha1 and 1.3.0, both of which works with Drupal 10.3 and 11.1 or newer
• Maintainership
  • Actively maintained
  • Security coverage
  • Test coverage
  • Documentation - includes Markdown files that explain how to set up and extend its capabilities
  • Number of open issues: 12 open issues, 4 of which are bugs
• Usage stats:
  • 24 sites
• Module features and usage
  • With this module installed, a site builder can attach action buttons to form fields in Drupal entity forms, for example for creating nodes or taxonomy terms
  • What happens when you click a button depends on what processor you associate with it, and the settings you configure for the processor. Processors can be provided by other modules, like AI or ECA.
  • For example, you could attach a button to a tags field that when clicked will send the content of the body field to an AI agent that will return a set of suggested tags. Or, you could have it trigger an ECA model for a more deterministic flow
  • This is all done using a plugin framework implemented by Field Widget Actions, so you also create your own custom processors to be used with action buttons
  • One of the things that got me excited about working with the team behind Augmentor AI was the approach that module used to make AI something a user would manually trigger, and then can curate before the suggestions are saved. Field Widget Actions allows that same approach to be implemented with the AI ecosystem that is growing by leaps and bounds thanks to the team involved with Drupal’s AI Initiative
  • It’s worth noting that Field Widget Actions used to be a submodule of the AI project, so if you’re using a version of that older than 2.0, you may already have Field Widget Actions available in your codebase

Today we are talking about Mautic, marketing automation, and its history with Drupal with guest Ruth Cheesley. We’ll also cover Mautic ECA as our module of the week.

For show notes visit:
https://www.talkingDrupal.com/541

Topics

• What Is Mautic?
• Self-Hosting and Data Ownership
• Who Uses Mautic + Personalization
• Mautic’s History with Drupal
• How Drupal Integrate Mautic
• Orchestration in Mautic
• Privacy & Compliance: GDPR Tools, Consent, and Do-Not-Contact Controls
• Hosting Options
• Advanced Segmentation
• Points-Based Lead Scoring
• Validating Segments
• Using Points to Boost
• Common Mautic Adoption Pitfalls
• Getting Support
• The Future with AI
• AI and Open Source Maintenance
• Mautic Sustainability & Fundraising
• How to Contribute

Resources

• Mautic
• Mautic Integration
• Advanced Mautic Integration
• Talking Drupal #343 - Marketing Automation with Mautic
• Managed hosting, 40% goes to the community
• Mautic/Drupal case study and presentation on that from our conference
  • https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r0SkfeHTLK8
  • https://mautic.org/case-study/inagro/
• GDPR cleanup jobs to remove old data
• Anonymization tasks to comply with specific laws (eg CCPA)
• Anonymize IP setting
• Proposal to overhaul all things privacy and streamline experience for marketers - currently seeking funding, planning to ship in Mautic 9
• Mautic contribution docs
• Testing PRs: inlcuding local setup guide
• Low/no-code tasks board
• Thanks Dev
• Ecosystems

Guests

Ruth Cheesley - ruthcheesley.co.uk RCheesley

Hosts

Nic Laflin - nLighteneddevelopment.com nicxvan
John Picozzi - epam.com johnpicozzi
Catherine Tsiboukas - mindcraftgroup.com bletch

MOTW

Correspondent

Martin Anderson-Clutz - mandclu.com mandclu

• Brief description:
  • Have you ever wanted to integrate Mautic marketing automation into your Drupal website, using ECA? There’s a module for that.
• Module name/project name:
  • Mautic ECA
• Brief history
  • How old: created in Jun 2025 by Abhisek Mazumdar (abhisekmazumdar) of Dropsolid
  • Versions available: 1.0.6 which works with Drupal 10 and 11
• Maintainership
  • Actively maintained
  • Documentation - detailed README
  • Number of open issues: 1 open issues, which is not a bug
• Usage stats:
  • 3 sites
• Module features and usage
  • With the module installed, your ECA models can respond to Mautic webhooks, and can also make use of new actions to give you CRUD capabilities (Create, Read, Update, or Delete) for contacts and segments within ECA
  • Mautic ECA declares the Mautic API module as a dependency, and you need to use it to set up an API connection, and to define any webhooks you want to use in your models
  • It’s worth noting that the maintainers of Mautic ECA also seem to be involved with a number of other modules in the Mautic API ecosystem, including Mautic Personalization, as well as Mautic Content Provider, which can expose Drupal content for use in Mautic, for example to include in emails

