Acquia Certified Drupal 9 Site Builder¶

Take introductory Drupal courses¶

Customers can access Drupal preparatory courses on Acquia Academy at https://customers.acquiaacademy.com/learn for free, and review them as many times as you like. If you are in an Acquia workshop or training program, you may be assigned the courses that you need to complete to obtain your certification.

Public, instructor-led Drupal training is available for purchase by the seat, and private training is available for purchase for groups of up to 10 people. Visit Professional Services Product Guide to review our available public and private Drupal training.

For Site Builders, we offer the following to get you started on your Drupal journey:

• Drupal Site Building

After taking the course, build a small website on your own to reinforce the concepts learned in the course.

Gain practical experience¶

Completing the courses may not fully prepare you to take the certification exam. You need some practical experience to attempt the exam. We recommend that you gain practical experience by working on at least 2-3 real-life projects.

Perform self assessment¶

Once you decide to take the exam, we recommend that you study the domains and topics covered by the exam and their relative weight. You should also perform a Self Assessment of your own areas of strength and weakness vis-a-vis the domains/topics covered by the exam blueprint. This is a recommended starting point for experienced Drupal Site Builders.

Use labs and study guide¶

Based on your self-assessment, you may need to gain knowledge and experience in some domains or topics. The best way to learn Drupal is by working or experimenting with it. Follow the suggestions given for preparation in the Preparation section and refer to the external resources given in the Study Guide section.

Register for and take the exam¶

At this stage, you should be ready to take the exam. Follow the instructions for registering for an exam.

How to use self assessment¶

We suggest you perform a skills and expertise self-analysis with respect to the domains and topics listed in the blueprint. The blueprint lists test objectives (topics) for each domain. Rank your skills on a scale of 0 to 10 against each test objective (0 for absolutely zero knowledge or exposure and 10 for complete mastery).

• Topics with 8+ score are your strengths.
• Topics with a score of 5 to 7 will need some preparation.
• The ones below 5 may require a lot of preparation, or guided instruction.

You may use the following table to carry out your self-evaluation.

Acquia Certified Drupal 9 Site Builder self assessment table¶

Domain	Topic	Your Score (1-10)
1	Understanding Drupal
1.1	Demonstrate the ability to explain the distinct and differentiating features of Drupal and understanding of Drupal Terminology
1.2	Given an example of a page layout, determine what is content versus a block
1.3	Demonstrate an ability to troubleshoot problems related to content, configuration and maintenance
2	Content modeling
2.1	Demonstrate ability to model content using content types and vocabularies
2.2	Demonstrate ability to configure and manage comment types and comments
2.3	Demonstrate ability to configure and manage block types and blocks
2.4	Demonstrate ability to configure and manage contact forms
2.5	Demonstrate ability to configure and use multilingual content and interface
2.6	Demonstrate ability to configure and manage menus, menu items and menu blocks
2.7	Demonstrate the ability to configure and use Rich media in content using Media module
3	Site Display
3.1	Demonstrate the ability to control the display of content across various regions of the site using the block system
3.2	Demonstrate the ability to provide different presentations of content entities (like nodes, comments, user profiles, terms, etc.) for editing or viewing
3.3	Demonstrate the ability to to create, manage and display lists of content using Drupal views
3.4	Demonstrate the ability to build layouts of content using Layout Builder
4	Site configuration
4.1	Demonstrate the ability to use the various options related to site configuration like account settings, content authoring, development, search, site and system settings, media
4.2	Demonstrate the ability to use the configuration and synchronization options to import, export, compare configuration across environments
4.3	Given a scenario, demonstrate the ability to configure user accounts
5	Contributed Module and theme management
5.1	Demonstrate the ability to add, update, and remove contributed modules
5.2	Demonstrate the ability to add, update, and remove contributed themes
5.3	Identify ways of community participation and reporting issues
6	Security and performance
6.1	Identify security issues resulting from site configuration
6.2	Identify performance issues resulting from site configuration

Knowledge resources¶

Supplementing introductory Drupal training with documentation and online resources is a good idea.

We provide a list of online resources and documentation for each learning domain in the Study Guide section of this document.

Labs and case studies¶

Finding sufficient practical case studies covering exam topics can be a challenge. Here are a few ideas and suggestions for finding case studies for your preparation:

Review several (3 to 5) Drupal 9 projects that you or your team has worked on in the past year. Review the content types, field settings, display settings, vocabularies, blocks, menus, and views used on the sites.

For each project, study the following:

• What are the Content Types for the site?
• What are the fields and field settings for each Content Type?
• What are the Displays configured for each Content Type? Are there any Custom displays? If so, how and where are they used?
• What Vocabularies are defined? Are they controlled or uncontrolled? How is the Taxonomy system used?
• How many Custom blocks are used on the site? Are there any Custom Block Types defined? Are there any custom fields in the blocks? How are they used on the site?
• How many Menus are defined? Are there any Custom Menus? How are the Menu items managed? Where are the Menus used on the site?
• List all the Views used on the site. For each View, check the Displays, Format, Fields, Sort Criteria, Filter Criteria, Contextual Filters and Relationships. Check how views are used on the site.
• List all the Custom Modules enabled on the site. Check the functionality added by each module.
• Go to the Configuration Settings page of the site. Check the settings made under all the available options. Check the settings made under People, Content Authoring, Development, Search and Metadata, RSS Publishing, System, Media, Regional and Language Settings.
• Go to Extend. Enable modules under Multilingual section. Check the different configuration options newly available under Language settings and Content type configurations. Play around with the settings to build a bi-lingual or a multilingual website.

