New Drupal Featured Content Module

Thanks to NatureBridge for helping sponsor this module! If you like this module, please consider donating to the non-profit NatureBridge to help them continue connecting youth with the natural world.

NatureBridge.org was interested in having functionality to allow their own staff to easily add featured content blocks on their site without having to rely on their programmer (me! :)

First, I looked into all the existing Drupal modules on drupal.org to see if there were any that would satisfy their requirements. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to find any that were close enough to what they needed. They wanted to add blocks of content based on content type(s), author(s), and term(s), and they wanted to be able to create as many blocks as they desired, and they wanted RSS feeds for these lists, and it needed to be *simple* (sorry, no views!). (See list at very bottom of modules I looked into.)

So, initially, I thought I'd just make a custom module that was just tailored to their needs, but quickly realized that I could make the module generic to use for anyone in a similar situation. NatureBridge graciously agreed to let me take ownership of the module, enhance it beyond their current needs, and submit it to drupal.org. You can download it here: Featured Content Module

This new featured content module is useful if you have non-technical staff who need to add blocks on the site that contain lists of node titles, node teasers, and/or full node content. This module can also be useful if you need to get up some related/featured content blocks quickly and are not familiar enough yet with views to do it.

The content that shows up in the block depends on how the user configured the block. The content can be sorted alphabetically, by date, or by popularity, or can presented randomly. There are additional visibility rules available so you can choose to show the block based on the content type, user/author, or taxonomy terms available for the node page being viewed.

One option is to specify a manual list of paths to show. The advantage of this is if you know the pages you are interested in, but want them sorted in a particular way or you want to apply some additional rules for when the block should show up.

The other option is to specify a number of filters to determine what content will be displayed. You can filter by content types(s), user(s)/author(s), taxonomy term(s), and by path. You can match the content type, author, or terms of the current node being shown, or can configure it independent of the page being shown.

Here are some examples of blocks you can create:

  • List of nodes that have the same author as the node being shown
  • List of nodes that have the same content type as the node being shown
  • List of nodes that have one of the same terms as the node being shown
  • List of nodes that start with the same path as the node being shown
  • List of nodes that are a chosen content type or types
  • List of nodes that are authored by a chosen author or authors
  • List of nodes that contain one of the chosen taxonomy terms

These can be combined as well. For example, you could chose to show a list of nodes that have the same author *and* content type as the node being shown.

Here are some screenshots:

Featured content blockFeatured content block

Featured content block configure 1Featured content block configure 1

Featured content block configure 2Featured content block configure 2

Featured content block configure 3Featured content block configure 3

Featured content block configure 4Featured content block configure 4

Featured content block configure 5Featured content block configure 5





Modules that I reviewed before writing this module:

Comments

I know the Views module is

I know the Views module is supposed to be king of all Drupal modules. However, I am a blind web developer, and for some reason my screen reader does not work well with the displays when I go to build a Block or Page. So, when I came across this module to help me display related posts in my blog, I was unashamedly ecstatic. Thank you for making it so ridiculously easy to display and sort featured content without the need to use Views or manually code PHP. You have no idea how simple this task has become for someone still getting familiar with Drupal in general.

Awesome!

Not sure how I missed this comment before but this is great :) Thanks for sharing!

how to make second page to akct as first page

How can I make page that will act as a first page which means that I can add desired content on the way that I do it with "promoted to front page" in publishing options. Is there any options where I can make other option "promoted to second page" or something similar with same results? Please help and sorry if I post it in a wrong section!
Thanks :)

Thanks

This is exactly what I am looking for, however I need the facility to select/choose related content/nodes when creating content. is this available? or is there any other way to accomplish this?

Thanks in advance
SN

Per node?

Do you want to select related content per node? I don't currently have this functionality though would be willing to add it in. I would just need to figure out the best way to add it.

There is a module that lets you selected related nodes per node in case that is all you need. It has a tab on the node page and then you can choose the related nodes for that node. The module is called node recommendation: https://www.drupal.org/project/noderecommendation

If you decide that module isn't right for you and want a way to select related nodes per node using the Featured Content module, you can add a feature request here:
https://www.drupal.org/node/add/project-issue/featured_content

Good luck,
Kristen

TWO THUMBS UP.

Very well done indeed. everyone has said how great it is but I wanted to add that it is one of the cleanest codes I've ever seen.
Definitely donating to the sponsor. they are lucky to have you :)
Thank you

Sort nodes by number of common terms!

Hi there,

I can't understand, why there are still new related/recommended/similar modules and almost none of them has option to sort by number of common terms, which is the most needed here.

This is what I am talking about:

-> https://www.drupal.org/node/353133

Greets,
Szy.

Great idea!

I just added it as a feature request here:

https://www.drupal.org/node/719660

Kristen

Done

This is in the latest release.

Kristen

great module

I would like to suggest, that programmers and non-programmers give this module a spin.

A lot of TLC has gone into module:

- well thought out
- feature rich
- great documention
- easy and fast to apply

Thanks!

Thanks for the comment...

Kristen

Can you select the vocabulary?

I have my site built with two taxonomy vocabularies. One is a category (news, interviews, reviews, etc...) and another that is a tagging system where you write in the artist name that the post is about.

My question is that I'm trying to display links that relate to the Artists vocabulary and not the Category. Is this possible with your module?

Thanks!

Freetagging

Sorry for the delay... just seeing this. In the future, you may want to post questions at: https://www.drupal.org/project/featured_content.

If you are using a free tagging vocabulary, it would work like any other vocabulary. If you are using a custom field that is not associated with a vocabulary, then it wouldn't work.

Hope that helps.
Kristen

Cool!

This looks like a really nice module and a great addition. Looking forward to trying it out!

some problems

warning: array_intersect() [function.array-intersect]: Argument #1 is not an array in /var/www/html/amanda/sites/all/modules/featured_content/featured_content.module on line 167.

Try Dev

I noticed that error this morning... should be fixed in dev version once the cron makes it available at https://www.drupal.org/project/featured_content

Kristen

Praise

I have tried a number of 'Related Content' modules and disabled them because they did not offer the featrues I needed. This 'Featured Content Module', however, is unique. It solved my issues immediately, and I must say that the documentation is first-rate (not always the case with Drupal modules).

Highly recommended. Thanks for sharing... I couldn't see a 'Donate' link on this site so I have visited a few of your Google Ads sponsors!

J

Cool

Glad it is working for you...

Feel free to donate to the non-profit sponsor: NatureBridge. They are doing great things.

Thanks!
Kristen

Cool

Glad you are trying it out! You can post questions here, or at drupal.org, or email me directly... whichever you prefer.

Kristen

inquiry

Kristen,
WOW! great module.
I have a few questions - would you perfer them here or at Drupal?

thanks
JW

I'm a Speaker at DrupalCon Portland