Join Karen Horrocks and Stephen Musgrave as they introduce the upcoming non-profit summit at DrupalCon 2026 in Chicago. In this comprehensive fireside chat, they explore how AI can be integrated to serve a nonprofit's mission, plus the dos and don'ts of AI implementation. Hear insights from leading nonprofit professionals, learn about the variety of breakout sessions available, and discover the benefits of Kubernetes for maximizing ROI. Whether you're a developer, content editor, or a strategic planner, this session is crucial for understanding the future of nonprofit operations with cutting-edge technology.

For show notes visit:
https://www.talkingDrupal.com/cafe015

Topics

• Introduction
• Meet Karen & Stephen
• Karen's Journey to Nonprofit Work
• Deep Dive into Drupal and Nonprofit Websites
• Capella's Approach to Continuous Improvement
• Nonprofit Summit Overview
• Exploring Summit Themes: AI and Resiliency
• Digital Sovereignty and Ethical Considerations
• Additional Breakout Sessions and Topics
• Community Engagement and Registration Details
• Conclusion and Final Thoughts

Stephen Musgrave

Stephen (he/him) is a co-founder, partner and Lead Technologist at Capellic, an agency that build and maintains websites for non-profits. Stephen is bullish on keeping things simple – not simplistic. His goal is to maximize the return on investment and minimize the overhead in maintaining the stack for the long term.

Stephen has been working with the web for over 30 years. He was initially drawn to the magic of using code to create web art, added in his love for relational databases, and has spent his career building websites with an unwavering commitment to structured content.

When Stephen isn’t at his desk, he’s often running to and swimming in Barton Springs Pool, getting a bit too wound-up at Austin FC games, and playing Legos with his little one.

Karen Horrocks

Karen (she/her, karen11 on drupal.org and Drupal Slack) is a Web and Database Developer for the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, a nonprofit dedicated to saving and improving human and animal lives through plant-based diets and ethical and effective scientific research.

Karen began her career as a government contractor at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center developing websites to distribute satellite data to the public. She moved to the nonprofit world when the Physicians Committee, an organization that she supports and follows, posted a job opening for a web developer. She has worked at the Physicians Committee for over 10 years creating websites that provide our members with the information and tools to move to a plant-based diet.

Karen is a co-moderator of NTEN's Nonprofit Drupal Community. She spoke on a panel at the 2019 Nonprofit Summit at DrupalCon Seattle and is helping to organize the 2026 Nonprofit Summit at DrupalCon Chicago.

Resources

Nonprofit Summit Agenda: https://events.drupal.org/chicago2026/session/summit-non-profit-guests-must-pre-register
Register for the Summit (within the DrupalCon workflow): https://events.drupal.org/chicago2026/registration
Funding Open Source for Digital Sovereignty: https://dri.es/funding-open-source-for-digital-sovereignty
NTEN’s Drupal Community of Practice Zoom call (1p ET on third Thursday of the month except August and December): https://www.nten.org/drupal/notes
Nonprofit Drupal Slack Channel: #nonprofits on Drupal Slack

Guests

Karen Horrocks - karen11 www.pcrm.org
Stephen Musgrave - capellic capellic.com

Today we are talking about Acquia’s Fully managed Drupal SaaS Acquia Source, What you can do with it, and how it could change your organization with guest Matthew Grasmick. We’ll also cover AI Single Page Importer as our module of the week.

