Find answers to some frequently asked questions you may have about creating your site in Drupal.
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All font colors are standardized across the site. There is no way to add other font colors.
Font colors will automatically adjust based on the background color of a page or design component. This ensures all fonts meet color contrast standards for accessibility.
All font sizes are standardized throughout the site. The font sizes are based on best practices and standards for web accessibility.
The text component allows you to add Lead Text, which uses a larger font size and line height than body text. Its use should be limited to the top of pages, to bring more emphasis to introductory content.
Use headings to structure your content - do not use them as design elements.
You cannot add a video to the hero region of a page at this time. You can add videos via the text editor or the video component to your layout builder page.
When you link to a URL that goes to a site that is not on a .gov domain, your link is considered an external link. The external link icon will appear automatically after your link text. The icon indicates to a user that they will be taken to an external site.
When you preview your page in its “draft” state, the background will be pink.
If you do not want your content to be constrained to the right of your left menu, then when you create a page, you will want to make sure you select Group node (Menu Page) as the node type. This will allow regions below the first section of your page to appear at full-width.
If you would like for your content to be constrained to more of a 2/3 region of the page (such as this FAQs page you are currently on,) then select Group node (Page) when you create your new page.
Once a page type is selected, you will not be able to convert it to the other style of page.
- Go to the /nodes page of your site.
- You can view all content there.
If you want to only see your pages (not updates, alerts, or vacancies,) you can use the Type drop down to select Page. Hit Apply to show all of the pages.
- Go to /nodes of your site.
- You can use the Published status drop down to look for all unpublished content.
- You can use the Moderation state drop down to sort your content by drafts, ready for review, and more.
- When you have selected what you want to see from the drop down(s), hit Apply to filter your content.
You can delete your page by selecting the Delete button on the top of your page.
It is a best practice to make sure your page is in the Unpublished moderation state before you permanently delete your page.
If you don't see the button on your page, you may need to reach out to someone on your team who has an elevated permissions role. Learn more about roles and permissions.
At this time, you will have to delete each page individually.
- Go to /nodes
- You can use the Published status drop down to look for all unpublished content.
- You can use the Moderation state drop down to sort your content by drafts, ready for review, and more.
- When you have selected what you want to see from the drop down(s), hit Apply to filter your content.
Use the Edit button to access the region of your page where this can be changed.
- Use the Edit button to access the region of your page where this can be changed.
- Look for the Metatags region.
- Collapse the Favicons & touch icons dropdown section.
- Under Basic Tags, there is a Description field.
- Delete the [node:summary] text that appears there, and enter your meta description.
What is a meta description? It is a brief and concise summary of the page's content that is a maximum of 160 characters in length. The description meta tag may be used by search engines to display a snippet about the page in search results.
If you want to make updates to your live page, but don’t want your updates to be publicly visible yet, change your published page to Draft. This will allow you to keep the page live, but work on updates to the page before publishing your new version. To come back to the in-progress draft, choose the Latest Version button.
Pages and updates cannot currently be scheduled to publish, but it is ticketed in our backlog.
Sites for directorates, divisions, and offices have a standardized menu structure. All menu links will need to be nested within a section of the menu.
Site menus cannot be hidden.
- Go to /Edit
- Go to URL Alias
- Uncheck Generate automatic URL alias
- Once that is unchecked, you can update your URL.
- The system will automatically redirect your old URL to your new URL.
Your link will not break. When a URL is edited, the system will automatically redirect your old URL to your new URL.
When you need to add a hyperlink to your text or design component, you will want to first search the Beta site to find your link. In the text editor, the hyperlink symbol looks like a chainlink. Other components will have URL fields. Simply begin typing the page title or URL in the URL field and results will begin to populate.
As more content moves to Beta, there will be more links for you to choose from.
We recommend searching by page title rather than URLs. Using internal links is important because it will help reduce broken links. If the internal page you are linking to changes or moves, your link will automatically be updated by the system, so the link will not break.
- When you look for a link in our link finder, you are only searching content that lives on the Beta site.
- Check if the URL you want to link to begins with beta.nsf.gov. If it does, it should be findable. If it begins with nsf.gov, you will not be able to find it via the site search and you will have to add the full URL manually.
- Content continues to be added to the Beta site, so more and more pages will be available to link to each week.
Use the Layout button on the page you want to make updates to.
Once you create a section with a chosen column structure, you won’t be able to change that section to a different column structure.
Instead, add a new section with the column structure that you want, and move any components you have created into your new section. You can then delete the old section.
Layout builder pages allow you to drag and drop components.
You can’t move sections around, but you can move individual components between different sections and columns.
When you are on the layout builder page, place your mouse cursor over the component you want to move. Your cursor will become a Move Pointer. Click and hold to drag and drop your component to a new section or column.
- Place your mouse cursor over the component you want to move.
- Your cursor will become a Move Pointer.
