News Roundup

Adimeo has published the replay of its 2025 WordPress vs Drupal debate. Experts compared each CMS on scalability, customization, and how they adapt to AI, headless, and accessibility. This session offers insights for teams weighing Drupal against both WordPress and newer CMS challengers.

The Drupal Association has announced Baddý Sonja Breidert’s return as Board Chair starting November 2025. She brings over a decade of leadership, including co-founding 1xINTERNET and organizing major Drupal events. Her focus will be sustaining community growth and supporting the Makers of Drupal worldwide.

Calibrate showcases Drupal AI 1.2.0-alpha, adding deeper AI automation into Drupal workflows. New features include Field Widget Actions, a Prompt Library, vector DB abstraction, and test mocking tools. While still alpha, it’s a strong preview of how Drupal AI supports content speed, scale, and consistency.

Drupak shares a practical guide for adding GitHub-hosted packages to your Drupal project via Composer. The method uses a VCS repository entry and supports versioning by tag, branch, or commit. Ideal for custom or private modules not on Packagist—just ensure a valid composer.json is present.

Drupal 11 introduces PHPUnit 10, which breaks some older tests. Alexander Shabanov’s migration playbook shows how to automate most updates, then fix tricky spots like data providers and outdated test patterns. The result: cleaner, future-proof tests that work across both Drupal 10 and 11.

Attico’s Volha Tsimaliak shares a step-by-step guide to building scalable design systems in Drupal. The tutorial covers design tokens, Single Directory Components, and multi-brand consistency. It demonstrates how Drupal teams can reduce costs, expedite delivery, and maintain design consistency across brands.

Christian ElWed shows how to boost Drupal site SEO with related content blocks. Using Views with contextual filters, you can dynamically display taxonomy-matched articles. The technique improves user engagement, internal linking, and search engine crawlability.

BinaryWorks will host a webinar on October 9 comparing Drupal 11 upgrades with WordPress migrations. The session targets Drupal 7 and 9 users facing end-of-life, rising costs, and security risks. Attendees get a side-by-side feasibility guide and a roadmap to make informed CMS decisions.

CanShield Digital highlights why digital sovereignty matters when Canadian organizations choose a CMS. Drupal offers sovereignty advantages as open source software that can be hosted with Canadian providers. The key takeaway: control depends not only on the CMS but also where and how data is hosted.

Box UK’s Joe Pilgrim explains why councils choose Drupal for digital transformation. Its strengths include WCAG-compliant accessibility, enterprise security, modular scalability, and cost efficiency. With open-source flexibility and proven public sector adoption, Drupal supports long-term citizen-first services.

Tag1 Consulting tested AI-assisted TDD on Drupal’s autosave_form module. AI generated tests and accelerated feedback, but manual debugging remained essential for quality. The takeaway: AI speeds development, but skilled oversight keeps results reliable.

DrupalCon Vienna 2025 runs October 14–17 at the Austria Center Vienna. The program features a new InfoSec & DevOps track, 100+ sessions, and four major keynotes. With Splash Awards and contribution days, it’s shaping up as one of Drupal’s most technical and collaborative events.

Imaxin joined DrupalCamp 2025 in Santiago de Compostela as a bronze sponsor. They shared takeaways on AI, accessibility, and headless Drupal. The recap was published in both Spanish and Galician, reflecting community roots.

Sponsorships are now open for DrupalCon Chicago 2026, happening March 23–26 at the Hilton Chicago. Core tiers like Presenting and Champion have already sold out, with limited spots left. Drupal Certified Partners get 10% off—apply soon, all packages are first-come, first-served.

DrupalForge has launched instant AI templates for Drupal in collaboration with QED42 and FreelyGive. These one-click sites demo AI use cases like OCR, SEO, and translation—no install needed. Perfect for testing, demos, or exploring Drupal AI with zero setup.

Iztok Smolic questions the myth of the 10x engineer. He argues consistency and integrity matter more than raw brilliance. The real multiplier? Building 10x teams, not chasing rockstars.

