By Anisa

I thought this page might be useful to some, and it will help me keep my thoughts straight on this matter. Please note that some links may not work unless you are a registered member!

This site uses Drupal 5. This is a list of which modules are used for which purpose, and which aren't used, and why.

Enabled modules in use

block
Controls the boxes that are displayed around the main content.

This module is required, and is used in the blocks that surround this page, such as the menu blocks on the left. Members can also enable certain blocks in their my account settings, and I can control which pages the blocks can be on. For example, even if a member has enabled it, no right hand blocks appear on the Scans Gallery pages.

book
Allows users to collaboratively author a book.

I love the book module. I like things with structure. The book module is used in the FAQ.

comment
Allows users to comment on and discuss published content.

Being able to comment on anything on the main site is one of the strongest features of the new ACO. It is also required for the forum to work.

contact
Enables the use of both personal and site-wide contact forms.

I use this to make the Feedback Form. Members also have their own personal contact form that they can use. Other members can contact them through it if they enable it in my account. As an administrator, I can always contact any member through their personal contact form, even if they don't have it enabled. I sometimes get contact form spam, since annonymous users can also use it, but not in any significant amount.

content
Allows administrators to define new content types.

This is also called CCK, or Content Creation Kit. It's still in development, but I used it on the site to create the Publishers section in the Encyclopedia. Since the Encyclopedia has been postponed, it is not being used at the moment. It comes with many baby modules.

• date: Defines a date/time field type.
• number: Defines numeric field types.
• optionwidgets: Defines selection, check box and radio button widgets for text and numeric fields.
• nodereference: Defines a field type for referencing one node from another.
• text: Defines simple text field types.
• userreference: Defines a field type for referencing a user from a node.
• weburl: Defines simple weburl field types.

drupal
Lets you register your site with a central server and improve ranking of Drupal projects by posting information on your installed modules and themes; also enables users to log in using a Drupal ID.

Do I use this anymore?

filter
Handles the filtering of content in preparation for display. required

forum
Enables threaded discussions about general topics.

Now that you can comment on anything, I wasn't really sure about the need for a forum. In the old ACO, there wasn't much demand for it. However, akai_neko wanted it, so I made it here on a much smaller scale. As there is a demand for it, I will create new categories, but making lots of categories without people to post in it? I'll pass this time.

gallery
Integration with Gallery2.1 (http://gallery.menalto.com/)

help
Manages the display of online help.

For the most part, I think members don't see this much, a lot of this is on the administrative side... Of course, Drupal help is seriously out of date in some places.

insert_view
Inserts content lists into nodes using [view:myview] tags

lightbox2
Enables Lightbox V2 for Drupal

locale
Enables the translation of the user interface to languages other than English.

I have this enabled for a few European languages and Japanese, but I don't actively maintain the strings, and I don't think this is a good solution for multi lingual sites. Members can select the language they want from my account. All it does is translate certain text phrases in Drupal, like, for example, Poll, or Submit. Nothing to do with content really. However, apparently, if you don't have the language enabled here, you can't view that language in the Gallery. Specifically, I have some Japanese in the Gallery, that can't be viewed unless I have Japanese set in Drupal.

logintoboggan
Improves Drupal's login system.

Normally, Drupal has three options... either give registered users all permissions immediately, or upon confirming their e-mail address. I wanted users to be able to have some limited permissions, but not all, to avoid possible fake users. Logintoboggin works well for me. Sometimes I have a problem where the login doesn't quite take, but this is a drupal problem.

masquerade
The masquerade module allows administrators to masquerade as other users.

I use this to 'masquerade' as a member. This lets me fix technical problems with a member account without having to bother the member herself/himself. As an administrator, I can edit everything you post, of course, but this lets me do it as you. Particularly useful if you were going to lose member points from the edit, essential for administrators, I believe. Only I can use this feature.

node
Allows content to be submitted to the site and displayed on pages. required

The node module! What would Drupal be like without nodes? ;p

menu
Allows administrators to customize the site navigation menu.

This module is what makes the menus on the right hand side. It has improved dramatically over time, but still has some quirks.

page
Enables the creation of pages that can be added to the navigation system.

I don't use pages muuuuuuch, I tend to use book pages instead. But I keep the option open.

path
Allows users to rename URLs.

This is good stuff! I use this to rename node/xx to faq, or member/lists. I love it. Very easy to use.

ping
Alerts other sites when your site has been updated.

