Composition over Maintenance: Building Repeatable Drupal Showcases with Convivial and Recipes
Time: Thursday 19th November 11:20-11:50
Track: Non-technical
Showcase sites are often created as standalone projects. As the underlying platform evolves, each showcase must be updated separately, turning useful demonstrations into an ongoing maintenance burden.
This presentation explores a recipe-driven alternative. Instead of maintaining permanent copies, we define each solution as a collection of composable Drupal Recipes and apply them to a fresh installation. Recipes can package content models, configuration, branding, navigation, search functionality and realistic demo content while remaining reusable and independently replaceable.
The same approach can produce distinctly different solutions, such as a public library, local council, healthcare clinic, university, cultural institution or community services portal. Each site can have its own identity and functionality while sharing a well-maintained foundation.
Convivial provides the evolving Drupal base for this implementation, but the broader idea applies to any platform that needs repeatable, up-to-date demonstrations. By separating the foundation from the solution definition, recipes make it possible to rebuild showcase sites instead of repeatedly porting updates—creating a faster path from a reusable platform to tailored, sales-ready experiences.
This presentation explores a recipe-driven alternative. Instead of maintaining permanent copies, we define each solution as a collection of composable Drupal Recipes and apply them to a fresh installation. Recipes can package content models, configuration, branding, navigation, search functionality and realistic demo content while remaining reusable and independently replaceable.
The same approach can produce distinctly different solutions, such as a public library, local council, healthcare clinic, university, cultural institution or community services portal. Each site can have its own identity and functionality while sharing a well-maintained foundation.
Convivial provides the evolving Drupal base for this implementation, but the broader idea applies to any platform that needs repeatable, up-to-date demonstrations. By separating the foundation from the solution definition, recipes make it possible to rebuild showcase sites instead of repeatedly porting updates—creating a faster path from a reusable platform to tailored, sales-ready experiences.
Speakers
Andrey Simonov
I am Drupal developer at Morpht, working with Convivial and GovCMS projects.
Focusing on reusable site architecture, automated delivery and practical ways to build tailored solutions on a shared Drupal foundation (Convivial).
Focusing on reusable site architecture, automated delivery and practical ways to build tailored solutions on a shared Drupal foundation (Convivial).