Content Hub is a solution for syndicating content across multiple Drupal sites. By using Content Hub, you can distribute content across a network of Drupal sites automatically or manually. Content Hub works at scale and enables global enterprises to discover, distribute, and reuse content throughout their organization in a secure cloud environment.
This page includes the following sections:
How Content Hub works
Content Hub empowers content syndication for a network of Drupal sites.
As part of Content Hub operations:
- Publishers export entities from Drupal to the Content Hub service.
- Subscribers import entities from the Content Hub service to Drupal.
Content Hub can replicate the publisher’s content entities on each subscriber by exporting content along with its dependencies and configurations.
Features
The following table lists the key features of Content Hub:
| Feature | Description |
|---|---|
| Unlimited publishers and subscribers | Connect as many Drupal sites as needed, with no limitations on network complexity. Content Hub syndicates your content needs when your Drupal site:
|
| Automatic and manual syndication models | Syndicate content created on a publisher based on predefined rules, referred to as filters. In addition, you can manually select content that you want to import to a subscriber. |
| Full dependency tree calculation | Verify that all dependencies, including related entities and configurations, are automatically included when content is exported. This ensures that the subscriber has the entire content and dependencies. |
| Multilingual support | Publish content in any language and syndicate the translations. Use Acquia’s advanced multilingual support to manage translations imported to each subscriber. |
| Content moderation support | Use your existing content moderation workflows. Ensure that drafts are not syndicated until they are ready, and use Acquia’s advanced content moderation support to define the workflow state for the drafts after they are imported. |
| Extensibility | Use the built-in no-code and low-code features to achieve your business needs or use Drupal custom modules. Leverage Acquia’s full-featured API to build new integrations. |
Dependencies
Content entities often have dependencies on other entities in Drupal. These dependencies are calculated when content is exported from the publisher. This ensures that when a subscriber imports the content, it contains everything it requires to interact with the content as a native Drupal entity.
If a blog post content type includes a taxonomy term field, then any blog post containing a taxonomy term must have that term and its vocabulary listed as dependencies. Exporting the taxonomy dependencies along with the blog post helps the subscriber to gain access to everything it needs. For example, power any search facets or views that filter content by taxonomy.
To use Content Hub efficiently, Acquia recommends keeping the dependency tree simplistic. If dependency trees are complex, it might lead to issues where a single piece of content exports hundreds of other entities.
You must also prevent circular dependencies. A circular dependency occurs when an entity, Entity A, depends on another entity, Entity B, but Entity B also depends on Entity A. It often happens by accident, but it can make troubleshooting difficult. Content Hub attempts to identify these during the export process.
Configurations
In addition to content entity dependencies, the necessary configurations to recreate the entity on a subscriber are also calculated. When a content entity is exported, several configurations are considered. The configurations might include which fields are assigned to a content type, what languages are enabled on a site, whether there are dependencies that require certain modules to be enabled, and other related configurations
To use Content Hub efficiently, subscribers must have the same configuration as the publisher. To ensure that the content is imported correctly, Content Hub attempts to modify the subscribers’ configuration to match the configuration of the publisher.
Workflow
The following diagram depicts the processes of Content Hub:
Content Hub automates subscription updates from publishers to subscribers. Publishers create content on their websites using standard Drupal practices and workflows. This content is then exported to the Content Hub service that makes it available to subscribers. Filters can be created to automatically send new content and updates to subscribing sites, or content can be manually imported to subscribers using the Publisher’s Dashboard.
Each Drupal site in the Content Hub network owns the content it creates. This content can be shared with other sites in the network through the Content Hub service. Syndication from one Drupal site to another can happen manually or automatically through cloud-based rules or filters that regulate what content gets shared.