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Finder Module

CREATED BY: CORNELL DATA MANAGEMENT SERVICE GROUP AND CORNELL INFORMATION TECHNOLOGIES CUSTOM DEVELOPMENT GROUP

This software is being shared free of cost and with no restrictions on re-use or modification. The code is provided “as is” without warranty of any kind, express or implied, and Cornell University takes no responsibility for maintenance or upgrades.

If you chose to re-use the code, please cite the original creators as: Cornell University Research Data Management Service Group and Cornell Information Technologies Custom Development Group (2018). Finder Module. Dupal 8. https://github.com/CU-CommunityApps/CD-finder

Overview

The purpose of the Finder module is to help users choose among a number of similar related alternatives.

In our initial use case, we had 18-20 computer data storage alternatives available for researchers. Our Help Desk created a list of questions to guide the researchers to specify their requirements. The Finder module allowed the researchers to enter requirements and interactively narrow the field of 18-20 to perhaps 2-3 alternatives. After the users clicks checkboxes to enter their criteria, ineligible results are greyed out. The user can click on remaining eligible results; these are highlighted and detailed characteristics of this smallest group are presented in a table to allow the researchers to make their final choice.

Implementing this application in Drupal allows the service managers to easily edit the available services and supporting data without additional programming.

We believe other groups will have a similar need for a self-service product to guide end-users to narrow down a choice within a set of moderately complex alternatives.

Planning

When using this module to help end-users choose between a number of complex alternatives, based on a number of criteria and the evaluation of information in several categories, expect that gathering the supporting information and designing useful questions will take a significant amount of planning and time. Changing questions or answers or adding or deleting categories of information after services have been entered requires editing each of the services.

We recommend starting with a simple example like that presented below to familiarize yourself with the data layout and editing workflow before beginning a “real” project.

Install Finder module via Composer

Install Drupal 8 using Composer:

  • composer create-project drupal-composer/drupal-project:8.x-dev testdrupal

Require the Finder module:

  • cd testdrupal
  • composer require cubear/finder

Note: If you aren’t using composer to manage your Drupal 8 site, you can clone the module from: https://github.com/CU-CommunityApps/CD-finder

From the Extend administrative page (/admin/modules), install the Finder module and its dependencies.

Setup of the Finder Module

  • In the Control Type taxonomy (/admin/structure/taxonomy/manage/control_type/overview) add two terms: "checkbox" and "radio.".
  • In the Facets taxonomy create a two-level hierarchy of terms representing criteria/questions and choices. For each of the criteria (top level facets), specify a control type: either “checkbox” (used when any, all or none of the choices may be selected) or “radio” (used when only one of the choices may be selected).
  • Drag the Facet taxonomy terms into a two level hierarchy, representing the relationship between criteria/questions and choices.

Services (the things being chosen) can contain a lot of data, and so require a bit of planning. Once the end-user has narrowed down their choices, they will be presented with a comparison table containing data in several fields. These fields are represented by a Drupal Paragraph called “Service Paragraphs”. Service Paragraphs should be edited before you start entering Service data at /admin/structure/paragraphs_type/service_paragraphs/fields

When delivered, the Finder module comes with two fields in Service Paragraphs: “First Category” and “Second Category.” You can rename or replace these, and add as many fields as you wish. We have found that Text (formatted, long) fields work best.

Now you may add Services. From the images above, you can see that a service has a title, summary (show on the cards in the first image. They are “eligible” to be chosen, depending on the choices the end-user has specified, and so need a set of “facet-matches” to indicate whether they are compatible with specific choices. They also have text data in several categories to be able to populate the comparison table.

Create your Services using the Drupal Service content-type. Add title and summary for each. Then fill in the text for the Service Paragraphs you have chosen.

Required: Add an additional Service with the title “Help” and put text in each field describing what to expect in that field. This will be used by the Finder module to display help information for the each row in the comparison table. The comparison table may not appear if the Help Service is not defined.

Instructions for Adding a Service

Step 0: Git clone the project (CD-finder)

git clone https://github.com/nyuhpc/CD-finder.git

Step 1: Build and Run the container

  1. Navigate to the project directory:
cd CD-finder/docker
  1. Build the Docker/Podman container (without cache):
podman build -t dev --no-cache .
  1. Run the container and expose the necessary ports:
# Replace port(8080), name(dev) to any value if you want
podman run -d -t --name dev -p 8080:80 localhost/dev

Step 2: Access the Container and Drupal

  1. Enter the running container:
podman exec -ti dev bash
  1. Generate a one-time login link for Drupal:
# directed to port 8080
drush uli --uri=http://localhost:8080
  1. Open the generated link in your browser, register as an admin and log in.

Step 3: Modify the Service

  1. Setup a username and password, if you are logging in for the first time. Setup Account
  2. Once logged in, navigate to the “Content” tab in the Drupal admin interface. Content Tab
  3. Add or edit the service as needed. Add or edit the servic You can add/modify the required information now. Fill the Info
  4. Confirm that the service appears in the list of available options.

Step 4: Export the Database

  1. After making changes, export the database:
# still in contianer
drush ard --exclude-code-paths=web/sites/default/settings.php
  1. Exit the contianer:
exit
  1. Copy the database archive from the container to local:
podman cp dev:/tmp/archive.tar.gz .
  1. Extract the archive:
mkdir archive && tar -xzvf archive.tar.gz -C archive

Step 5: Save and Clean Up

  1. Save essential files:
cp archive/files/.ht.sqlite .
cp archive/files/.ht.sqlite-shm .
cp archive/files/.ht.sqlite-wal .
  1. Remove temporary files:
rm -rf archive && rm archive.tar.gz

Tips

  • You may wish to remove all sidebar blocks from this page, so that the Finder can use the full width of the page.
  • The Finder module is displayed at the URL path /finder.
  • There is a configuration page to edit titles and other data on the Finder page at /admin/config/content/finder
  • Check out our production implementation at https://finder.research.cornell.edu
  • You will need to configure the SMTP module to allow the Finder module to send mail.
  • Installation works only at a root site, not if installed in a subdirectory.

FAQ

Q: I encountered the 'no unqualified-search registries' error when trying to build the container:

# $xxx:~/Documents/CD-finder/docker$ podman build -t dev --no-cache .
# Error: error creating build container: short-name "drupal:10.2.6-php8.3-apache-bullseye" did not resolve to an alias and no unqualified-search registries are defined in "/etc/containers/registries.conf"

A: This error occurs because Podman cannot resolve the short name to a fully qualified image name. To resolve this, you need to configure the container registries in the /etc/containers/registries.conf file.

  1. Open the registries.conf file with superuser privileges:
sudo nano /etc/containers/registries.conf
  1. Locate the [registries.search] section and modify it to include the Docker registry:
[registries.search]
registries = ['docker.io']
  1. Save the file and exit.
  2. Retry the build command: