We're pleased to announce a brand new Drupal module...

...but first, the reason we created it:

No matter how appealing an online service is, users and developers alike always feel frustrated when their noses bump up against walls.

Facebook users feel it when they receive email messages notifying them that they've received Facebook messages... without saying what those messages contain. LinkedIn users have felt it when they try hunting for a news feed for their own LinkedIn Answers.

And Second Life users feel it when they want to find some way to connect their in-world activity in some way with the rest of the online world; with a few limited exceptions (and to their credit, Linden Lab is working hard to expand them), that can be an exercise in frustration.

Maybe we can help change that.

Introducing the Second Life framework, a free Drupal module that allows scripts within Second Life to interact over the web with applications running on a Drupal web site.

This is an enabling module, built for developers. It allows you to create new Drupal modules with cool Second Life-integration functionality, but doesn't add new functionality in and of itself. It's built to interact with scripts written in LSL, the Second Life scripting language. (We built it as part of a larger project within SL; more on that as it develops.)

The download package includes a sample module and a handy Second Life client emulator. (It lets you test your work even if you aren't running Second Life. That reduces development time and lets you write modules for SL even if your LSL scripts aren't ready yet.)

The module was created by Khalid Baheyeldin of 2bits, our Drupal programmer of choice for brilliant coding. (Khalid is starting to take on mythic qualities. The other day, we mentioned to a friend who moves frequently in Drupal circles that we were working with Khalid. "Ah," the friend said, his eyes widening slightly. "'The Hammer.'" Apparently we aren't the only ones who think there isn't a Drupal problem out there that Khalid can't crack.)

He worked closely with LSL whiz Catherine Winters as they braved the idiosyncracies of LSL and mapped out the protocols needed for Drupal and Second Life to talk to each other.

We have our own cunning plans for employing this module, but we're eager to see how the community puts it to work. Exposing SL activity to the rest of the web? Bringing blog content interactively into SL? Using Drupal as a database for an SL script?

We hope this module will work alongside efforts like SLFeed to help break down the barriers that separate avatars from the wider world of the world-wide web. There's some amazing stuff going on in the walled gardens of the online world; it's time some of those walls came down so we can all have a look.

And if you're working with Drupal and Second Life, drop us a line. We'd love to know what you're up to.

Links: 

• The Drupal project page for the Second Life framework
• Khalid's announcement of the release 

User-based sites like Vancity's ChangeEverything.ca thrive on participation. And there's a lively community creating changes and blogging about them... which is a tribute to the community, to the site's compelling concept and to the work of community animator Kate Dugas.

Now Vancity wants to take participation to the next level.

Every community site has a large, often-untapped base of what are sometimes called "lurkers"; according to usability guru Jakob Neilsen, they're the vast majority of users. By giving them a quick, simple way to make a meaningful contribution, we think we can start them on their way up the participation ladder.

And the way we're doing that is a new feature called Nudge, which is being released today as a free open-source module for Drupal. (You can download Nudge here.)

It's programmed by the go-to guy for great Drupal module creation, Khalid Baheyeldin of 2bits.com, and it works like this:

• When you see a blog post or change on ChangeEverything.ca, and you'd like to encourage the author to keep working on it, you click on the Nudge link below that post or change.
• The author gets an email message letting them know you're nudging them, along with an optional custom message from you.
• And you get the satisfaction of knowing you've given someone a little encouragement (and perhaps a gentle push forward).

There's an obvious appetite out there for small-scale participation (witness the popularity of a feature like "poke" on Facebook, which is like Nudge on the surface, but lacks Nudge's use of context and personalization). And it may well be that one of the tricks to getting people to start climbing the participation ladder on your site is to make the first rung as low as possible.

As Neilsen says, "The lower the overhead, the more people will jump through the hoop."

Nudge lowers the overhead for initial participation, but there's an added bonus: the encouragement it gives people to contribute more richly with blog posts and changes.

If you're looking to give participation on your Drupal-based site a Nudge, check out the module. And let us know how you're using it.

For a while now, folks like Google, MyYahoo! and Netvibes have been vying to be your home page. They've made it easy to create a custom page crammed with blog headlines, news updates, weather forecasts, the latest Hollywood gossip and more – whatever online info happens to catch your fancy.

The competition has been fierce... but every alternative has its little idiosyncrasies, tiny things that can drive you bat-spit crazy. 

While all of this has been going on, the open-source community hasn't been napping. Take the folks who develop modules for Drupal, the content management system we've used (happily and enthusiastically) in several projects so far.

Last month, Ayman Hourieh posted a tutorial for creating a drag-and-drop portal interface in Drupal. And now comes a new Drupal module called MySite:

MySite pages are designed to let users create a personalized summary of the site. As such, the MySite module duplicates the functionality of tools like MyYahoo! and Google's personalized homepage.

The module allows registered site users to create a MySite page that contains content from throughout the site. For sites that use the Aggregator module, users may also add feeds from external web sites to their MySite pages.

BarCamp Vancouver last weekend was inspiring and inspired.

I caught John Ounpuu's introduction to Sutori, a site that gives consumers a place to share stories of customer satisfaction and, probably more often, dissatisfaction. James Sherrett previewed the intriguing AdHack, which will allow people to upload and publish their own ads for products they love... and reap the benefits if the companies behind the products like what they see.

Kate Milberry walked us through the history of tech activism, the wonderful Dethe Elza explained how you can wield Python to warp OS X to your will, Alex explained how you can use tagging to do the same thing to the entire world, and I offered seven tips for better tech presentations. For us the day ended early, but I gather from the blog posts I've read out that there was plenty more where that came from.

With so many conferences geared to monetizing this and finding venture capital for that, it was great to see something organized out of the sheer love of what emerging digital technology can do for people. Congrats to everyone who made this happen.