I seriously don't pay attention to this. I just figure it can't be bad, right?

poll
Allows your site to capture votes on different topics in the form of multiple choice questions.

Polls! I wish all members would just tell me what they think, and I wouldn't have to use polls, but there ya go. The poll feature is pretty decent.

profile
Supports configurable user profiles.

Well... take a look at my profile!

quicktags
Allows Drupal to use quicktags around the textarea for easier user input

This was the easiest and most intuitive html editor that caused the least problems. I tried a bunch!

search
Enables site-wide keyword searching.

Search does not work without a cron job, but once you have one, it works pretty well. It's integrated with the gallery, so you can search the gallery too.

statistics
Logs access statistics for your site.

For my eyes only!

story
Allows users to submit stories, articles or similar content.

I use this to post Site News. Only I can post site news.

system
Handles general site configuration for administrators.

This is required. I am not sure what it does.

tablemanager
A simple module to manage and display tables.

I love this module! If the programmer could ajax it, all would be beautiful.

taxonomy
Enables the categorization of content.

I can't quite master taxonomy. In any case, pretty much all content on ACO can be tagged with a big Anime Series list. Taxonomy is also used to create forum categories, image galleries, site news topics, user news topics, poll categories, etc. I found it works best if I combine taxonomy with different content types, instead of trying various taxonomy access modules, which tend to be wonky.

throttle
Handles the auto-throttling mechanism, to control site congestion.

We've been getting a lot of bots lately, and sometimes that slows down the site. A lot of modules that were not in use have been disabled, and some memory intensive modules have been set to be disabled when the number of guests exceeds 10.

tracker
Enables tracking of recent posts for users.

upload
Allows users to upload and attach files to content.

urlfilter
Automatically turns web and e-mail addresses into clickable links.

user
Manages the user registration and login system. required

userpoints
Users earn points as they post nodes, comments, and vote on nodes

views
The views module creates customized views of node lists.

Ohmigod! What Drupal was like before this module...you don't want to imagine! This sophisticated work lets you create customized lists of modules, or views. Used all over the place, notably in the member trading lists, and the main page.

views_bookmark
This module allows you to create customized 'bookmarks' that individual users can set on nodes.

views_ui
The views module creates customized views of node lists.

watchdog
Logs and records system events. required

Enabled modules NOT in use
actions
Scriptable actions configurable through the web.

blog
Enables keeping an easily and regularly updated web page or a blog.

I am not really sure what to do with this. No one seems interested in having their own blog. But I keep it up, in case I decide.

taxonomy_block
Makes blocks based on taxonomy vocabularies and terms.

taxonomy_browser
An interface for viewing content grouped by arbitrary taxonomy terms.

votingapi
Provides a shared voting API for other modules.
votingapi_actions

workflow
Enables users to manage content using workflow states.

Disabled modules

aggregator
Aggregates syndicated content (RSS, RDF, and Atom feeds).

Aggregator was used to bring members news from other sites, although only stories related to Japan from Yahoo! News and news from Anime News Network were used. It was disabled because I didn't think anyone used it..

archive
Displays a calendar for navigating older content.

I might use this later, but it is not essential.

bbcode
Allow the use of BBCode in your posts.

This wasn't fun.

bbcode_wysiwyg
A module that adds several buttons that allow users to enter bbcode in a wysiwyg type fashion

I think this actually just didn't work well.

blogapi
Allows users to post content using applications that support XML-RPC blog APIs.

Without blogs, why use the blogapi?

legacy
Provides legacy handlers for upgrades from older Drupal installations.

This is a fresh install of Drupal, this module was not needed.

mediumvote
Adds a vote widget to every node and comment.

This didn't quite do what I wanted, be able to rate something on various criteria.

nice_menus
Make drop down css/javascript menus for site navigation and admin menus

This module is very very nice, but unfortunately, it doesn't seem to work well with the interlaced theme on this site.

nodeimageblock
Provides a block to displays all images attached to a node.

This sounded like a good idea, but it didn't reduce the size of really big images.

nodereview
Add reviews to arbitrary node types.

nodevote
Allows users to vote on specific node types using various criteria

tinymce
The TinyMCE Javascript HTML WYSIWYG editor.

I was looking for a way for users to use tags like bold or italics, and this seemed like the best thing. However, there were too many bugs that I didn't want to spend time fixing, so I gave up on it.

tac_lite
Simple access control based on taxonomy.

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