DrupalSouth Community Day 2025
This is the detail of sessions that has been provided by our presenters. See the schedule for an overview of the day.
Say hello to the AI Agent: your newest persona!
Keynote, sponsored by Salsa Digital
Akhil Bhandari & Julia Topliss - 9:05am - Top of the Cross
Non-technical
AI Keynote Personalisation UX
AI as your next UX persona? Salsa Digital unpacks what that actually means - no pitch, just perspective.
Discover how AI agents are becoming the newest UX personas, reshaping digital journeys with smarter, more adaptive, and more human-centred experiences. AI agents are emerging as a new kind of persona in website and UX design, not just abstract tools, but active partners in shaping user journeys.
Salsa Digital introduces the AI Agent persona concept to expand traditional persona frameworks, enable more adaptive and personalised experiences and open up fresh opportunities for designers to create smarter, more human-centred digital interactions today and into the future.
Reef Knowledge System: Personalising the user experience on GovCMS
David Flores-Condezo - 9:30am - Top of the Cross
Non-technical
Case Study GovCMS Personalisation UX
The Reef Knowledge System (RKS) curates data and information from across the Reef 2050 Integrated Monitoring and Reporting Program (RIMReP). The primary aim of the Reef Knowledge System is to serve as a first port of call for Reef intelligence, providing a comprehensive platform for integrating and sharing knowledge about the Great Barrier Reef.
Earlier this year, the legacy RKS site underwent a complete rebuild from the ground up to improve areas of usability, accessibility, and future scalability, ensuring the platform could grow alongside the needs of its diverse audience.
A major highlight of the rebuild was the introduction of personalisation on the site. Particularly, a recommendation engine was configured and installed to recommend content to users based on their browsing history. This presentation will take you behind the scenes of the RKS rebuild to explore the design and implementation process that brought this innovative approach to life.
The presentation will be of benefit to:
- Site owners interested in pushing the envelope with content personalisation on GovCMS SaaS
- Developers interested in integration approaches for a recommendation engine.
No technical expertise is required for this presentation.
Open Source Web Analytics for Drupal
Vladimir Roudakov - 9:30am - Orion
Technical
Analytics Data Performance Privacy
Let’s explore open source alternatives to Google Analytics for Drupal websites, highlighting how organisations can gain insights without sending their data to third-party providers. We will look at the benefits of using privacy-focused analytics solutions and why many teams are retaining control of their data.
The session will focus on Matomo, a powerful and widely adopted open source analytics platform, with a demonstration tailored for Drupal.
We’ll cover custom metrics such as tracking per-user role activity and capturing search results, showing how these features can provide deeper and more meaningful insights into site performance and user behaviour.
Seeing what they see: user research insights from the field (and what we keep getting wrong)
Maddi Collings - 10:05am - Top of the Cross
Non-technical
Accessibility Content Research UX
After hundreds of hours watching real people use government websites, you start to notice patterns.
This talk shares a few of the things users consistently struggle with—regardless of department or design system—and what we can learn from them. It’s not just about empathy.
It’s about fixing the stuff that gets in their way.
Visual regression testing: BackstopJS for the win
Marji Cermak - 10:05am - Orion
Technical
Automation GovCMS Performance Testing
How do you catch problems before they become public? How can you quickly identify the needle in the proverbial haystack? How can you demonstrate to the client that there have been no regressions in a recent feature or upgrade? Visual regression testing provides the answer to these questions and can be an invaluable tool for maintaining consistency and quality on sites.
In this presentation, the BackstopJS visual regression testing tool will be introduced. Attendees will learn how it can be incorporated into developer and release workflows to ensure that nothing has visually changed on a site.
A practical setup will be shown for GovCMS SaaS working with custom commands using ahoy. Attendees will see how to:
- Define effective test cases
- Prepare a reference environment for comparison
- Update Docker images to work with the testing tools
- Configure ahoy commands to trigger the test procedure.
