drupal 9 and backwards compatibility: why now is the time to upgrade to drupal 8

Drupal 9 and Backwards

CompatibilityWhy now is the time to upgrade to Drupal 8

Angie @webchick Byron

Office of the CTO

Agenda

– Brief overview of Drupal

– History/evolution of Drupal releases

– Drupal 8, 9, and the future

– Practical advice for site builders

#1: Flexible framework

#2: Amazing community

#3: Cutting edge of technology

Drupal 8: Overview

Graphic courtesy of

themesnap.com

Modern, Object-Oriented PHP

• Cleaner

• Well structured

• Improved consistency

• Testable

• Design patterns

Improved Theming

• Twig library

• Simplified syntax

• Separation of logic + presentation

• Improved Security

• Template Inheritance and Overrides

Configuration Management

You can build REAL sites, out of the box.

Maturing contrib ecosystem

Drupal 8 is now the go-to release for most agencies

Numerous success stories.

A history of Drupal release management

Overview

Drupal 5

Jan 2007 - Jan 2011

Drupal 6

Feb 2008 - Feb 2016

Drupal 8

Nov 2015 - Drupal 10

Drupal 7

Jan 2011 - Drupal 9

Consequences

– “It’s done when it’s done” meant no one knew when to

expect new features / plan for migrations

– Little incentive for funded core dev = burnout

–Coupling new features with backwards compatibility breaks

limited innovation in core product

– “We’ll break your code, not your data” = people often stayed

on release until EOL, then faced painful upgrade path

D8 Semantic Versioning: New capabilities every 6 months

Drupal 8.2.0

October 5, 2016

• Content Moderation*

• Settings Tray*

• Date Ranges

• REST API++

Drupal 8.3.0

April 5, 2017

• CKEditor++

• New Status

Report

Drupal 8.4.0

October 4, 2017

• Media API

• Layout API

• jQuery/Symfony

Drupal 8.5.0

March 7, 2018

Layout Builder?

Demo Install?

Workspaces?

Drupal 8.1.0

April 20, 2016

• Migrate UI*

• Big Pipe

• Tours

• JS Testing

*With* Backwards Compatibility!

https://dri.es/making-drupal-upgrades-easy-forever

Introducing “LTS” releases / “security fixes only” stage

Innovation through “experimental” modules

Benefits

– Predictable release schedule that both end users and core

developers can plan and organize around.

– Site builders can acquire powerful new functionality without

reinventing site.

– Opportunities to get end-user feedback and evolve features

over time (vs. being “stuck” with whatever shipped in 8.0.0).

– Drupal 9 becomes just a normal “minor” release, with

backwards-compatibility layers dropped.

Drupal 9

Drupal 9: When? Here are the pre-requisites:

https://www.drupal.org/node/2608062

Putting into practice

#1: Know the release schedule.

https://www.drupal.org/core/release-cycle-overview

Supported release

Supported releaseDevelopmentAlp

Y1 M2 M3 M4 M5 M6 M7 M8 M9 M10 M11 Y2 M2 M3 M4 M5 M6 M7 M8

#2: Keep abreast of forthcoming changes.

https://www.drupal.org/list-changes/drupal

#2: Keep abreast of forthcoming changes.

https://groups.drupal.org/core

#3: Understand what backwards-compatibility means.

https://www.drupal.org/core/d8-bc-policy

#4: Read the release notes for “gotchas.”

e.g. https://www.drupal.org/project/drupal/releases/8.4.0

#5: Preview the goals for 8.5.0 and beyond

https://www.drupal.org/core/roadmap

Migrate Media Layout API-First Workflow

Outside-In Out-of-the-Box JavaScript

Framework

Automated

Updates

But, these things don’t happen without help!

#6: Get involved!

https://www.drupal.org/core/roadmap

• Stable migration path

• oEmbed (e.g. YouTube) support

• Media Library

• JSON API

• Automatic Updates /

Improved Composer Support

• Layout Builder

• Workspaces

• Full-Site Previews

• Demo Content + Theme

• React vs. Vue vs. Web

Components vs…

#6: Get involved!

https://www.drupal.org/getting-involved

Design /

Theming

Automated

tests / QA

Accessibility

Peer Review

Project

Management

Documentatio

nArchitecture

HTML / CSSJS User

Experience

Testing

But I’m still on Drupal 7!

If it’s working for you, that’s fine! (Until Drupal 9.)

But if D8 offers features you want, consider earlier adoption.

Monitor the contributed modules you need.

https://www.drupal.org/project/issues/contrib_tracker

Test the migration path.

https://www.drupal.org/docs/8/upgrade/upgrading-from-drupal-6-or-7-to-

drupal-8

So, don’t delay; try Drupal 8 today!

https://www.drupal.org/8

https://www.drupal.org/docs/user_guide/en/index.html

https://api.drupal.org/api/drupal

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