Administation Help
Introduction
This website administration system has been designed to be a simple to use as possible. The BeamWeb system is database driven for easy use and security. It offers the ability to edit most website information using a simple form entry based system without the need of any knowledge of web systems. The system is designed so that all Staff, Governors and PTA members can update their sections of the website easily.In order for someone to be able to modify the websites content they need to have a valid login user account. When setup this login account gives the user a list of roles they can perform on the website. Roles include: "adminPta", "adminGovernors", "adminPupil" etc. The user needs to have some "admin*" role in order to be able to perform any adminisration on the website.
The Administration features are seperated into a number of separate modules. The main modules an administration user can access are:
- User Management: This provides for management of the user accounts.
- News Management: This provides the ability to add, edit and delete news items.
- Calendar Management: This provides the ability to add, edit and delete calendar entries.
- Document Management: This provides the ability to manage the formal documents stored in the system.
- Showcase Management: This provides the ability to manage "Showcases" of pictures.
- Link Management: This provides the ability to add, edit and delete links for to websites.
- Page Managment: This provides the ability to add, edit and delete web pages from the website.
- Statistics: This provides information on the usage of the website.
Website Features
The primary purpose of the website system is to provide better communications between the school and parents. It also provides a means for storing and managing the public school documents. The website system provides a number of special features to assist in these areas. These include:- User account ability for website administration and parents.
- Ability for many people to add information to the website in an easy manner.
- Simple calendar system that many people can add events to.
- The calendar can be easily cut and pasted into a newsletter document. This saves staff having to maintain a separate calendar for the newsletter.
- Simple news system to add news items and class notes.
- Automatic usage of email to send out emails to all interested parties on news events or new school newsletters etc.
- Storage of documents current and past versions in editable formats such as Microsoft Word.
- Automatic conversion of documents to PDF format on new document uploads.
- The ability to upload a set of pictures quickly and easily as a showcase of school work or events.
- KidsZone area providing a set of educational or general links for children s web sites.
- Shared website links page allowing the easy sharing of useful website links relevant to the school.
- Ability to easily edit web pages on-line using a simple to use web text editor.
- Optional ability to send out SMS text messages to users on special events (such as emergencies). This is a chargeable service.
- Database driven system for ease of management and use.
General Administration Usage
Once the user has been allocated an administration capable login account they can access the administrative features of the website by logging in to the system. Once logged in web pages can be directly edited. Further administration functions can be accessed by clicking on the "Admin" button on the main menu.Each separate administrative page is laid out in a similar manner. At the top is the site navigation menu-bar. At the left is a set of operations the user can perform. At the centre is the main information view or edit area. A number of the operations require a particular data entry selection to work with. This can be selected using "select" buttons within the list of data entries in the central window. All of the data entry items have extra help information that is shown when the mouse cursor is allowed to "hover" over the text field in question.
Most of the administrative pages allow you to list, view, add, edit and delete entries from the database by using the left hand operation buttons. Each of these operations will bring up a new page with the appropriate information or a simple form to enter data to the system. Some operations will present the user with a file browser to allow upload of files from their own local computer.
User Management
The User Management facility provides the ability to add, edit, enable and delete user login accounts on the system. Only users that have the "adminUsers" role can perform this function. Non "adminUser", users can add their own login accounts by using the "Create New Account" link in the left hand panel. These users will not have any administrative roles by default and so cannot perform any administration on the website.When the main User Management page is accessed the user is presented with a list of all of the system users. The left side panel provides a set of operations under the "Function" title that the user can perform. Some of the operations, such as "Edit User", require the user to select a user on which to perform the action. Users are selected by clicking on the "Select" columns checkbox.