This presentation will be of benefit to:
- Site owners who would like to easily review wide sweeping changes on their site
- Developers and project managers who want to improve their testing chops.
The presentation will be technical in nature and is best suited to a technical audience. However, there will be value for attendees who want to understand the principles and outcomes.
Drupal Jeopardy
Toby Wild - 11:00am - Top of the Cross
Non-technical
Community Education Game Interactive
The main section will be a game of Jeopardy based on Drupal topics. Four contestants would be picked out of the crowd to participate, everyone else watches along.
Will include: Acronyms, Famous Faces, Module Mania, Code Corner, GovCMS Central, Community Club.
Whoever wins the most points gets a trophy!
Content design systems: A whole of government approach to content
Emma Kelson & McGee Noble - 11:25am - Top of the Cross
Non-technical
Content Content Strategy Design Systems Governance
Many government jurisdictions face similar challenges in managing complex digital ecosystems made up often of hundreds of websites and services, managed by different teams with varying levels of expertise.
When this goes wrong, there is chaos for those managing the sites and worse still, for the users visiting them. Now, as AI tools proliferate, the stakes for this content chaos is higher.
How can we help Governments rein in the content chaos by creating structure and consistency for the business and for users and for AI? At Weave, we believe that a whole of government approach and documented content design systems are key to solving these problems.
In this talk, we detail the work we completed at Weave Content Strategy and Design to bring clarity, structure and a shared central source of truth to a state government’s digital presence through a Whole of Government content framework, content strategy, proposition, information model and content design system.
No code rules engine for Drupal automation and AI integration
Vladimir Roudakov - 11:25am - Orion
Technical
AI Automation Governance Workshop
This hands-on workshop introduces the ECA (Event-Condition-Action) module in Drupal, a no-code rules engine that helps site builders and administrators to create powerful automations without writing a single line of code.
Participants will learn the fundamentals of no-code automation with Drupal and ECA 3.0, including how the module supports Business Process Model and Notation (BPMN) standards for designing and visualising workflows.
We will explore two practical scenarios: modifying Drupal behavior through event-driven rules and creating new content dynamically based on user interactions.
The workshop will also demonstrate how to extend ECA with AI-driven capabilities, opening new possibilities for automated decision-making within Drupal.
Designing a starter theme
Murray Woodman - 12:30pm - Top of the Cross
Non-technical
CSS Frontend GovCMS Theming
What goes into building out a starter theme? What theme level tools can be built to help with accelerated site delivery? Drupal is about leveraging out-of-the-box tools and handling complexity. How can the theme layer make this a reality?
In this presentation, we will share some of the techniques and approaches which can be used for building out the backend of a starter theme. The following areas will be covered:
- Foundation theme selection
- The power of CSS Variables
- Components and Classes, breaking the BEM conventions
- Colour palettes
- Dark mode
- User Interface
This presentation will be helpful for those working on GovCMS SaaS, where the environment is a little more constrained. You will find out how to trick out the theme layer to build a more functional interface for ambitious sitebuilders. Drupal devs may also gain some insights into how a theme can be structured and organised for maximum flexibility.
Five Years Late, Still On Time: mentalhealthonline.org.au Drupal 8 to 11 journey
Alex Skrypnyk - 12:30pm - Orion
Technical
Case Study CI/CD Performance Testing
In 2018, Swinburne University commissioned the Mental Health Online platform — a Drupal-based service delivering evidence-backed programs, therapist–client interactions, and research capabilities. Development was completed the same year on Drupal 8, but for internal and business reasons the platform remained behind closed doors and used only internally for five years.
The challenge: keeping a large, complex platform (150+ modules, permissions, messaging, multi-user workflows) production-ready for half a decade without ever going public. Instead of freezing, the platform was continuously maintained and progressively upgraded — from Drupal 8 to 9 to 10.