- Click and hold to drag and drop your component to a new section or column.
It is normal to see some additional white space around components or sections when building your page.
To remove the white space and see what your page will look like closer to its published state, select Save Layout.
If you are in a draft state, you will see a pink background behind your content.
No, it will not.
If you choose a two-column layout and only put content into one column, the empty column will remain empty when the page is published.
For landing pages
The full-width backgrounds are available in sections below the left navigation menu on a desktop view.
For interior pages
Make sure you create your new page as a Menu page content type.
- Go to Configure section, and then check Display section at full browser width
- Then choose a background color from the Section Background Color dropdown.
- Dark blue
- Light gray
- Light blue
Check out this content specs cheat sheet. You can also learn more about each component individually.
You can add headings, tables, images, videos and text via the text editor to your tabs or accordions.
No, you aren’t able to add a component into another component. You can add headings, tables, images, videos and text via the text editor to your tabs or accordions.
- Create a CTA Component.
- Only fill in the Link URL and Link text fields and choose Primary button as the link style.
- Some components may already include heading fields.
- You can add a Text Component above any component to add a heading.
- If you put your heading in the Section Heading field of the text component, you will create an H2 heading. If you need another heading style (H3, H4,H5,) then go to the Format dropdown and choose the heading style you need to create the proper structure for your page.
- In a multi-column layout, an optional section will appear above your columns. You can place a Text Component there and add a heading to the text component.
We do not currently have a slideshow/carousel component available.
Some character limits are enforced by Drupal that will be noted in help text in the system.
Visit this page to learn more about character limits in components and more.
A hero image is a large, decorative image at the top of your page.
Hero images are responsive, which means the image will adjust as the size of a user’s browser or screen increases or decreases.
This can lead to parts of your image being cropped out. That is why it is best to think of hero images as decorative elements to add visual interest, rather than a way to convey information.
Because hero images are responsive and adjust to the size of a user’s screen, you do not want to add an image there if the whole image needs to be seen in order to be understood.
If you want a full image to be shown, such as a graphic or an image with people, add an Image component to the top of your page.
While this is a creative decision, you can find an alternative image for the hero image that is more decorative, or you can forego a hero image altogether and add the image somewhere to your page, either via an Image component or via the Text editor.
Hero images are required for directorate, division and office landing pages. The image selected as the hero will also show in image teasers throughout the site.
Organization landing pages
An organization landing page is the main page of your directorate, division or office site.
Because an organization landing page also contains controls to manage other aspects of your site, not all roles will be able to edit this landing page.
If you don't have access to edit your site's landing page, contact an author in your group who has a higher level of permissions, such as an Admin or a Content Publisher. Learn more about roles.
- Select the Edit button on your landing page
- The text added to the Mission Statement field will populate the text at the top of your landing page. 500 characters is a recommended length. Links and headings can also be added to this region.
Not all roles will be able to edit your organization's landing page. If you don't have access to this, contact an author in your group who has a higher level of permissions, such as an Admin or a Content Publisher. Learn more about roles.
- Text component
- Call-to-action (CTA)
- Featured program
- Featured content
At this time, you can choose between a one-column or two-column layout for new sections added to your landing page.
Full-width color backgrounds can be added to a site’s landing page. The full-width backgrounds are available in sections below the left navigation menu on a desktop view.
- Go to Configure section, and then check Display section at full browser width
- Then choose a background color from the Section Background Color dropdown.
- Dark blue
- Light gray
- Light blue
There may be certain placeholder content on your layout builder page that will be visible when you edit your layout. The placeholders are there to note dynamic content regions or other fixed components, such as the Updates component, that may populate when your page is published. The placeholders will help you to design your layout with those fixed components in mind.
Adding an update
An Update is a content type that allows you to feature content on your landing page.
- Go to Nodes > Add New Content > Group node (Update)
- Add a title to your update.
- Add your content to the text editor.
- You can add headings, images, video, links and files to your update.
- You will not be able to add any components to your update.
- Select the group type from the Type dropdown.
- Start typing the name of the site to add where you want your Update to appear.
When you select a type from the Type dropdown, you will only be able to add that update to similar group types. For example, if you select Organization, you can add the same update to other organizations, so you can create one Update that could then appear on your directorate, division and office landing pages.
- To add an update across multiple groups/sites of the same type, click on the Add another item button and a new field will appear.
- The fields are constrained to the group types, so for example you will only find organizations populating in the organization field, and not other group types.
- If you select Initiative, you can share the update with other initiatives, but you would not be able to share it with organization group types.
- Updates appear near the top of your landing page in a box titled “Updates.”
- They are featured in reverse chronological order, with the most recently published updates appearing first.
- Up to two updates will show, with a “View All Updates” link will automatically populate to take you to a listing page of all of the updates.
Pages and updates cannot currently be scheduled to publish, but it is ticketed in our backlog.