Kevin Quillen updates the Search API Solr Dense Vector module to support Drupal AI chatbots. It adds vector-based search for Solr 9, enabling RAG-style responses via indexed content. Developers can now integrate OpenAI or Ollama to build smarter, searchable chatbot experiences.

John Locke introduces Group Purl, extending the Drupal Group module with group-specific URL paths. It integrates with PURL to auto-prefix content URLs and adds Views filters, block conditions, and menu link context. Aimed at Drupal 11 sites, Group Purl streamlines navigation and content management for group-based projects.

DrupalCon Nara 2025 kicks off with a citywide Treasure Hunt on November 16. Teams will solve Drupal-themed and cultural challenges across historic Nara for prizes. It’s a fun, inclusive way to explore the city and start the conference in community spirit.

The DropTimes highlights Drupal and open-source community events for September 29 to October 5. This week includes automation workshops, design system webinars, and local meetups in Berlin, Atlanta, and Edinburgh. Developers can connect, learn, and share experiences through both online and in-person sessions worldwide.

Part 3 of Jeff Greenberg’s Unmanaged Files in Drupal series is here. This tutorial shows how to render unmanaged files through a custom block plugin with service injection and caching. Follow along now, and stay tuned for Part 4, where files will be rendered directly in Twig templates.

The Drupal Association’s Global AI Report 2025 shows AI has moved from experiment to mainstream, with nearly 80 % of organizations already using AI in daily operations. Use cases lean heavily toward marketing, content personalization, and efficiency automation—especially tools that reduce manual workload. But adoption still demands human oversight: respondents want control, transparency, and safeguards against AI doing critical tasks autonomously.

IT Care has released a beta of YMCA Website Services 11.1.0.0, now running on Drupal 11. The update modernizes the platform with Symfony 7, Single Directory Components, and Project Browser support. It also integrates Drupal’s new AI module to streamline editorial workflows and future-proof YMCA websites.

Ivan Zugec is going live on September 26 at 18:30 UTC to demo Webform embedding in Drupal. That’s midnight IST on September 27, with live site building and Q&A. Watch on YouTube, Twitch, or Kick.

Southwestern Ontario Drupal Camp opens for session proposals until September 29. The Oct. 24 event in Kitchener welcomes topics beyond Drupal—AI, SEO, UX. First‑time speakers and non‑Drupal talks are encouraged.

Drupal Trivandrum is hosting its next meetup on September 27 at The Millet Café in Uloor. Shibin Das will lead a hands-on session on performance testing using K6. It’s a great chance for local Drupalers to connect and learn together in a relaxed setting.

Open source gives enterprises more than cost savings—it gives them control and freedom from lock-in. DrevOps highlights Drupal and CivicTheme as models of secure, community-driven innovation. Why lease your future when you can co-own the ecosystem?

CKEditor has released updates to its Drupal modules, Premium Features 1.6.0 and Plugin Pack 1.4.1. The release adds Merge Fields with Drupal Tokens, inline CSS export for email, and dark mode for source editing. Drupal users also gain PHP 8.4 compatibility and new media embedding options.

Today’s the final day to submit a session proposal for DrupalCon Chicago 2026. The call for speakers closes at 11:59 p.m. Central, with all session types open—workshops, panels, lectures, and more. Diverse, community-focused proposals are encouraged, and accepted speakers receive up to two free registrations.

Nextide has joined the Vector Institute’s FastLane program to enhance AI in Maestro, its Drupal-based automation engine. The program gives Nextide access to mentorship and machine learning expertise to scale responsible automation. This move aims to expand Maestro’s AI-driven productivity benefits for organizations in Canada and worldwide.

Luisanny Carrasco from weKnow shares version-specific Drupal upgrade guidance. She reminds users that Drupal 8 and 9 are out of support, and upgrades are urgent. Planning ahead is key for Drupal 10 users before Drupal 11 becomes the new standard.

The Drop Times is featuring an article by Kelly Jacobs, a web developer at Kalamuna. He explores Drupal’s new Config Actions API and how it powers recipes with reusable configuration updates. The piece shows how this makes Drupal site building more flexible, predictable, and developer friendly.