For show notes visit:
https://www.talkingDrupal.com/540

Topics

• Introduction to Acquia Source
• The Evolution of Acquia Source
• Cost and Market Position of Acquia Source
• Customizing and Growing Your Business
• Challenges of Building a SaaS Platform on Drupal
• Advantages of Acquia Source for Different Markets
• Horizontal Scale and Governance at Scale
• Canvas CLI Tool and Synchronization
• Role of AI in Acquia Source
• Agencies and Enterprise Clients
• AI Experiments and Content Importer
• AI and Orchestration in Drupal
• Future Innovations in Acquia Source

Resources

• Acquia source
• Nebula

Guests

Matthew Grasmick - grasmash

Hosts

Nic Laflin - nLighteneddevelopment.com nicxvan
John Picozzi - epam.com johnpicozzi
Catherine Tsiboukas - mindcraftgroup.com bletch

MOTW

Correspondent

Martin Anderson-Clutz - mandclu.com mandclu

• Brief description:
  • Have you ever wanted to use AI to help map various content on an existing site to structured fields on Drupal site, as part of creating a node? There’s a module for that.
• Module name/project name:
  • AI Single Page Importer
• Brief history
  • How old: created in Jan 2026 by Mark Conroy (markconroy) who listeners may know from his work on the LocalGov distribution and install profile
  • Versions available: 1.0.0-alpha3, which works with Drupal core 10 or 11
• Maintainership
  • Actively maintained
  • Documentation - pretty extensive README, which is also currently in use as the project page
  • No issues yet
• Usage stats:
  • 2 sites
• Module features and usage
  • With this module enabled, you’ll have a new “AI Content Import” section at the top of the node creation form. In there you can provide the URL of the existing page to use, and then click “Import Content with AI”. That will trigger a process where OpenAI will ingest and analyze the existing page. It will extract values to populate your node fields, and then you can review or change those values before saving the node.
  • In the configuration you can specify the AI model to use, a maximum content length, an HTTP request timeout value, which content types should have the importer available, and then also prevent abuse by specifying blocked domains, a flood limit, and a flood window. You will also need to grant a new permission to use the importer for any user roles that should have access.
  • The module also includes a number of safeguards. For example, it will only accept URLs using HTTP or HTTPS protocols, private IP ranges are blocked, and by default it will only allow 5 requests per user per hour. It will perform HTML purification for long text fields, and strip tags for short text fields. In addition, it removes dangerous attributes like onclick or inline javascript, and generates CKEditor-compatible output.
  • It currently supports a list of field types that include text_long, text_with_summary, string, text, datetime, daterange, timestamps and link fields. It also supports entity reference fields, but only for taxonomy terms.
  • Listeners may also be aware of the Unstructured module which does some similar things, but requires you to use an Unstructured service or run a server using their software. So I would say that AI Single Page Importer is perhaps a little more narrow in scope but works with an OpenAI account instead of requiring the less commonly used Unstructured.

Join AmyJune and Avi as they discuss the complexities of organizing large events in changing times. The discussion covers topics from past DrupalCons, the crucial coordination behind community health and safety, accessibility, and the evolving challenges involving inclusivity. They also touch on the intersection of community dynamics, the importance of creating shared realities, and the engaging experience of the Drupal community. Additionally, expect an overview of upcoming events, including keynotes and fun activities like the Drupal Coffee Exchange.

For show notes visit:
https://www.talkingDrupal.com/cafe014

Topics

• Catching Up with AmyJune and Avi
• Memories of DrupalCon and Camps
• The $2 Bill Tradition
• Open Y and Community Contributions
• Community Working Group and Governance
• Initial Reactions and Reflections
• Challenges of Organizing DrupalCon
• Accessibility and Safety Concerns
• Event Planning and Community Involvement
• Learning from Other Events
• Upcoming Keynote and Event Highlights
• Community and Collaboration

AmyJune Hineline

AmyJune works with the Linux Foundation as the Certification Community Architect, supporting the Education team in developing and maintaining exams and related documentation across the foundation’s certification portfolio.

She’s also a DrupalCamp organizer (Florida DrupalCamp, DrupalCamp Asheville, and DrupalCamp Colorado), a member of the Community Working Group’s Conflict Resolution Team, and serves on the board of the Colorado Drupal Association.

