By rosemarypdx on

Hi all,

I'm a Drupal (and web server) newbie, and I'm trying to get my head around the Drupal file structure on a web server. I'd particularly like to understand this better before I attempt a Drupal version upgrade. I've looked for something online to no avail, but perhaps I'm using the wrong search terms. Does anyone know if something like this exists, or would someone be kind enough to explain it to me?

Thanks!
Rosemary

⋅ Categories: Drupal 7.x

Comments

paean99’s picture

paean99 commented

Some links:
Upgrading from previous versions
Update Drupal Core
Updating Drupal 7 to the Latest Version

Anatomy of a Drupal Website
Drupal 7 Folder Structure & important files
Drupal File Structure
Lesson 3: Understanding the Drupal file structure
Explain Directory Structure of Drupal?

rosemarypdx’s picture

rosemarypdx commented

Very helpful, thank you!

kruser’s picture

kruser commented

With a standard install, you should only touch files inside the /sites folder - excluding of course .htaccess and robots.txt. There is an UPGRADE txt file in the base directory with instructions for updating.

-----------------------------------------------------
Bob @ Drupal Aid (https://www.drupalaid.com)

rosemarypdx’s picture

rosemarypdx commented

Thanks Bob. Love the design of your site.

kruser’s picture

kruser commented

No problem, thanks for the compliment :)

-----------------------------------------------------
Bob @ Drupal Aid (https://www.drupalaid.com)

rpontius’s picture

rpontius commented

Thanks for providing those links above - I found them very useful as well! However, I still have a few questions, and I'm hoping you or someone else will have time to answer them. I am also fairly new to Drupal and web developing.

I'm running Drupal 7 on an Apache server. (The server belongs to a friend who helped set up the server and original drupal installation. He's terribly busy, so I try not to bother him with questions.)

At the top level of the file structure (when viewed by my FTP,) I have two folders I'm trying to understand. I have "public_html" which contains the Sites directory. I also have a "www" folder which also contains the Sites folder.

These two separate top level folders seem to completely mirror one another, which is making it very confusing when trying to apply a core update manually, as I know that I should delete everything except the Sites folder. So I'm wondering... which Sites folder should I keep, and why do these two folders mirror one another?

ColdSun’s picture

ColdSun commented

They may in fact be mirrors of each other (one might be a symbolic link). You could ask your friend who hosts it if that is the case.
I suppose an alternative way would be to upload a test file into one directory and see if it appears in the other.

If so, just go ahead and do it to either directory as they really are the one and in the same.

rpontius’s picture

rpontius commented

Thanks for the help! I think I understand now!