By Blacksheep01 on

Alright, I have managed to get not only one drupal website uploaded to the web but two. Now that they are up and working I have only managed to do basic things like add themes and pretty much modify stuff via the GUI on my drupal site. That is going alright but my problem is now in the customization of my site's theme and features.

I do not know PHP, at all. I barely know HTML, I pretty much used Front Page then Dreamweaver most of my life and skipped over code beyond the very, very basics. I have issues just reading and learning code from a book or website. I was a History major in college, I read a lot and work as a reporter now, I like words and pictures. Code and math looks like Chinese to me when its just listed in giant columns with tiny little explanations about what it does. I even bought a book entitled "Building Online Communities With Drupal, phpBB, and WordPress." I have followed the directions exactly about adding basic code, like getting different fonts in TinyMCE to work. I have followed the directions three times, copied the code exactly and the damn fonts still do not show up so I feel like a big idiot!

So my dilemma is that I need a place where the directions about code are tied directly to actions if such a thing even exists. i.e. "If you want to add a graphic banner at the top of your page with links embedded to separate pages in the graphic, then you need to type this exact code and modify this file on this precise line. Then you need to add the image to xx folder," and so on. I can learn things, but I need them to be tied directly to actions and be laid out clearly. Honestly I need a guide that is so dumbed down it would say something like "would you like to change the colors on the bluemarine theme to something else? Then open xx file and change xx color number on xx line. In this fashion I feel that I could learn PHP, but all I can seem to find around here or in books is code, lines and lines of code with little explanation about what else I need to modify or where the code goes.

I really, really want to learn this, I don't want to give up or just be told I shouldn't be using drupal. I want to use drupal, I just need really specialized help. Is there a book on PHP, a website on drupal, or anything for people like me?

⋅ Categories: Drupal 4.7.x

Comments

pwolanin’s picture

pwolanin commented

My advice to you if you need help at this level is for each simple question to first search well here for the answer. If you can't find an answer, post a single, simple question here in the forum.

---
Work: BioRAFT

VM’s picture

VM commented

I feel your frustration. With no prior coding experience it can be a bit overwhelming. however, there is more to drupal than php. there is some HTML, CSS involved as well. The resources I've found starting out that didnt overwhelm even more were found http://www.w3schools.com/ there.

Unfortunately there isn't a "Drupal for Dummies" out there yet. The two books out thus far, are the one you already own, and Drupal from Pakt Publishing, written by Ron Mercer. There is another due out in April (I think was the release date on Amazon) which will go into more depth.
, but I can't be sure about how much handholding.

I tend to learn more from my mistakes with code than my success's.

The forum is a great place to get a question answered in detail (most times). Provided the question is communicated well enough. A direct title also helps. for example having a problem with the CSS of Tinymce would get many tinymce users if it was titled Tinymce CSS - Changing font size. You could than quote the pieces of code you are changing and or using (for those without the book) and it could be worked out and looked at by multiple inviduals.

If there is something specific you want to do, please ask away ... : )