Avi Schwab

Avi came to Drupal for the community and has been active in it since 2008. He is a founding organizer of MidCamp, Midwest Open Source Alliance, and the Event Organizer Working Group. In his role as a Technical Product Consultant at ImageX Media, he builds and supports Drupal sites for over 40 YMCA associations in the USA and Canada. For fun, he bikes, bakes, and enjoys time with his family.

Guests

AmyJune Hineline - volkswagenchick
Avi Schwab - froboy

Today we are talking about EvolveDigital, What it is, and how it started in Drupal with guest Maya Schaeffer. We’ll also cover Drupal CMS 2.0 as our module of the week.

For show notes visit:
https://www.talkingDrupal.com/539

Topics

• Comparing Drupal and WordPress
• Evolve Digital Summit Insights
• Marketing and Drupal Integration
• Evolve Digital and CMS Comparisons
• Summit Structure and Networking
• Speaker Selection and Outreach
• Balancing Content and Community
• Lessons from Different Cities
• Future Plans and New Formats

Resources

• EvolveDigital
• Drupal CMS documentation
• Decoupling Content & Frontend Nika Karliuchenko, John Picozzi, Pete Navarra
• Drupal Canvas Webinar

Guests

Maya Schaeffer - evolvedigital.com mayalena

Hosts

Nic Laflin - nLighteneddevelopment.com nicxvan
John Picozzi - epam.com johnpicozzi
Catherine Tsiboukas - mindcraftgroup.com bletch

MOTW

Correspondent

Martin Anderson-Clutz - mandclu.com mandclu

• Brief description:
  • Do you want to start your next Drupal site using a variety of best practices, including Canvas for page layouts, or site templates for an opinionated architecture out of the box? Then the recently released Drupal CMS 2.0 could be just what you need.
• Module name/project name:
  • Drupal CMS
• Brief history
  • 2.0 release was created by phenaproxima less than a week ago, and requires Drupal 11.3
• Maintainership
  • Actively maintained
  • Security coverage
  • Test coverage
  • Documentation guide linked in the show notes
  • 145 issues on the development project, 24 of which are bugs
• Usage stats:
  • No direct way to track, but drupal_cms_helper was added as a dependency late in the Drupal CMS 1.x cycle, so the fact that it has been installed 3,780 times likely indicates that Drupal CMS has been installed several thousand times at a minimum
• Module features and usage
  • The biggest change in Drupal CMS 2 is the addition of Canvas for creating and managing layouts. We talked about Drupal Canvas in depth back in episode #518 so I won’t go into too much detail here, but having it set up for you as an out-of-the-box feature is a big benefit
  • Drupal CMS 1.0 included a carefully curated content architecture, including some optional recipes for additional capabilities. With version 2, the intent is for site templates to be the source of the content architecture. I’m sure we’ll be hearing a lot more about site templates, including a marketplace where people can find them, in the coming and in particular with DrupalCon Chicago fast approaching
  • Drupal CMS 2.0 also ships with much more sophisticated AI capabilities. There’s a dedicated Canvas AI that can be used to generate and populate entire layouts, as well as generating code components, based on a user’s prompt. And listeners may remember the demo in the Vienna Driesnote of using the Context Control Center to automatically create drafts of content updates when marketing information changes
  • And of course, starting with Drupal core 11.3 means you’ll get all the performance and other improvements in the latest version

Today we are talking about Development Workflows, Agentic Agents, and how they work together with guests Andy Giles & Matt Glaman. We’ll also cover Drupal Canvas CLI as our module of the week.

