Many thanks and warm end of 2006 wishes

Thanksgiving has already passed (can you believe it?!?) and we are officially knee-deep in the Holiday season.

As hectic as these weeks may be, we want to be sure that you know how grateful we are for clients like you.  We are honored to work with you and wish you a peaceful and prosperous remainder of 2006.

Need help or have any questions during the last few days of 2006?  Give us a call at (281) 497.6567.

Important court ruling: Web site owners can’t be sued for comments

Gavel
Tendenci is built to facilitate communication, human connections and the sharing of ideas.  Tools like comments, ratings and TrackBacks can open up important dialog between your organization, your members and the general public.

A recent ruling by the California Supreme Court declared that Web site owners cannot be for sued libelous or defamatory comments written by site visitors.  Basically, if a discussion on your Web site gets heated, only the authors of those comments are held accountable.  (read more about the ruling here)

This is great news for organizations who want to keep an open, honest dialog going but also want to be in the clear legally.  Opposing points of view and a little heated discussion can be healthy,
but if things get out of hand and start veering towards libel it’s always best to err on the side of caution.

Ways to manage your site’s comments:

  1. Require a site administrator to approve a comment before it is posted live to your site
  2. Periodically check up on a comment thread and delete any comments that run against your organization’s online etiquette

Long story short – use your best judgment and contact your organization’s legal department for your specific situation, but definitely encourage your site visitors to take part in the conversation.

Thanks to Gulo Solutions Blog for the heads up on this!

IE7 and Firefox 2 Tendenci compatability

Newbrowsers

Change is good!  Everyone here at the Schipul office LOVES the new IE7 and Firefox 2 browser updates.  They incorporate great security and usability features that make our Internet lives simpler and happier.

Tendenci is compatible with both updated browsers, so be sure to download the newest versions of your favorite browser today!

Download Firefox here:  http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/

Download IE7 here:  http://www.microsoft.com/windows/ie/default.mspx

Updates are done – new functionality

Hey guys –

We finished the latest round of updates late yesterday afternoon.  Time got away from me so I’m just now getting a chance to create this post.

New features:

Collasable Form: So far we’ve only added this feature to the search pages in articles and users. When you view the page, it looks like normal.  When you enter search criteria and submit the form, the form fields are hidden.  This serves two purposes.  One, it shows an obvious result page, and two, it brings the content up on thep age.  See the Articles module on Schipul for an example, https://www.tendenci.com/en/articles/search.asp

Here’s a link that shows a submitted search for "marketing" articles.  Notice that the form fields do not display, https://www.tendenci.com/en/articles/search.asp?category=&searchcriteria=body&searchtext=marketing&submit=Submit

WYSIWYG editor:  Many of you have noticed that this update includes a new WYSIWYG editor.  I know, you just got used to the other one, right?  Well, this one is a better product, or so they say.  We seem to think so but you’ll be the ultimate judge.  More to come on specific details of the new editor in a separate post.

Thanks,
J

Picture this – pretty up your user profile

Want to put a face to a name?  Encourage your users to personalize their profiles on your site by uploading their photo.  This is a great way to ensure members can recognize each other at your next meeting or conference – no more staring at nametags all day!

It couldn’t be easier to upload an image to your profile:

  1. View your user profile
  2. Click the gray profile photo box (the one with the big question mark in it)
  3. Browse your computer for your image
  4. Click submit and voila – your profile just got friendlier!

Before:
Profile_pic_before

After:
Profile_pic_after

Keeping it simple with ‘News Rivers’

Your Tendenci site is now much more friendly to site visitors using cell phones and other mobile devices, thanks to our newly implemented ‘news rivers‘.

So what are news rivers?  They are simplified versions of your site pages that make it easy to scan and read all of the latest updates on your Web site using a portable device.

To access the news river page on your site visit http://www.yoursite.com/en/rivers (ie: www.onlyinhouston.org/en/rivers/).  It is a very simple concept, but makes all the difference for a mobile device user – check it out on your Blackberry today! 

Tendenci updates went out today

Hi guys –

We posted a complete update today.  The biggest change involves CAPTCHA, "Completely Automated Public Turing Test to Tell Computers and Humans Apart".  It is now available on the membership applications.  It’s also easier to implement on other forms. 

Here’s an example of CAPTCHA in use on our Tendenci contact form, https://www.tendenci.com/contact/.  If you’re interested in using it on your site, go ahead and complete  the contact form. Be sure to let us know what site and which form you wanted it added to.

Other updates include minor formatting changes to reduce the load on the servers.

Thanks,
J

Put a face with that name!

Photo_2 Did you know you can upload photos of your members to your site? Members (and admins) can view their profile and click the Upload your Picture! link.

Turn your members directory into a facebook! It’s easy and a great way for your members to get to know each other!!

Do you have a category called “Category”?

Does your Search Articles page show a category called "Category" lumped in with your real categories? Do you have a "SubCategory" too??

Category_1

These were set up during the development process to populate your category lists. Now that you have real data on your site, you can get rid of these generic category labels.

Just go to your Site Variables listing for your site and find the one for Articles Category. Change the default name from "Category" to a basic category you currently use on your site, such as "Member News" or "Community Events". Do the same for Articles Subcategory.

Use this same process to get rid of the generic categories in Directories.

Not sure how to change your site variables? Contact Schipul at 281.497.6567 and anyone here can walk you through it!