The following pages cover some of the basic "one-shot" settings: the things you'll likely set at first, and not change later (or at least not often). Topics include the name and slogan of your site, the default front page, the name given to anonymous visitors, and the site's graphic Theme.
"Site information" refers to the name, slogan, mission statement, and footer messages that appear on your site, as well as the default front page, the email address your site uses for automated notices, and the name it gives anonymous visitors. All of these settings appear on one convenient form:
Navigation menu » Administer » Site configuration » Site information
You can set your site's name, slogan, etc. on the Site information form, but whether and where they appear also depends on your site's Theme. A Theme is a set of files that determine the overall graphic appearance of the site. Your Theme will set where the name and slogan appear, for example – or it may let you choose whether or not to have the slogan appear, or it may not be capable of displaying the slogan at all.
In other words, the basic appearance of your site is largely determined by 1) the information you input here in Site information, and 2) the site's Theme. See more at Configuring Your Theme.
Here are the fields on this form:
The name of your site.
Input an address that your site will use for automatic notifications, password requests, and so on. This should be an address that the chief site administrator checks often.
If your site's name is its title, its slogan is like a sub-title. Use this field for a short description of the site, or any slogan or message you want to appear alongside the site name.
If the site slogan is like a sub-title, the mission statement is like a sub-sub-title. Input something here if you'd like yet another identifying or greeting message. With many themes, the mission statement will appear not in the site's header, but at the top of main content, and only on the front page.
A message that appears at the bottom of the site. This is traditionally used to note the site's designer or developer.
This item seems a bit out of place on this page, but there it is anyway. Your site needs to place some name on anonymous visitors – for example, in logs that note visitors, or in comments if you allow anonymous visitors to leave comments. Here you can set what you like. "Anonymous" or "Visitor" are common, bland choices. Some sites use more interesting names (like those that place the label "Anonymous Coward" on visitors who leave comments without registering for an actual user name). It's all up to you.
You can conveniently set any page within your site as the front page that a visitor will see when heading to your site. For example, if you've created a page with the address '<your domain URL>/special_sale' and would like that page to greet all visitors, input 'special_sale' here.
See more here: Setting the Front Page
First, read this safety tip. Did you follow it? If so, you're ready:
You can, with a couple of clicks, change the entire graphical appearance of your site! Here's how:
Navigation menu » Administer » Site building » Themes
Here you'll see a number of Themes. These are Themes which your Drupal installation is able to find on its server, and is offering here for your consideration.
Note these columns:
Some sites want to give users the ability to choose a Theme, rather than display the same Theme to all visitors. Only those Themes which you've enabled, via the check box, will be available to users as choices.
Most sites, though, aren't concerned with that choose-your-own-appearance functionality; chances are you want to display one and only one graphical appearance to all users. Just enable whichever Theme you intend to use.
Here you select the one Theme that your site will use (or, if you're offering multiple Themes to users, the Theme that your site will use until a user chooses another one).
For most site owners, you'll just need to check 'Enabled' and 'Default' for the single Theme you want to use.
Themes that are enabled will present a 'configure' option here. Here's how it works:
You are able to configure default 'Global settings' that will be used for any Theme, as well as unique settings for any specific Theme (which will override the default Global settings).
Whichever you choose, here are the choices offered on the form:
Do you have a graphic logo you want to appear on the site? Here's where you direct the theme to display it (see instructions below on specifying the logo file).
Unfortunately, you're not able to specify the logo's exact position or size through these settings; the logo file needs to be "ready to go", and able to fit nicely into the space allotted for it by the Theme. Anything beyond that is a job for major editing of the Theme itself (see below).
How big should your logo be? It depends on the Theme you're using. Below are ideal logo sizes in pixels for a few common Themes you may have access to (information taken from http://drupal.org/node/120644 ):
| Theme | Width | Height |
|---|---|---|
| Bluemarine | 48 | 55 |
| Chameleon | 49 | 57 |
| Garland | 64 | 73 |
| Minelli | 64 | 73 |
| Pushbutton | 144 | 63 |
| Fancy | 80 | 80 |
If your Theme is not one of the above, you may require another ideal logo size.
If you've input these items into the Site information form, these are the settings that tell your site to display them.
If your site allows users to upload an identifying image, these settings instruct the Theme to display them.
If your site's Theme has a built-in search box functionality, this setting turns it on or off.
This search box, if supported by the Theme, will appear wherever the Theme directs it – in many cases, toward the page's upper right corner. This search box is separate from any other search box you may have have enabled in a block. Chances are you'll want this built-in search box enabled, or a search box in a block, but not both.)
This refers to the tiny icon that appears in front of the URL in a browser's address bar. Check this if you'd like the site to display this icon.
Here you can set the logo and shortcut icon for the Theme to use, should you choose to use those. Each item has a handy 'Browse' button so you can locate and upload a file from your computer.
This setting only appears on the settings for Global configuration, not for specific Themes.
Do you want posts by users – including you, the site administrator – to display a message "Submitted by <user name> on <date>"? If so, check the boxes for the types of node on which you want such messages to appear.
On a typical site, you might want such a message to appear on Blog entries and possibly on Stories, where the date and author are important. But you might not (to continue the example) want to have the message appear on Pages, which you may be using for static information like a company overview. It's all up to you.
Beyond the options offered here, editing a Theme is beyond what the Drupal site itself can do. A Theme consists of several PHP, CSS, and image files, all of which work together with Drupal to output an HTML document to site visitors' web browsers. Editing or creating a Theme requires knowledge of PHP and CSS, and probably creation of custom graphics.
If you need further customization of a Theme or have an idea for an entirely new one, talk to a designer about the work, or see the drupal.org Theme Developer's Guide.