For show notes visit:
https://www.talkingDrupal.com/538

Topics

• Understanding Agentic Development Workflows
• Understanding UID Generation in AI Agents
• Exploring Generative AI and Traditional Programming
• Building Canvas Pages with AI Agents
• Using Writing Tools and APIs for Automation
• Introduction to MCP Server and Its Tools
• Agent to Agent Orchestration and External Tools
• Command Line Tools for Agent Coding
• Security and Privacy Concerns with AI Tools
• The Future of AI Tools and Their Sustainability
• Benefits of AI for Site Builders

Resources

• Decoupled frontend with Drupal Canvas
• AI workflows will reshape development organizations – mglaman.dev
• Agents.md
• AI is here to stay
• Autocomplete training 38:09 Code completion
• MCP
• Open Code
• Geerlingguy ai voice

Guests

Matt Glaman - mglaman.dev mglaman

Hosts

Nic Laflin - nLighteneddevelopment.com nicxvan
John Picozzi - epam.com johnpicozzi
Andy Giles - dripyard.com andyg5000

MOTW

Correspondent

Martin Anderson-Clutz - mandclu.com mandclu

• Brief description:
  • Have you ever wanted to sync components from a site using Drupal Canvas out to another project like a headless front end, or conversely, from an outside repo into Drupal Canvas? There’s an NPM library for that
• Module name/project name:
  • Drupal Canvas CLI
• Brief history
  • How old: created in July 2025 (as xb-cli originally) by Bálint Kléri (balintbrews) of Acquia
  • Versions available: 0.6.2, and really only useful with Drupal Canvas, which works with Drupal core 11.2
• Maintainership
  • Actively maintained
  • Number of open issues: 8 open issues, 2 of which are bugs, but one of which was marked fixed in the past week
• Usage stats:
  • 128 weekly downloads according to npmjs.com
• Module features and usage
  • With the Drupal Canvas CLI installed, you’ll have a command line tool that allows you to download (export) components from Canvas into your local filesystem. There are options to download just the components, just the global css, or everything, and more. If no flags are provided, the tool will interactively prompt you for which options you want to use.
  • There is also an upload command with a similar set of options. It's worth noting that the upload will also automatically run the build and validate commands, ensuring that the uploaded components will work smoothly with Drupal Canvas
  • I thought this would be relevant to our topic today because with this tool you can create a React component with the aid of the AI integration available for Canvas and then sync that, either to a headless front end built in something like Next.js or Astro or a tool like Storybook; or you could use an AI-enhanced tool like Cursor IDE to build a component locally and then sync that into a Drupal site using Canvas
  • There is a blog post Balint published that includes a demo, if you want to see this tool in action

Today we are talking about Integrations into Drupal, Automation, and Drupal with Orchestration with guest Jürgen Haas. We’ll also cover CRM as our module of the week.

For show notes visit:
https://www.talkingDrupal.com/537

Topics

• Understanding Orchestration
• Orchestration in Drupal
• Introduction to Orchestration Services
• Drupal's Role in Orchestration
• Flexibility in Integration
• Orchestration Module in Drupal
• Active Pieces and Open Source Integration
• Security Considerations in Orchestration
• Future of Orchestration in Drupal
• Getting Involved with Orchestration

Resources

• Orchestration
• N8N
  • https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2026-21877
  • https://www.cve.org/CVERecord?id=CVE-2026-21858
• Drupal as an application
• Tools
  • Orchestration
  • ECA
  • Maestro
  • AI
  • Flowdrop

Guests

Jürgen Haas - lakedrops.com jurgenhaas

Hosts

Nic Laflin - nLighteneddevelopment.com nicxvan
John Picozzi - epam.com johnpicozzi

MOTW

Correspondent

Martin Anderson-Clutz - mandclu.com mandclu

• Brief description:
  • Have you ever wanted a Drupal-native way to store, manage, and interact with people who might not all be registered users? There’s a module for that.
• Module name/project name:
  • CRM - Contact Relationship Management
• Brief history
  • How old: created in Apr 2007 by Allie Micka, but the Steve Ayers aka bluegeek9 took over the namespace
  • Versions available: 1.0.0-beta2, which works with Drupal 11.1 or newer
• Maintainership
  • Actively maintained, latest release just a day ago
  • Security coverage: opted in, but needs a stable release
  • Test coverage
  • Number of open issues: 73 open issues, but all bugs have been marked as fixed
• Usage stats:
  • 10 sites
• Module features and usage
  • Listeners may remember some mention of the CRM module in the conversation about the Member Platform initiative back in episode 512
  • As a reminder, something other than standard Drupal user accounts is useful for working with contact information for people where you may not have all the criteria necessary for a Drupal user account, for example an email address. Also, a dedicated system can make it easier to model relationships between contacts, and provide additional capabilities.
  • It’s worth noting that this module defines CRM as Contact Relationship Management, not assuming that the data is associated with “customers” or “constituents” as some other solutions do
  • At its heart, CRM defines three new entity types: contacts, contact methods, and relationships. Each of these can have fieldable bundles, and provides some default examples: Person, Household, and Organization for contacts; Address, Email, and Telephone for contact methods; and Head of household, Spouse, Employee, and Member for relationships
  • Out of the box CRM includes integrations with other popular modules like Group and Context, in addition to a variety of Drupal core systems like views and search
  • As previously mentioned CRM is intended to be the foundational data layer of the Member Platform, but is also a key element of the Open Knowledge distribution, meant to allow using Drupal as a collaborative knowledge base and learning platform

