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Fingerprint module and server - bringing settings dumps to Drupal

Senior Developer
Aug 05, 2010

Fingerprint is part of ModuleCraft. A project we started to raise awareness and funds for a set of awesome Drupal tools for the community. If you haven't heard about it go check it out. To show you that we have the determination and the knowledge to go trough with all our promises, we already started developing some of the tools. The first wave was the Cardgame, and now here's the second: For some time now we have the ability to represent some of Drupal's settings in code with Features. As time goes by, more and more modules integrate the necessary hooks and get all the advantages of being exportable. We saw in this the ideal tool to make a configuration dump for Drupal, a bit like the crash report with all the settings that you can get from most desktop software. But fingerprint is more than that: it exports all the settings in a searchable and easily readable format: XML. This format is not for importing or backuping, but it gives you the ability to search similarities and differences in two Drupal site, to find bugs, best practices or changes that happened to your site.

The system is flexible, so XML is just the first export format that had been implemented, one crazy idea we have is to store it in a Non-relational database for easy searching and analysis. We've set up a free public fingerprint server for the community of which the basic functionality is and will remain free for all to use (e.g. fingerprint uploading for bug tracking, or just sharing your configuration with the community). Later we'll be adding private fingerprints to our server as a premium feature (that won't be free since these fingerprints will not be benefiting the community). You can get your hands already now on a premium subscription if you donate to the documentation+ fundraising round at modulecraft.com (that's the premium service you get no matter how much you donate for the documentation+ fundraising round). We have a lot of good ideas for this project, and I'm sure you have too. So help us decide the future of this project by voting and contributing your ideas at the ModuleCraft Fingerprint page. Or download a copy at Drupal.org.

Kornel is a dedicated software engineer. In the Pronovix he spends his time architecting and developing Drupal-related services. He is a proud member of the International and Hungarian Drupal community, having contributed several modules and core patches. Kornel is enthusiastic about the web, programming and open source technologies, his thirst for knowledge doesn't stop at the computer: in his offline life he is interested in fitness, nutrition and neuroscience.

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