Drupal for Education and
E-Learning
Teaching and learning in the classroom using the
Drupal CMS
Bill Fitzgerald
BIRMINGHAM - MUMBAI
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Drupal for Education and E-Learning
Copyright © 2008 Packt Publishing
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval
system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, without the prior written
permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embedded in
critical articles or reviews.
Every effort has been made in the preparation of this book to ensure the accuracy of
the information presented. However, the information contained in this book is sold
without warranty, either express or implied. The author, Packt Publishing, and its
dealers and distributors will not be held liable for any damages caused or alleged to
be caused directly or indirectly by this book.
Packt Publishing has endeavored to provide trademark information about all of the
companies and products mentioned in this book by the appropriate use of capitals.
However, Packt Publishing cannot guarantee the accuracy of this information.
First published: November 2008
Production Reference: 1181108
Published by Packt Publishing Ltd.
32 Lincoln Road
Olton
Birmingham, B27 6PA, UK.
ISBN 978-1-847195-02-9
www.packtpub.com
Cover Image by Vinayak Chittar (vinayak.chittar@gmail.com)
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Credits
Author
Bill Fitzgerald
Reviewers
Joel “Senpai” Farris
Michael Peacock
Peter M. Wolanin
Senior Acquisition Editor
David Barnes
Development Editor
Swapna V. Verlekar
Technical Editor
Dhiraj Chandiramani
Editorial Team Leader
Akshara Aware
Project Manager
Abhijeet Deobhakta
Project Coordinator
Brinell Lewis
Lata Basantani
Indexer
Monica Ajmera
Proofreader
Dirk Manuel
Production Coordinator
Shantanu Zagade
Cover Work
Shantanu Zagade
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About the Author
Bill Fitzgerald was born in 1968, and worked as a teacher for 16 years. During that
time, he taught English and history, and worked as a Technology Director at the K12
level. Bill began using technology in his own teaching in the early '90s; from there,
he moved on to database design and systems administration. During that time, Bill
began developing strategies to support technology integration in 1:1 laptop systems,
and in desktop computing environments.
In 2003, Bill and Marc Poris founded FunnyMonkey, a Drupal development shop
working primarily within the education industry. Bill started, and manages the
Drupal in Education group on
http://groups.drupal.org, and is active in
various educational and open source communities. Bill blogs about education and
technology at http://funnymonkey.com/blog.
When Bill is not staring deeply into computer screens, he can be found riding
his xed gear bicycle through Portland, OR, or spending far too much time
drinking coffee.
This book took nearly six months to write, and I would not have
been able to complete it without the support of numerous people.
First, my wife Isabelle gave unending support and understanding
throughout the entire process—when I was stressed, she helped me
laugh, and that was a gift beyond words.
Additionally, Marc Poris and Jeff Graham, compatriots at
FunnyMonkey, provided support of a different kind: when I was
stressed, they wrote code, and their snippets and modules grace the
pages of this text.
Finally, the team of people I worked with at Packt provided a great
blend of guidance and support. David Barnes, Brinell Lewis, and
Swapna Verlekar all worked with me to keep the project on track,
and I thank them for the opportunity to write this book.
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About the Reviewers
An avid user of the Drupal framework since 2006, Joel "Senpai" Farris is highly
active in the Drupal Community as a Document Maintainer, Patch Tester, core and
contributed modules Patch Creator, and an expert in the support of and care for
new Drupalites.
Under the monicker Senpai (
http://groups.drupal.org/user/4009), Joel co-led
the charge for the Drupal Dojo training sessions (http://drupaldojo.net) for over
a year, and was joined in that endeavor by some of the community's most famous
personas, including Josh Koenig (http://groups.drupal.org/user/429) of
Chapter 3, LLC (http://www.chapterthree.com), Addison Berry (http://groups.
drupal.org/user/1607
) of Lullabot (http://www.lullabot.com), Squidster
(http://groups.drupal.org/user/3763), Dmitri Gaskin (http://groups.
drupal.org/user/1322
), and many, many others who gave freely of their time
so that all people could learn ninja Drupal tactics in a cutting-edge and
edifying environment.
Joel currently functions as the Chief Operations Ofcer for the new San Diego
WorkHabit ofces, and is passionate about any opportunity to get the company's
staff involved in outreach operations. He is responsible for implementing and
maintaining the WorkHabit Community Fridays, in which qualied individuals take
an entire payday to work on one selected core or contrib patch in order to further
Drupal's progress.
Thanks go to my parents, who were both lifelong educators and
enabled me to begin learning computers from the dawn of personal
computing, and my sister who's currently teaching grade school and
loving it. Thanks also to Bill Fitzgerald, who's devotion to Excellence
In Drupal has far surpassed what even he thought was possible only
a year ago. Go, Bill, go!
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