In this episode, we discuss the 'Drupal in a Day' initiative, aimed at introducing computer science students to Drupal and invigorating the community with new energy. Martin Anderson-Clutz and Hilmar Hallbjörnsson talk about its origins, development, and the specifics of condensing a comprehensive university course into a single-day curriculum. They also cover the enthusiasm and logistics behind the events, insights from past sessions in Vienna and Drupal Jam, and future plans for expanding the scope of this program. Tune in to hear the vision for bringing more students into the Drupal community and the benefits for universities and organizations alike.

For show notes visit:
https://www.talkingDrupal.com/cafe013

Topics

• What is Drupal in a Day?
• Origins and Development of Drupal in a Day
• Target Audience and Curriculum
• Teaching Methodology and Community Impact
• Student Engagement and Event Comparisons
• Momentum and Future Plans for Drupal in a Day
• Logistics and Volunteer Involvement
• Open Source and Community Contributions
• Personal Stories and Final Thoughts

Hilmar Hallbjörnsson

Hilmar Kári Hallbjörnsson is a senior Drupal developer, educator, and open-source advocate based in Iceland. He works as a Senior Drupal Developer at the University of Iceland and is the CEO/CTO of the Drupal consultancy Um að gera. Hilmar is also an adjunct professor at Reykjavík University, where he teaches “Designing open-sourced web software with Drupal and PHP.”

Deeply involved in the Drupal ecosystem, Hilmar is an active contributor and community organizer, with a particular focus on Drupal 11, modern configuration management, and the emerging Recipes initiative. He is a co-founder of the Drupal Open University Initiative and Drupal-in-a-Day, and has served on the organizing committee for DrupalCon Europe.

His work bridges real-world engineering, teaching, and community leadership, with a strong interest in both the technical evolution and philosophical direction of Drupal as an open-source platform.

Martin Anderson-Clutz

Martin is a highly respected figure in the Drupal community, known for his extensive contributions as a developer, speaker, and advocate for open-source innovation. Based in London, Ontario, Canada, Martin began his career as a graphic designer before transitioning into web development. His journey with Drupal started in late 2005 when he was seeking a robust multilingual CMS solution, leading him to embrace Drupal's capabilities.

Martin holds the distinction of being the world's first Triple Drupal Grand Master, certified across Drupal 7, 8, and 9 as a Developer, Front-End Specialist, and Back-End Specialist. (TheDropTimes) He also possesses certifications in various Acquia products and is UX certified by the Nielsen Norman Group.

Currently serving as a Senior Solutions Engineer at Acquia, Martin has been instrumental in advancing Drupal's ecosystem. He has developed and maintains several contributed modules, including Smart Date and Search Overrides, and has been actively involved in the Drupal Recipes initiative, particularly focusing on event management solutions. His current work on the Event Platform aims to streamline the creation and management of event-based websites within Drupal.

Beyond development, Martin is a prominent speaker and educator, having presented at numerous Drupal events such as DrupalCon Barcelona and EvolveDrupal. He is also a co-host of the "Talking Drupal" podcast, where he leads the "Module of the Week" segment, sharing insights on various Drupal modules.
Martin's dedication to the Drupal community is evident through his continuous efforts to mentor, innovate, and promote best practices within the open-source landscape.

