The launch of Drupal 11 marks a new era for the platform, focusing on improving the experience for developers, site builders, and content editors. In addition to the already well-known performance improvements and new tools, one of Drupal's most ambitious projects is Drupal Starshot, which aims to prepare the platform for the future while maintaining its relevance and competitiveness in the global digital landscape.

Key Features

Improvements in the Administration Interface

With a more responsive and accessible administrative interface, administrators have greater control over the site elements, optimizing content organization and publishing. This approach results in a smoother experience for users who need to perform daily administrative tasks while also offering greater flexibility in customizing Drupal's functionalities.

Single-Directory Components (SDCs)

For developers, Single-Directory Components (SDCs) is a revolutionary innovation. Now, UI components can be organized centrally in a single directory, simplifying the creation and maintenance of visual elements and layouts. This allows developers to create reusable components, optimizing user interface development. The modularity promoted by SDCs not only accelerates development but also makes the code cleaner and easier to manage.

Improved Performance and Scalability

Drupal 11 has been extensively optimized to offer better performance and scalability. With leaner code and the elimination of obsolete code from previous versions, the platform becomes faster and more efficient, especially for large sites that require high performance. Furthermore, compatibility with PHP 8.3 further enhances responsiveness and page load times, making Drupal an even more scalable platform.

Enhanced Content Moderation

For editorial teams, Drupal 11 brings an improved content moderation experience. The review workflow has been streamlined, allowing different versions of content to be reviewed, edited, and published without compromising the integrity of the original content. This is essential for large teams that need to manage multiple layers of approvals and edits before publication.

Improved File and Media Management

Another significant improvement is in file and media management. Drupal 11 includes support for media revisions and offers enhanced tools for sanitizing and transliterating file names. Additionally, images can now be saved in WebP format, reducing the size of image files without sacrificing quality, thus providing a faster and more efficient browsing experience for users.

Workspaces: Management in Separate Environments

The Workspaces module has become a powerful tool in Drupal 11, allowing users to create and manage different versions of content in separate environments. This facilitates the preparation of site updates in parallel with the live site, ensuring that content can be tested, reviewed, and approved before publication. For large content teams, this functionality is essential to ensure coordinated and error-free launches.

Recipes: Facilitating Site Creation

The new concept of Recipes introduced in Drupal 11 aims to accelerate site development by automating the installation and configuration of modules for specific use cases. Recipes eliminate the need to manually configure multiple dependencies, allowing site builders to quickly deploy common functionalities such as blogs, e-commerce, or events, saving time and reducing development complexity.

Below are some examples of Recipes and their applications:

• Blog: Configures modules for creating posts, comments, and categories, facilitating content publishing and integration with social media.
• E-commerce: Configures an online store with product management, secure payment integration, and checkout, ideal for selling physical and digital products.
• Events: Creates event pages with registrations and participant management, ideal for companies managing events and ticket sales.
• Product Catalog: Organizes a product catalog with filters and search options, ideal for marketplaces and sites that need to display large portfolios.

Drupal Starshot: The Future of Web Development

One of the most promising aspects of Drupal's future is the Drupal Starshot Initiative. The main goal of Starshot is to create the Drupal CMS, an optimized version of Drupal's core, which already includes common and necessary functionalities right from the initial installation. This includes integration with Recipes, the Project Browser, and Automatic Updates, which further simplify the lives of developers and editors, allowing for the rapid creation of sites without extensive configurations.

The Drupal Starshot aims to take the platform to new heights with a more user-friendly interface and functionalities that will facilitate use for both developers and new users without technical experience. By focusing on development speed and user experience, Starshot will transform Drupal into an even more competitive and innovative tool for site development.

What’s Coming Up?

The next version, Drupal 11.1, will bring important improvements, including:
 

• Improvements in Recipes: Expansion of templates and more optimized configurations, making it even easier to implement pre-configured functionalities.
• Enhancements in the Project Browser: Updates will make it easier to find and install modules directly in the administrative interface, improving user experience.
• Automatic Updates: More robust support to keep the core of Drupal and modules automatically updated, ensuring greater security and stability for sites.
• Launch of the Experience Builder: The initial version of the Experience Builder will allow for the visual creation and editing of site layouts, reducing the need for custom code.