ubercart

Drupalcamp Atlanta recently launched their new site for the 2010 Camp. I reviewed some of their features and found it to be a solid site. As the GVS team increases our focus on selling events with Drupal, I wanted to hear more about the backend of the site. So, I got in touch with Brent Ratliff who was the lead developer on the site, to find out how the site was built.

Adding Signups and Payment to an Event Site: UC Signup

In 2009, the site was a standard build relying mostly on Views and content types. For 2010 they needed all of the features from the previous year but also needed to charge an entry fee for the event, for individual sponsorships, as well as the ability to submit and vote on sessions. The Atlanta Drupal Users Group decided to base their 2010 site on the acclaimed 2009 Drupalcamp LA site that was released as a zip file. The LA code, updated with new module releases, handled the voting, some nice Views, helpful theme functions, context, and some of the "attendee logic," but not the e-commerce portion. Brent was familiar with using the UC Node Checkout module for building an event site, but ultimately decided to go with the Ubercart Signup integration module along with Rules and custom hooks to handle workflow. UC_Signup allows them to collect profile information from users during checkout and helps keep track of attendees using the Signup module. They also grant roles to users based on which products they have purchased.

Ezra Glidesgame has been writing a module to integrate the Signup module for managing event registration with the Ubercart e-commerce module: Signup integration for Ubercart (short name: uc_signup). The uc_signup registration process was designed to support a wide variety of use cases (one user potentially signing up multiple other users for different events, in different quantities) while still being easy to use. We wanted to see what users thought of the preliminary uc_signup registration process, so in June we ran a small usability test here at the Growing Venture Solutions office. The test revealed several subtle and interesting findings that applied to the uc_signup module, the Ubercart checkout process, and specific aspects of the client site's configuration.

First, some background on the project

AUSSIE provides professional development in the field of K-12 education. One of their services is to offer workshops around the country, with registration done through their website. Uc_signup is being written to give AUSSIE more control of the look and administration of their sign-up process, and internalize their events management, which is currently being hosted by Eventbrite. The improved Aussie site is scheduled to launch in August.

About our Usability Participants

We recruited 4 participants having the following profile characteristics:

• Two men and two women between the ages of 29-36
• All with general office experience and good computer proficiency
• All use the internet daily, with a range of 3 to 40 hours per week
• Internet purchasing comfort level: comfortable to strongly prefer
• Three of the participants had previously signed up online for classes or workshops