Basic How-To Add Information On The TCARC Website

The TCARC site does not have one person to write all the articles, stories, speicial announcements, maintain the calendar or load photos to share with others. The new website has been designed specifically so that all members, and others in the ham community, can add "content" to the website directly.

Almost everything NEW that you want to add is called CONTENT-- categorized in major ways. Content can be something you write, picture, video, audio, event notice, etc..

One way to add new content is to use the menu on the left side. After login, the the username/password space goes away, and is replaced by menu under your login name. One of the menu items is titled "Create Content". Click that, and you will see in the main area, as a minimum:

  • Album-- Creates a picture album container to contain pictures. Up to 100 pictures per album. Later you can upload pictures to an album, but the first step is to create the album container to put them in.
  • Classified Ad-- obvious
  • Info Class-- General information about the Tri-City Amateur Radio Club, announcements, etc. Info categories at the moment are The New Ham Kit, President's Corner, Special Announcements, Testing/News/Events/, Area Repeaters, Join the Club or Renew, and this Website How-To. (Note: only the president can create President's corner, only the secretary can create meeting minutes thus on the Create Content menu, you won't see these.) Members can create Special Announcements and Event Notices
  • Forum Topic-- Forum Topics have two major classes (Info and Forum). Each are then sub-divided
    • Forum Class-- typical discussion forum with Forum categories like General, Newbie Questions, UHF/VHF, repeaters, HF yada yada
    • Image-- you can create, well really upload, an image (photo). Not really handy unless your intent is to embed it in another type of content. Albums are loaded differently, and much easier!!! Discussed below.
    • Poll-- you can create your own poll!!! Others can vote on your poll.

    A 2nd way to add content in the two major Forum Classes (Info and Forum) is within the class itself. The PRIMARY menu (not to be confused with the USER menu on the left) is those rectangular tabs across the very top-- Home, Information, Forums, Photos, Swap Meet and About. In either Info, or Forums, there is a link to the Create Forum Topic page which will let you post anywhere you have rights to post it. That is, you can be in the Newbie forum, create a new forum topic, and save it in the Competition forum. You don't need to navigate to the location bin to write something. As you create and save the content, you will choose where on the website to put it.

    • Photos (images, whatever you want to call them) that you want placed in albums are uploaded AFTER the album is created. 1st create the album, as discussed above. THEN, go to Photos on the Primary Menu (on the top). If you recently created the album, it will be on top, Click the album title and the album will be opened up. To upload picture files, click the Images Management link. Then there is an Upload button which brings up a directory navigator, and you use the appropriate Microsoft/Apple/Linux method to pick files. Yes, you can highlight mutliple files!!!! Upload a whole directory of files.... whatever. Once you have picked the files, you then need to hit the "Click here to start upload" and let 'er rip.
    • Comments-- for every piece of primary content, comments can be added. Down at the bottom of most things. For example, the latest President's Corner blog, when opened to the full detail, has a "add comment" link at the bottom of the main content.
    • Subscriptions-- most content, forum topics and such can be subscribed to. A subscription is simply a notification via email if the content is edited or a comment is added. Handy if you want to keep track of a certain item or subject. For example, you can subscribe to the Competition Forum, and if anyone posts to it, you get notified via email.

    That's the basics. There are many other content types, calendar entries, the rotor entries, pages, books and book pages. "Content Managers" can create and edit these other types. If you are interested in becoming a Content Manager, use the "Contact Us" menu item on the left menu, and send your request to the Webmaster. Also, there are Forum Moderators. They can delete inappropriate forum postings, edit postings, move things (re-categorize) etc. We need forum moderators to help police things-- send your request with which forums you are willing to help out on to the Webmaster through the Contact Us form.

    If you have any questions, please create a New Comment to this Forum Topic. The Webmaster has subscribed to this topic, so will be notified of the new comment and will respond.

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