Colorado Soaring Association

WebsiteTips and Management

Notes for Website Users

Printing:

In the upper right corner of the content frame is a printer icon. This can be used to print a copy of just the content frame and is very useful for some documents. Sometimes you will see two printer icons. The second has "me" under it. This is because some of the pages are actually imported applications (like the schedule and membership list). In these cases the website printer icon does not know how to print the imported application. The Print Me icon is part of the imported application and will be able to print what is in the content frame.

Pictures:

Submit pictures to the CSA website using the following guidelines:

The width of a picture should be between 600 and 800 pixels
Please resize landscape (horizontal) pictures to no more than a 800 pixel width
Please resize portrait (vertical) pictures to no more than a 600 pixel width
Please provide information for a caption, especially for achievements (name, date, achievement)

Please submit pictures to the website photo manager: Neil Van Lieu.

News:

If you have a news item you would like posted, please submit it to the website news manager: Aland Adams.

Forums:

In general the forums can be read by by anyone. The CSA Members Only forum requires the CSA password for access. To create or reply to a topic in any forum you must register and then login first. Registrations have to be approved since all kinds of folks and web bots try to get access to forums and clog them up with stuff we don't want to read.

Website Content Management

Content and functionality for this website is managed through a web-based administrative interface. This interface is where pages can be edited, files and pictures uploaded and new functionality added. If you would like to participate in the ongoing content management and re-fresh for this website, please contact the website lead: Aland Adams.

CSA Document Requirements and Modification

CSA endeavors to maintain its document repository on this web site. So, documents available here are considered the "official" versions.

CSA documents must have a title, and a date of last revision on a title page, footer or otherwise.
Original documents may be in any editable format, with any naming convention when submitted to be posted
Posted documents will be retrieveable in PDF format and the names will end up being rather generic so that website links do not have to be modified when a new version is posted

If you want to add a new document to the repository, e-mail it to the CSA address ( csa@soarcsa.org ). The website lead will then have the CSA Board, or other appropriate individuals review and approve it. Contact the website lead, Aland Adams, to get the modifiable original. Make the desired changes. Then e-mail it to the CSA address. Again, the website lead will have the appropriate individuals review and approve it. Don't be surprised if it gets bounced back with suggested changes. We don't have a lack of opinions in this club, and we try to more or less run in a consensus fashion. The website lead will create the PDF file version of the document once it is approved and store the original on the website server as well.

Notes for Website Editors

Editing Pages

Font style and colors and other text attributes are maintained consistently across the website using css data (cascading style sheets). So it is important to follow some basic guidelines so that you don't inadvertently cause issues.

You should always have the web site open in a separate window so you can check how things will really look. Use the Apply button in the editor and Refresh the separate window to keep an eye on your work.
When using the internal editor do not use the Style and Font selectors. This is taken care of with the css definitions. The font will not "look" right in the editor, but will be correct on the web page.
Line spacing will look a little different on the web site. So use extra blank lines carefully. Again take a look at the separate window to see how things look.
Pasting in text that you have copied out of separate text editors like MS Word can cause a LOT of problems. When you do this a LOT of style and font information is pasted in a well. All of this overwrites what the css definitions are trying to do resulting in a messy looking web site. If you need to copy in text first paste it into a very simple editor like Notepad or vim which will strip all that pesky style stuff out. Then copy and paste it into the website editor and add the formatting you need like heading format, bold, italics, indenting, bullets, etc (again without using the Style and Font selectors).
If you need to copy in a document as-is, without conforming to the websites style (such as the membership application) open it in MS Word, save it as an "web page .html' file, then close Word. Double click on the file you saved and it should open in a browser. Now cut and paste from the browser into the website editor. This should rid the file of all the MS Word "stuff" that causes problems, but it will override the website style.
If you get in trouble and it really starts looking bad, it can be fixed. This is done by switching to Source mode and editing the raw HTML. Don't do this unless you really know what you are doing. Instead call someone, like Aland, who does and he will fix it for you.

Photos for the Website

Photos for posting should have a width of no less than 600 pixels and no more than 800 pixels (see above). Not only with this fit nicely, it is a fair compromise between viewable resolution and speed to view the page. If a picture is submitted outside of these guidelines it should be resized before uploading. There are three content management tools which are involved in the administration of photos:

File manager: This tool can be used to upload multiple image files. Be sure to navigate to the destination website folder before uploading. Generally thus should be one of the directories under "images/albums", weather pictures go in "images/weather". Otherwise contact the website lead to figure out where to put them. The file manager can also be used to move, copy and delete photos. HOWEVER avoid using these tools as the file manager does not show image thumbnails and does not delete, move or copy them. It is better to just upload the original to the proper directory and use the Image manager to delete the one in the wrong location. (Actually, the best thing to do is to AVOID USING THIS TOOL for image management)
Image manager: The image manager can be used to upload one image, delete an image or edit and image. The image manager also creates thumbnails for files automatically (these thumbnail are used in many other tools). If you delete an image with the Image manager it will also delete the associated thumbnail. If you uploaded an image with the File manager it is important to visit the directory you loaded it into using the Image manager. Doing this will cause the Image manager to create the thumbnails for the uploaded file(s). You can preform some rudimentary editing with the image manager. HOWEVER the image manager will not overwrite the original image file. If you don't rename it, it won't save it. (Actually, the best thing to do is do all editing before the image is uploaded, or copy it to your PC, edit it, delete the one on the website and upload it again.
Picture Album: One basic concept you need to know: The Picture Album tool does not copy or store copies of the actual images. It just stores a reference to the original image files and other associated data like the album it is in, and the captions it has. So, if you delete an image from an album, it only the album data and not the original image and thumbnail you see in the Image manager. Another concept is that you can have the same image in multiple albums, and this is done on the CSA website. There are two classes of albums: Home Page and CSA Activities. These are albums which display uniquely on the website and the images in them are transitory..
1. Home Page class:
  1. Home Page album: Images in this album are picked randomly for display on the home page. Before an image is removed from this album it should be added to the Home Page Archive album in the CSA Activities class. Before deleting the image from the Home Page album, copy its caption to the image added in the Home Page Archive album. Finally, some images may already be present in other albums. In this case it is not necessary to add the image to the Home Page Archive.
  2. Current Achievements album: Images in this album are displayed in a two column table on the Member Achievements page. Any image added to this page should also be added to the Achievements album for a historical record. Make sure to add the the same caption to the image in each album. The Current Achievements Album should contain no more than 6, preferably 4 images given the layout of the Member Achievements page.
2. CSA Activities class:
  1. All the albums on this page appear on the website Photo Albums page. As mentioned above,some of these albums have a special purpose. Otherwise they are generated as needed. If an image does not readily fit into an existing album, please contact the website lead to create an album. Please don't attempt to create a new album unless you really know what you are doing.

Conventions:

All images in the Home Page class albums must have a caption to explain what they are about. In the CSA Activities class each album must have a title and it is very desirable for each image to have a caption as well.
It is OK to put member names in captions, but please abbreviate the lase name (e.g. John D.)
It is good form to add some kind of date to the caption. It could be just the year, year and month or full date.

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