Let's Install an Orchard "Module"

Orchard CMS has "modules" that you can install. Some interesting, many not so much. Here's a quick walk-through showing some images of when I recently installed the YouTube module.

Click on the Modules menu item under Gallery in the left-hand administrative navigation.

The list of available modules shows:

I'll select the "YouTube Field" module and click the Install link:

Now the "module" shows under "features" (don't ask me why - it doesn't make sense).

And from there it needs to be enabled.

 Now you have to add it to a Content Part, which is found under Content Types...

Then click the Content Parts button.

Then select the specific content item you want to edit, I'll edit the Blog Post item.

Now we have to Add the new module.

Give the new module (here referenced as a "field") a name and save it.

Now when you add a new blog post you'll automatically have an option to add a YouTube video URL and the module will automatically embed it into the post for you.

So, where does that leave us? Exhausted, that's where! That is a tremendous amount of work to just embed a YouTube video. As anyone who uses YouTube already knows, after you upload a video you are automatically presented with both a URL *and* sample HTML code to embed the video in your page. A much simpler solution would be to just embed the HTML code in your blog post.

Dear Orchard team: If this is CMS-For-Dummies - *PLEASE* make it simpler. Install is easy. Page updates are easy. Setting up a blog is easy. Anything beyond that seems like way more work than it should be.