[documentation] Sharing content/users between Drupal sites (was Re: multi site docs)

[Laura Scott]

On Oct 5, 2006, at 1:55 PM, Boris Mann wrote:

> Please...the term "multi-site" refers ONLY to Case 1 -- nothing
> shared, just running on the same codebase.
>
> If this is a HOW TO for *sharing content*....that is a whole other
> tutorial, and is not officially supported (although pulling together
> the info would be great). As I hinted at earlier, you can do sharing
> content without multi-site...it's ALL done at the database layer.
>
> So...I think it should in fact be titled "HOW TO: Sharing
> content/users between Drupal sites"...making no mention of multi-site.

-1 to this idea.

Multisite has been used to mean at least 3 different approaches --  
different databases, same database, hybrid. That is what people will  
be looking for. To deliberately avoid using the word out of a desire  
for diction purity would, in the end, make the handbooks a little  
less usable by making the content a little less findable.

I could see how it could be part of a larger section on sharing  
content, where then feednode approaches, publish/subscribe, and other  
ideas would also be addressed. It should all be in the same area,  
imho. But having multisite covered in one area, and sharing content  
somewhere else altogether, would make no sense to me -- nor, I  
imagine, most d.o users.

I think the best documentation will address user needs as being task- 
oriented, as opposed to organized by functionality or terminology  
exclusively.

Consider an auto manual. How do you check your clutch fluid? A strict  
function-oriented manual would have an explanation of under-dash  
controls in one area. Now you can pop the hood. Another area will  
have an explanation of where all the dipsticks and reservoirs are.  
Now you can spot the clutch fluid reservior. Another area of the  
manual will explain the engine fluids. Now you can understand the  
importance of clutch fluid. Yet another area will tell you how to  
remove the cap. Perhaps another area will offer "best practices" on  
how to do things like check fluids. Some other area yet explains that  
you don't want to check such fluids when the engine is hot. Yet  
another area will tell you just what level the clutch fluid should  
be. Maybe another area will describe the kinds of tools you should  
have on hand.

OR

The manual has an area on owner maintenance. One section covers it  
all. Ah, there's the part on clutch fluid. Right there are all the  
essential pieces of info, from all these different /functions/ of the  
car, pulled together in a way so the person can do the task. (Can you  
tell I had to deal with precisely this on my car recently?)

Back to Drupal handbooks.... People will be looking for ways to solve  
a problem, most likely. For example, "I have seven sites that are  
related somehow. How am I going to configure this?" They /might/  
search for "sharing content" but odds are they've heard or read about  
multisite, and could very likely use that term, too. However they  
search, my feeling is that the results should lead them to an area  
with all of it. To have people search for multisite get only one of a  
half dozen or more approaches, with maybe a mention to refer to some  
totally different area of the handbooks, would be like the first auto  
manual above -- accurate, perhaps, but not very handy for a handbook.  
Like it or not, "multisite" is an important keyword for a large part  
of content-sharing tasks.

If I'm preaching to the choir, please consider this a friendly rant  
to the spheres of the universe.

Laura