Once you study the projects as above, for each project, ask questions:

• Why are the configurations the way they are?
• What can be changed or improved?
• What are the issues or support requests raised by the client?
• What changes were made to initial configuration and why?

Drupal user guide¶

Check out the new Drupal User Guide for understanding key concepts.

Topic-specific reference material¶

1. Understanding Drupal & Working with a Drupal Site

1.1. Demonstrate the ability to explain the distinct and differentiating features of Drupal

1.2 Given an example of a page layout, determine what is content versus a block

1.3 Demonstrate an ability to troubleshoot problems related to content, configuration and maintenance

Topic	Link
Understanding Drupal	https://www.drupal.org/docs/understanding-drupal
Drupal Version Numbers	https://www.drupal.org/docs/understanding-drupal/understanding-drupal-version-numbers
Drupal System Requirements	https://www.drupal.org/docs/system-requirements
Drupal General Concepts	https://www.drupal.org/node/19828
Administering a Drupal Site	https://www.drupal.org/docs/administering-a-drupal-site/getting-started-with-drupal-administration
Managing Content on a Drupal Site	https://www.drupal.org/docs/administering-a-drupal-site/managing-content

2. Content Modeling

2.1. Demonstrate ability to model content using Content Types and Vocabularies

2.2. Demonstrate ability to configure and manage comment types and comments

2.3. Demonstrate ability to configure and manage block types and blocks

2.4. Demonstrate ability to configure and manage Contact forms

2.5. Demonstrate ability to configure and use multilingual content and interface

2.6. Demonstrate ability to configure and manage menus, menu items and menu blocks

2.7 Demonstrate the ability to configure and use Rich media in content using Media module

Topic	Link
Planning Data Types	https://www.drupal.org/docs/user_guide/en/planning-data-types.html
Planning Content Structure	https://www.drupal.org/docs/user_guide/en/planning-structure.html
Content Types	https://www.drupal.org/docs/user_guide/en/content-structure-chapter.html
Blocks	https://www.drupal.org/docs/user_guide/en/block-concept.html
Contact module documentation	https://www.drupal.org/documentation/modules/contact
Drupal Multilingual Guide	https://www.drupal.org/docs/multilingual-guide
Working with Menus	https://www.drupal.org/docs/user_guide/en/menu-concept.html
Setting up Content Structure	https://www.drupal.org/docs/user_guide/en/content-structure-chapter.html
Media Module	https://www.drupal.org/docs/8/core/modules/media

3. Site Display

3.1. Demonstrate the ability to control the display of content across various regions of the site using the block system

3.2. Demonstrate the ability to provide different presentations of Content Entities (like Nodes, Comments, User Profiles, Terms etc) for editing or viewing

3.3. Demonstrate the ability to to create, manage and display lists of content using Drupal Views

3.4 Demonstrate the ability to build layouts of content using Layout Builder

Topic	Link
Views User Guide	https://www.drupal.org/docs/user_guide/en/views-chapter.html
Working with Views	https://www.drupal.org/documentation/modules/views
Working with blocks	https://www.drupal.org/docs/user_guide/en/blocks-chapter.html
Layout Builder	https://www.drupal.org/docs/8/core/modules/layout-builder

4. Site Configuration

4.1. Demonstrate the ability to use the various options related to site configuration like account settings, content authoring, development, search, site and system settings, media

4.2. Demonstrate the ability to use the Configuration and Synchronization options to import, export, compare configuration across environments

4.3 Given a scenario, demonstrate the ability to configure user accounts

Topic	Link
Managing your site configuration	https://www.drupal.org/docs/configuration-management/managing-your-sites-configuration
Managing User Accounts	https://www.drupal.org/docs/user_guide/en/user-chapter.html

5. Module and Theme management

5.1. Demonstrate the ability to add, update, and remove contributed modules

5.2. Demonstrate the ability to add, update, and remove contributed themes

5.3 Identify ways of community participation and reporting issues

Topic	Link
Finding and installing a contributed module	https://www.drupal.org/docs/extending-drupal/installing-modules
Extending Drupal	https://www.drupal.org/docs/extending-drupal
Installing themes	https://www.drupal.org/docs/extending-drupal/installing-themes
Evaluating a contrib module	https://dev.acquia.com/blog/how-select-drupal-modules-part-3-evaluation-tips
Ways of community contribution	https://www.drupal.org/contribute
Reporting a problem	https://www.drupal.org/node/314185

6. Security & Performance

6.1. Identify security issues resulting from site configuration

6.2. Identify performance issues resulting from site configuration

Topic	Link
Secure configurations for Site Builders	https://www.drupal.org/docs/security-in-drupal/secure-configuration-for-site-builders
Drupal Performance improvements	https://docs.acquia.com/cloud-platform/performance/
	https://docs.acquia.com/cloud-platform/performance/#cloud-perf-drupal-core