Advancing Your Drupal Skills

I spend a lot of time with people who have a desire to advance their Drupal skills. Whether its the good folks in #drupal-support IRC chatroom, the people in the forums and groups, or the members of my local Indy Drupal Users Group here in Indianapolis, they all have one thing in common. They find it challenging to navigate the tremendous wealth of resources available to Drupal users. I think you'll agree that this "problem" is a good one to have. It sure beats the other CMS communities who don't have anywhere near as many resources for their users. What to do? I am fond of talking [at long length usually] about all the resources available to Drupal users, and when I say "users" I mean beginners, developers, coders, designers, themers, etc. No matter what your angle of entry into Drupal, there are resources geared towards you. Not everyone reading this will be able to attend www.DoItWithDrupal.com so I hope you will check out this list of resources. You should also check out my Indiana Drupal Group's resource list over at http://groups.drupal.org/node/4507/resources Here Comes the List! Most are Drupal specific resources, but a few are general webdev. http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_gw?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywor... This is an Amazon search of ALL the Drupal books available. WHOA! http://Drupal.org An obvious place to stay in the know of Drupal http://drupal.org/handbook getting started / beyond the basics / theming guides / developing for Drupal It's All Here http://drupal.org/handbook/site-recipes Step by Step procedures on how to build very specific projects. http://drupal.org/planet kind of a one-stop-shop for a running list of the most valuable posts gathered from all the discussion groups. http://groups.drupal.org/ check out the dojo group http://groups.drupal.org/drupal-dojo and many other groups. sit back and read OR jump in and interact http://lists.drupal.org/listinfo subscribe to any of the mailing lists that interest you. I'm a member of the support group and the Drupal Consultants Group. http://drupaldojo.com/ this is the website that supports the Drupal Dojo Group http://Lullabot.com lots of great articles, blogs, audio and video podcasts. Their workshops rock too. GET ON THEIR EMAIL LIST!! http://geeksandgod.com/ podcasts, seminars, reviews, etc. Even if you're not working on a Church website, these guys have useful info for you. http://mustardseedmedia.com/podcast Some excellent videos! https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1843 You've GOT to get firebug. It's cooler than web-dev-toolbar! https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/60 Web Developer Toolbar. does some things that firebug does not. http://mydrupal.com/ excellent for beginners! Videos, articles, etc. http://www.ubercart.org/ Lots of news and resources here. http://blip.tv www.youtube.com & www.archive.org Search for "Drupal" http://docs.jquery.com/Main_Page for all your JQuery needs http://www.roopletheme.com/ Some very cool themes. http://w3schools.com/ Free Education! Learn CSS, HTML, javascript, PHP, RDF. etc.... http://www.lynda.com NOT FREE but worth the money. Buy one class at a time OR subscribe https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1843 If you don't use Firefox I don't know why. If you do use Firefox then you MUST also install FireBug. Download it, install it, and you'll see why. http://drupal.org/forum Drupal Forums are a must! http://drupal.org/taxonomy/term/14/0 New Drupal module report. http://www.istockphoto.com Very inexpensive online stock photos. Good selection here. http://www.yugma.com Free online conferencing. http://www.gotomeeting.com Paid online conferencing, but very good. http://kuler.adobe.com/ Great color tool from adobe. http://browsershots.org/ Test your web design in different browsers. http://www.wufoo.com Online form builder. Drupal 6 http://drupal.org/theme-guide Drupal 5 http://drupal.org/theme-guide/5 Go ahead and add your favorite resources in the comment section. There are so many I'm sure I missed some good ones.