Automated testing and CI/CD pipelines ensured every change was validated, while Behat and PHPUnit coverage safeguarded critical functionality. Rector accelerated code upgrades, with regression tests providing confidence at each step.
When the university was ready in 2023, the site launched immediately on Drupal 10 — stable, secure, and future-proof. Since then, the same practices have allowed it to be upgraded further to Drupal 11, proving the long-term sustainability of this approach.
During this session, we’ll walk through the processes and tooling that made this possible: how test coverage, CI/CD, and progressive upgrades can keep a complex Drupal project healthy and launch-ready for years — even when real-world delays get in the way.
Mad Libs meets Drupal
Alistair O'Neill - 1:50pm - Top of the Cross
Non-technical
Community Game Education Interactive
Its a session about Drupal but the blanks are filled in by the crowd, mad libs style: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mad_Libs
We will have the bones of a session, but it will be up to you to help us tell a story.
Whether it makes sense will depend on your creativity during the session. We will aim for some classics like nouns, verbs and look to through in some drupalisms too.
If you can think of a word then this session is for you!
Content Governance: Delivering Accurate, Accessible, and Trusted Information
Julia Topliss - 2:15pm - Top of the Cross
Non-technical
Accessibility Content GovCMS Governance
Clear, accurate, and accessible content is essential to building trust with citizens. But without strong governance, content quickly becomes outdated, inconsistent, or hard to use.
This session shows how to use Drupal (GovCMS) to keep content accurate, accessible, and trusted. This session will cover simple, actionable steps, a governance checklist and insights into tools you can use to help your team deliver content that people can rely on.
Building for the Future with Web Components
Brynn Briedis - 2:15pm - Orion
Technical
Accessibility Design Systems Frontend Web Components
Drupal’s Single Directory Components (SDC) open the door to a more modern, component-driven way of building frontends. But how do we take that even further by integrating Web Components — a browser-native standard for encapsulating markup, styles, and behaviour?
In this session, we’ll explore how Web Components and SDC can work together to create reusable, framework-agnostic building blocks that fit seamlessly into Drupal’s theming layer.
We’ll cover why Web Components are worth considering, how they align with design systems, and practical approaches for integrating them into a Drupal project. Along the way, we’ll look at real examples, common pitfalls, and tips for making sure your components are accessible, maintainable, and future-friendly.
You’ll leave with a clear picture of how to use Web Components with SDC to modernise your Drupal frontend architecture.
Unifying the UX pipeline
André Kakos & Matt Commons - 2:50pm - Top of the Cross
Non-technical
Design GovCMS Prototyping UX
Project outcomes are improved when the discovery, design and implementation phases are unified and working together. When your research, prototype, design and build tools are all working together, the process becomes a lot more efficient with iterative steps leading to better and faster outcomes.
In this presentation, such a toolchain will be demonstrated from technical and practical perspectives.
The following aspects will be shown:
- Design system with key components
- Colour palette abstraction for branding and accessibility
- Figma templates with strong alignment to the design system
- Figma prototypes capturing the information architecture
- Optimal Workshop leveraging Figma for quantitative and qualitative research
- Data analysis for iterative updates to design
- Drupal implementation for the rapid delivery of design
The presentation will be relevant for:
- Site owners who wish to understand the project lifecycle through the Design, Alpha and Beta stages
- UX designers who wish to see some practical use of tools
- Developers may gain insight into what UX designers do throughout their working day.
The presentation requires no technical background - just a passion for designing and delivering better sites.
The Anatomy of a 100 Lighthouse Score
Pat Roberts - 2:50pm - Orion
Technical
Accessibility GovCMS Performance SEO
Every site has a body - some are lean and lightning-fast, others a little sluggish and bloated. In this session, we’ll take a closer look at the anatomy of a perfect Lighthouse score and what makes a website truly healthy. From performance and accessibility to best practices and SEO, you’ll learn how to diagnose common issues, apply the right fixes, and get your Drupal or GovCMS site feeling fit, fast, and full of life.