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I am new to drupal and am building an app for my brother's business as a test case to help me learn.

I just built a solution to opening an add content form and pre-populating some fields depending on a code entered by the user. To be specific, you enter a code allocated by the company to a property they manage and it opens an 'add new payment' node entry form and fills in the name of the owner and populates a select list widget for an entity reference field with just the charges for that property, so you can select which charge the payment is for.

I solved it (over two days!) bit by bit learning about each module as I went, so although it works, it has some weaknesses.

If I was to explain how I achieve this and ask about specific parts that I think might cause problems, that should be useful to others in the future, right?

If not, can you point me towards where I might be able to do this.

Thanks for your time.

  • Stand by a little on this. I don't think we have ever discussed this topic before. I am checking what some of the other tech-specific sites are doing with questions like this. – mpdonadio♦ Jan 3 '14 at 21:14
  • It is worth mentioning also that for pure code-review questions, there is codereview.stackexchange.com – Letharion Jan 9 '14 at 22:12
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Speaking mostly as a site user and not an overlord a moderator, I think we can allow a few of these as test cases under a few conditions.

  • The question needs to be made somewhat generic to allow it to be of use for future users.

  • The question needs to be of small enough scope so that an answer can be concise, yet complete.

  • They aren't pure code-review type questions

  • That some heavy editing may be needed to bring questions closer to these conditions.

I would also suggest that the problem be posted as the question, and that the solution be posted at the same time as a self-answer.

I think that users would also need to be understanding that these things are judgement calls, and that the "power" users here can identify the difference between a concise best-practice and one-way-vs-another questions.

  • Ok, thanks for putting in some time on this. I will post the question over the next couple of days (bit busy right now) and maybe if you could help me out with any edits that it requires that would be most appreciated. Thanks. – NectarSoft Jan 4 '14 at 15:09
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    Yep I'd second that. This is often the first place I search if I run into a problem. The thing I'd emphasize, along with the abstraction is the more effort put into the problem, the reasoning and the eventual solution in the question (i.e. everything that isn't code) the more useful it is. It's a great way for amateurs like me to get into the head of someone more skilled. – Dominic Woodman Jan 13 '14 at 20:12
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It seems to me since the Drupal Way requires extensive amounts of enculturation, this would be appropriate. Chances are someone who comes from another background is not going to get it "right" the first time. This would be a great way to getting noobs started in the Drupal mindset, given the restrictions that MPD outlined.

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