Drupal, Initial Configuration, 2006-12

After installing Drupal 5, you're presented with some initial configuration tasks.

Note: These are not instructions. They are notes of my experience meant to accompany existing instruction.

First User

This first user account you're asked to create is like root . I set:

Username
webmaster
E-mail
webmaster@domain

Because this account has infinite privilages, and little accountability because it is not associated with a specific person, its use should be avoided.

Our User

  1. Create a "regular" user account for yourself (as suggested by the Drupal installation's initial homepage)
  2. Create a "webmaster" role. Give this role all privilages to start. See "Permissions Online" for more information about the "webmaster" role.
  3. Logout as webmaster and login with your own "regular" user account

Clean URLs

I think Clean URLs are so important they should be our first real customization.

  1. Enable Apache's Rewrite module: a2enmod rewrite ; invoke-rc.d apache2 force-reload
  2. Set Apache's RewriteBase directive in Drupal's .htaccess (620/drupal/live/.htaccess) to: RewriteBase /
  3. Enable Drupal's Clean URLs: Administer, Site configuration, Clean URLs

Customize

Check out the log of customizations.