Tamara Bondarenko from Drupfan has shared a tutorial on building forms with Drupal’s Webform module. It walks through installation, setup, and key features like conditional logic, exports, and email handlers. The guide confirms Webform remains Drupal’s most powerful solution for flexible, customizable site forms.

Akshay Devadiga at Specbee shows how to use the Views Data Export module in Drupal. It enables CSV, JSON, or XML exports from Views without custom coding, now updated for Drupal 10. A simple, efficient solution for reporting, migrations, and handling large datasets.

The InfoSec Tribune revisits Drupalgeddon 2—CVE-2018-7600—and the costly flaw in Drupal’s render system. One crafted request gave attackers full control via post_render, impacting thousands of sites. The lesson? Even years later, old vulnerabilities still haunt unpatched systems.

Dripyard is set to unveil its new premium Drupal themes in a launch webinar on September 30 at 11 a.m. ET. Expect live demos covering accessibility, landing pages, and Drupal-data integration, plus a tour of their design system and future roadmap. The session will be hosted by Mike Anello, with technical production by Stephen Cross. Attendees can register and suggest topics in advance.

Cheppers CTO Bálint Pekker shows how SDC and Storybook are transforming higher-ed websites with Drupal. By bundling styles, templates, and logic, SDC simplifies components; Storybook brings live previews and collaboration. The result? Less fragmentation, faster dev cycles, and stronger brand consistency at scale.

Christian Sanders of ComputerMinds shares a practical guide to rendering plugin blocks. He covers Views and Webform blocks, plugin IDs, and render arrays. The post warns of missing hooks, access gaps, and caching gotchas.

John Locke has added PHPUnit testing support to Drupal Flake, an experimental Nix-based dev tool. Unlike Docker setups, Flake runs Drupal locally with shell utilities, now including test helpers. The update, tested on Drupal 11.2, offers commands for module-specific and custom PHPUnit runs.

In Episode 521 of Talking Drupal, hosts Nic Laflin and John Picozzi speak with James Sansbury, CEO of Tugboat. They discuss how Tugboat automates deploy previews for Drupal pull requests and helps teams streamline QA. The episode also features the ShURLy module—a Drupal-native URL shortener.

Sergiu Nagailic has released Nichebench, a benchmark for testing AI models on Drupal 10 and 11. It evaluates code generation and knowledge accuracy using quiz tests and real Drupal tasks. The goal is to fine-tune an open-source LLM tailored for Drupal development and architecture.

QED42 has integrated Writer AI into the ADA’s Drupal platform. The new Writer AI module supports automated alt text and in-line AI tools for editors via CKEditor. It’s a real-world example of how AI in Drupal can improve both accessibility and content efficiency.

The PNW Drupal Summit 2025 still has limited sponsorship spots open. Available tiers include Platinum, Gold, and Video Sponsorship, with visibility perks through September 30. If your team wants exposure at a key community event, now’s the time to act.

Drupal AI 1.2.0 is now out with major updates. The release adds agent progress tracking, PDF ingestion, JSON outputs, and streaming tool calls. These features improve real-time feedback, structured integration, and content accessibility in Drupal AI.

Drupal EU Government Day 2026 is now accepting speaker proposals for its January 29 event in Brussels. The free, one-day conference brings policymakers and developers together to explore open-source solutions for government. Talks on AI, LocalGov Drupal, cybersecurity, and GovCMS are especially encouraged—submissions close October 15.

DrupalCon Vienna 2025 is inviting volunteers to serve as contribution mentors from October 14–17. Mentors support new contributors by guiding them through setup, workflows, and contribution day activities. No coding experience is required—just a welcoming attitude and a desire to grow the Drupal community.

The Drupal Association has named Molly Shenberger as its new Chief Revenue Officer. With two decades of experience in partner-led growth, Molly brings a strong track record from her time at Acquia. She’ll focus on expanding partnerships and revenue streams to support Drupal’s long-term mission.