Post installation

I am setting up a local business directory. Each business will have general info about the business, the address, and a link to a map. I want to make it so that the teaser has a link to the map pops up in a new window but the full node has the map embedded in it.

Because I want users to be able to enter businesses, I want to make the entry form as simple as possible. I would like them to enter the street address and choose the city from a drop down and have the state, zip, latitude, and longitude all filled in automatically.

As a first step towards this, I installed the location and gmap modules and set them up to work with my CCK directory listing type. This got me the address info added to my node from location and there was also a map and lat/long fields. But entering in the address didn't make it fill in the lat/long and there was no way to get the map to not center on the Atlantic Ocean. I did some searching and found I need to disable the location module and use something built into gmap instead. This got me a nice interface for getting the lat/long with the map centered correctly and the lat/long filled in automatically. It's almost perfect except that the address is now just one text box that doesn't get saved. Argh!

So my first question is, has anyone figured out a way to have the location module's fields fill in the lat/long fields? If I can get past that, then I'll need to figure out how to get the state/zip to fill in automatically.

I enabled drupal module
on the login vlock, i get the message "you can use your drupal id to login etc"
how do i remove this message

It says Navigation. I'd prefer something like Links, or Begin here...

Thanks!

I want to let users submit pictures for thier profile, but choose whether to display them on stories.

I created a custom profile as a checkbox called profile_useImage. When selected, this is 1, when not selected, it's 0. The database is updated OK (I checked).

So I tried to change the node.tpl.php file for the theme. I changed the snippet

 if($picture) {
   print $picture;
}

to

I want to have different nodes, that I can use for different user groups to collaborately authoring texts. However, I dont want them to be able to change e.g. view permissions or publishing options.

I have used an adation of the book module to make the different nodes, e.g. a carbook.module and a bikebook.module. In this way I can have collections of books for each subject.

It works OK but I want to limit the possibility for the contributors to change the new node's properties - menu setting is another example of what I dont want them to change.

how do I get the main body of the page when going to my domain (www.blahasdfasdf.com) to just show a static node/page detailing what the site is all about.. hiding all the content, until they click on the menus i have set up on the left side?

thanks in advance..