Homepage Variations

Drupal's default front page

Drupal's default front page displays a list of the 10 most recent content nodes on the homepage. Each item in the list will display:

  • Title
  • Summary/Teaser
  • "Read more" link

The default front page list is comprised of 2 groups of content:

  1. Content marked Sticky AND Promoted to front page. Sticky items come first in the list. If multiple items are Sticky, they will be ordered newest-oldest by created date.
  2. Content marked only Promoted to front page, ordered newest-oldest by created date. If multiple items are Promoted to front page, they will be ordered newest-oldest by created date. (Items marked Sticky will not be duplicated in the group that is just Promoted to front page.)

I still see "Welcome to <site name> / No front page content has been created yet."

This default text will display until you mark something "Promoted to front page."

Variations

  • You may include any type of content in the list of content on the front page by marking it Promoted to front page.
  • The number of items in the list of content on the front page can be changed to the number of your choice (see Configuring Site Information or contact SCLS Help Desk or your local developer).
  • Instead of a Summary/Teaser and "Read more" link, it could display the full Body and no "Read more" link (contact SCLS Help Desk).
  • The length of the Summary/Teaser can be changed to a different number of characters (default is 600) (contact SCLS Help Desk).

Overriding Drupal's default front page

Contact the SCLS Help Desk or your local developer to replace Drupal's default front page with one of the following options.

Display a specific node instead of a list

Drupal can be set to have a single node (i.e. one specific Article, Basic Page, Event, Photo Album, or Photo Gallery) display on the homepage in place of the list-of-content default. See Configuring Site Information.

Display a list of content with custom settings

The default list of content can be replaced with a list (powered by the Views module) made up of different fields, compiled according to alternate filtering, grouping, and sorting criteria. Many, many combinations are possible.

Fields are what gets displayed for each item. Examples:

  • Title
  • Event date
  • Body
  • Tags
  • ...almost anything else that is stored in a separate box in the editing screen

Filtering criteria limits which items appear in the list. Examples:

  • Type (i.e. Article, Basic Page, Event, Photo Album, or Photo Gallery)
  • Has an image in an image field
  • Sticky (or not)
  • Promoted to front page
  • Labeled with a particular taxonomy term or tag (or not)
  • Limited to a particular number of items
  • Limited to a particular range of time (e.g. upcoming in the next month)
  • ...and more

Grouping criteria can segment the list into sub-lists of similar items. Examples:

  • Within a list of items that are all Promoted to front page, all the Events could appear at the top of the list ahead of the Articles.
  • Within a list of items that are all Events, all the Children's events could appear at the top of the list, followed by all the Teen events, followed by all the Adult events.
  • ...and more

Sorting criteria can determine the order of items in the list (or sub-lists). Examples:

  • In a list of items that are all Promoted to front page, all the Events could appear in order of soonest upcoming to farthest in the future.
  • In a list of items that are all Sticky and Promoted to front page, all the articles could be ordered newest-oldest by last updated date.
  • Anywhere items are sorted newest-oldest, it could go oldest-newest instead.
  • Items can be sorted alphabetically or reverse-alphabetically.
  • ...and more