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Affiliated Site Build Guide

This is an outline for building websites based on a structure of "Affiliated Sites". Independent sub-sites fall under a top-level organizational umbrella.  This approach aims to achieve two important design principles. 

Dry: Don't Repeat Yourself 
KISS: Keep It Simple Stupid 

Concept Requirements:   
- Independent sub-site visual themes. 
- Independent data access for Site Search and SEO. 
- Role based access permissions. 
- Flexible URL Schema. Support common URL paths among any sub-site. (/people,/calendar,/about, etc.)

URL and Path Aliases
 -- Notes on other considerations or options. Apache.conf and the Domains Modules.
 -- Sites share a common Org level 403/404 page 
 
Context Module - sets up site sections 
 

TODO / Explain:  
Taxonomy Terms  (Affiliated Sites) 
URL and Path Aliases
 -- Sites share a common Org level 403/404 page 
Context Based Block Display 
Robots.TXT  
Apache Solr Search (Index Collections) 
Metadata Module 

Terms Condition Module: module provides a simple Condition plugin for taxonomy terms.

- Menus / Footers 
- Theme Elements (Favcons and Logos)

 

Content Types: 

"Affiliated Link" (affiliated _link)
Holds a Site Title and URL. Used for building flexible footer menus.

Used to present an affiliated site menu. A basic content type that holds a Display Title and URL link. Since these links can be internal or external, affiliated sites can live anywhere.  Affiliated sites can be easily added or adjusted, making things more flexible for site migrations and edge case needs. 
 

Metadata Context Setups

1.) Front Page - Domain Env set through Apache Virtual Host, passed into site's settings.php.
2.) Affiliated Site Taxonomy Terms, sets Logo/Menus block display, Site Front / Home link.

Canonical URL
A link to the preferred page location or URL of the content of this page, to help eliminate duplicate content penalties from search engines.

 

Attribution