Guests

Hilmar Hallbjörnsson - drupalviking
Martin Anderson-Clutz - mandclu

Today we are talking about Patching Drupal, Composer, and Composer Patches 2.0 with guest Cameron Eagans. We’ll also cover Configuration Development as our module of the week.

For show notes visit:
https://www.talkingDrupal.com/536

Topics

• What is Composer Patches 2.0
• Exploring Community Dynamics in Composer Patches
• The Genesis of Composer Patches
• The Decision to Use GitHub
• Broadening Composer Patches Beyond Drupal
• The Evolution to Composer Patches 2.0
• Understanding Workflow Complexities
• Refining User Experience in 2.0
• New Features and Enhancements in 2.0
• Navigating Controversial Changes in 2.0
• The Role of Dependency Patches
• Introducing patches.lock.json
• Best Practices for Patch Management
• Transitioning to Git Patching
• Exploring New APIs in Composer Patches 2.0
• Understanding Capabilities and Events
• Transitioning to Composer Patches 2.0
• Future of Composer Patches and Community Contributions

Resources

• Announcing Composer Patches 2.0
• Recipe issue for config devel
• Docs
• Patch man page

Guests

Cameron Eagans - cweagans.net cweagans

Hosts

Nic Laflin - nLighteneddevelopment.com nicxvan
John Picozzi - epam.com johnpicozzi
Andy Giles - dripyard.com andyg5000

MOTW

Correspondent

Martin Anderson-Clutz - mandclu.com mandclu

• Brief description:
  • Do you maintain modules that provide configuration files? There’s a module that can help manage them.
• Module name/project name:
  • Configuration Development
• Brief history
  • How old: created in Apr 2014 by chx, though recent releases are by Joachim Noreiko (joachim)
  • Versions available: 8.x-1.11, which works with Drupal 9.3, 10, and 11
• Maintainership
  • Actively maintained
  • Security coverage
  • Test coverage
  • Number of open issues: 36 open issues, 7 of which are bugs
• Usage stats:
  • 2,391 sites
• Module features and usage
  • The module really provides three useful features. First, it can ensure specific configuration files are automatically imported on every request, as though the contents were pasted into the core “single import” form
  • Second, it can automatically export specific configuration objects into files whenever the object is updated. You provide a list of filenames and the module will derive the objects that need to be exported.
  • Finally, it provides a drush command that can be used to generate all the necessary configuration files for a specific project. You put a list of the files into the project’s info.yml file, and then with a single command a fresh copy of all the specified files will be generated and placed directly into the project’s configuration folder.
  • For obvious reasons this is not something you should ever have enabled in production, so definitely a best practice to pull this in using the require-dev composer command

Today we are talking about Recording Podcasts, The tech used, and How Drupal Can help with guest Stephen Cross. We’ll also cover Chosen as our module of the week.

For show notes visit:
https://www.talkingDrupal.com/535

Topics

• Podcasting and Second Signal Media
• Evolution of Podcasting
• Tech Essentials for Podcasting
• The CEO's Video Strategy Transformation
• Overcoming the Fear of Speaking on Camera
• The Importance of Consistency in Content Creation
• Editing vs. Authenticity in Video Content
• Choosing the Right Environment and Equipment
• Setting Realistic Goals for Your Podcast
• Recording Workflow Recommendations
• Tools and Tips for Improving Audio Quality

Resources

• Basic Editing with Kdenlive
• Audio clean-up tools
• Izotope
• Secret sounds

Guests

Stephen Cross - stephencross

Hosts

Nic Laflin - nLighteneddevelopment.com nicxvan
John Picozzi - epam.com johnpicozzi
Andy Giles - dripyard.com andyg5000

