The Drupal 8 annotation plugin system allows you to define custom code which changes the look, feel, and behavior of a site while leaving a central project intact. This allows for unprecedented capacity to scale your Drupal project and make multiple sites with “last mile” changes to appearance and feature set. In this talk, we will go through the awesome possibilities the new plugin system provides. Key points will include: - Generate custom “add” buttons with correct access controls using the Views Add Button module - Using forms built with plugins to create a dynamic settings page - Change API behaviors with different processing plugins - Empower content creators by using the select list field to create custom access rules In addition to these, we will also discuss our experiences with using plugins, and when to use annotation plugins versus other options, such as configuration entities.
Dr. Michael Nolan is the Founder and CEO of Cerium Software LLC, a software company that specializes in platform-based automation for research and education. Michael maintains several modules on Drupal.org, including Views Add Button, Flashpoint Education, Spectra Analytics, and the Niobi Research Center distribution. He has been a Drupal enthusiast since Drupal 5, and started working with Drupal professionally since 2012, when he began writing Drupal sites for laboratories as a grad student. Dr. Nolan’s vision is to build open source communities that meet, learn, and do on a wide variety of topics through Drupal-based platforms. The first major project for this vision is Flashpoint Education (https://www.drupal.org/project/flashpoint), a free to use education delivery platform which links content creators and educators through communities of like-minded developers. ** This is the first time the talk "What’s awesome about the Drupal 8 plugin system" is being given.
