As we were preparing to go live with our solution, we realized we should write it all down so we wouldn't forget anything. Then we realized it might be good to share the process with anyone who might be following this story.
The Environment
Our environment complicates our solution a bit, so it might help to explain it. Many of the steps below can be eliminated in a more "typical" situation.
The first installation was for a support group whose site is pretty much only available to members. The "expert" was someone who had made some presentations to the group, but does not, herself, meet membership requirements. So the expert had to be kept out of most areas of the site, yet allowed to get to enough to be able to answer the questions. This required a new role be defined and locked down.
The site already uses TAC_Lite for access control. That was some help. Another help is that the navigation is split into three separate blocks that are controlled by visibility settings.
Step-by-Step
Some of these steps may seem obvious, but I'm including them because this article stemmed from my own planning sheet.
- Upload the latest versions of the modules.
- FAQ_Ask
- FAQ
Subscriptions- Taxonomy_Image (with patch).
- Basic settings.
- Assign to "expert" role.
Add subscription for new FAQ category.
- access comments
- access content
- access site-wide contact form
- edit faq
- view faq
- answer question
- access taxonomy images
Add "ask question" to "authenicated users" so members get it too.
- Choose roles.
- Select users.
The process is really not that different than most new module installations. We needed to be careful here because of the security concern. You probably already do most of the steps above anyway; you've just never written them down.
Comments
Helpers module
is also needed.
http://drupal.org/project/helpers
It was
I don't think it really is any more.
NancyDru
minor clarification request
Great documentation. Just a little clarification please before I install.
5. Upload expert's picture.
- I assume this is for taxo-image? I assume it goes up to the server in /sites/all/files(?) Is there a specific directory that the taxo-image module is going to look to find the uploaded image?
6. Add new term to FAQ categories. Also taxo-image. Note term number.
- I assume the FAQ taxonomy vocabulary/category is created by the module, right?
- If so, I assume the term being added is the expert with his image, right?
1+7. ... why is subscription lined out. Does the module have its own mail notification?
thanks in advance
Hmm...
There are two ways to go with the image, the first being a user's picture, the second being a taxonomy image. Depends on whether you want multiple experts for a category. There does not need to be a one-to-one mapping of experts and categories.
No, FAQ does not create its own vocabulary; you will do that and tell it which one to use. Then you can set up Faq_Ask. The terms are just ordinary taxonomy terms. Experts are users. In Faq_Ask, you identify experts for each category. Some terms may have more than one expert, others may have none.
Yes, Faq_Ask does its own notifications because Subscriptions will not work for unpublished nodes, which is what the unanswered questions are.
NancyDru
thank you. very helpful
thank you. very helpful