MOTW

Correspondent

Martin Anderson-Clutz - mandclu.com mandclu

• Brief description:
  • Have you ever wanted to give users on your Drupal site a more intuitive alternative to native HTML multiselect widgets? There’s a module for that.
• Module name/project name:
  • Chosen
• Brief history
  • How old: created in Jul 2011 by shadcn but recent releases are by Bálint Nagy (nagy.balint) of Hungary
  • Versions available: 3.0.6, 4.0.3, and 5.0.3, the last of which works with Drupal 10.2 or 11
• Maintainership
  • Actively maintained
  • Security coverage
  • Test coverage
  • Number of open issues: 221 open issues, 4 of which are bugs against the 5.x branch
• Usage stats:
  • Almost 38,000 sites
• Module features and usage
  • With the module installed, your Drupal site will selectively replace select elements with a more intuitive widget, leveraging the Chosen library. In the module’s configuration you can specify how many options should trigger Chosen, and also specify form field selectors to explicitly include or exclude.
  • The three active branches of the module reflect usage of different forks of the Chosen library. Notably, the 5.x versions use a fork that no longer requires jQuery, and allows Chosen to be enabled for mobile devices.
  • In addition to the module configuration, you can also force a custom form’s select element to use the Chosen library simply by adding the “chosen-select” class to the form array.
  • Back in episode #409 we talked about Tagify, which in some ways is similar, but is designed specifically to work with entity reference fields. That makes it less “general purpose”, though Tagify does also include some additional capabilities, such as being able to include labels or icons on results based on a property of the result.
  • Years ago I used another popular project called Select2 for turning multiselects into listboxes that included a search filter, but that project relied on a library that required jQuery but is incompatible with jQuery 4. So, Select2 has been officially replaced by Tagify, but Chosen could also be useful if your field is not an entity reference.
  • There are a variety similar modules you can also look at, including Choices.js, Selectize, and Selectify, but Chosen is by far the most widely used, even if you’re only looking at numbers for the 5.x branch

Join Johanna and Jess as they dive deep into their experiences and insights working with Drupal in the nonprofit sector. Learn about their early careers, the evolution of Drupal's development, the significance of community in nonprofit tech, and the origins and importance of the Nonprofit Summit at DrupalCon. Discover how their community initiatives foster collaboration and support among nonprofit technologists, and get a glimpse into the upcoming summit details. Perfect for anyone interested in Drupal, open-source technology, and nonprofit organizational challenges.

For show notes visit:
https://www.talkingDrupal.com/cafe012

Johanna Bates

Johanna Bates (they/them, hanpersand on drupal.org) is co-founder and co-principal of DevCollaborative, a company that builds accessible and sustainable Drupal and WordPress sites exclusively for nonprofit organizations.

Johanna began their formal tech career at WGBH in Boston in 2000 as a front-end developer. They have been building Drupal sites since 2004, and have been co-moderating NTEN's Nonprofit Drupal Community and its monthly chats for over a decade.

Johanna was involved in early Nonprofit Summits at NYCcamp starting back in 20-teens 2015, and helped bring the Nonprofit Summit to DrupalCon North America in 2017.

Jess Snyder

Jess Snyder (jesss on drupal.org and Drupal Slack) is Director of Web Systems for WETA, the flagship public media station for Washington, DC, and has over 20 years of experience in website development.

Jess is an organizer for NTEN’s Drupal Community of Practice as well as Drupal GovCon. She also co-chaired the triumphant return of the Nonprofit Summit to DrupalCon Portland 2024 and its sequel at DrupalCon Atlanta 2025.

When not Drupaling, Jess sits on the Board of Directors for the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences.

Topics

• Meet the Speakers: Johanna and Jess
• Johanna's Journey in Nonprofit Tech
• Jess's Path in Public Broadcasting
• The Importance of Community in Nonprofit Tech
• Organizing Nonprofit Summits
• Challenges and Changes in Drupal
• The Value of Open Source for Nonprofits
• Comparing Drupal and WordPress
• Concerns About JavaScript in Content Editing
• Importance of Accessibility in Content Management
• Guardrails for Content Editors
• The Nonprofit Summit: Origins and Evolution
• Summit Format and Community Building
• Sponsorship and Event Details
• Getting Involved in the Nonprofit Drupal Community
• Conclusion and Final Thoughts

Guests

Johanna Bates - hanpersand
Jess Snyder - jesss