The usage of the fields is described below:
| Field | Required | Description |
|---|---|---|
| Name | yes | This is the full name of the user. It is used when sending emails to the user or listing the users account. |
| Enabled | yes | This enables the user for login to the system. If disabled the user cannot login to the system |
| User Name | yes | The is the user login name. The user uses this name to login to the system. It must be a unique name. It is conventional to use the users email address as their user name but any name can be used. On adding a new users, the system will return an error if the user name is already in use. |
| User Password | yes | This is the password the user will use to login to the system. |
| Send Emails | yes | The system will send emails to the user on particular events. The typical events are: A new news item is added to the web site or a new newsletter is added. |
| Email Address | yes | This is the email address of the user |
| Postal Address | no | This is the postal address of the user |
| Telephone Work | no | This is the work telephone number of the user. |
| Telephone Home | no | This is the home telephone number of the user. |
| Telephone Mobile | no | This is the mobile telephone number of the user. If the SMS text message feature is enabled, this allows SMS text messages to be sent to the user on special, perhaps, emergency news items. |
| Roles | yes | This is a list of the roles the user is allowed to perform on the website. |
The user roles are:
| Role | Description |
|---|---|
| admin | This role provides overall administrative functions. |
| adminPta | The user is a PTA member. This allows them to edit the PTA pages and add PTA news items and calendar items. |
| adminPupil | The user is a Pupil member. This allows them to edit the Pupil pages and add Pupil news items and calendar items. |
| adminGovernor | The user is a governor. This allows them to edit the Governor pages and add Governor news items and calendar items. |
| adminUsers | Only users with this role can manage the users accounts on the website. |
| adminDelete | Only users with this role can delete items from the website. This is for safety as once an item has been deleted it cannot be recovered. |
News Management
This facility provides the ability to view, add, edit and delete news items. Each news item has a title, a category and a description. The categories are listed in a simple to use selection box. Whenever a new news item is added, an email will be automatically sent to all users that requested emails to be sent to them. The system will only show the most recent 20 news items.Calendar Management
This facility provides the ability to view, add, edit and delete calendar items. Each calendar entry has a title, category, description and start and end dates. The description field is optional. The main calendar date is the "Start Date" field. The "End Date" field can be left empty unless the event carries on over multiple days. The date fields can be filled in using the pop-up month and day selection boxes or a, simple to use, pop-up month calendar can be accessed using the calendar icon to the right of the date entry field.The "View Calendar For Newsletter" operation allows the viewing of the calendar in a manner that allows it to be easily "copied and pasted" into a conventional word processor.
Document Management
This facility provides the ability to view, add, edit and delete documents. The document system allows the uploading of the master documents in standard document formats. The document system will automatically convert these documents to PDF format so that users can easily view the contents. Both the master and PDF forms of the document can be downloaded from the website. Each document stored has a version number. When documents are updated, the system keeps the past versions available for access. This keeps a "paper" trail of document changes available.All documents have a title, a category and an optional description to go along with the actual document. The system can work with documents in a number of master formats, the main ones being:
| Microsoft Word | *.doc | Microsoft word processor document |
| Microsoft Excel | *.xls | Microsoft spreadsheet document |
| OpenOffice Writer | *.odt | Open Office word processor document |
| OpenOffice Calc | *.ods | Open Office spreadsheet document |
| Adobe Postscript | Adobe postscript documents |
The document admin interface provides the following functions:
- List All: This operation displays all of the documents on the system.
- Edit Document Info: This operation provides the ability to edit the document information such as the title and description.
- Upload New Version: This operation allows the user to upload a new version of an existing document. The current document will remain available and the new document will have an incremented version number.
- Upload New Document: This operation allows the uploading of a new document to the system.
- Convert to PDF: Normally the system will convert a document to PDF format on uploading. Sometimes in very busy periods this may fail. This button provides the ability to manually convert the selected document to PDF format.
- Delete Document: This operation will delete the document from the system. Only users with the "adminDelete" role can do this.
- Upload Newsletter: This operation is a short cut for uploading a new Newsletter. Newsletters are uploaded as new versions of the same document.
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| Title | This field provides a title for the document. |
| Category | This is the category the document is in. General is for most standard documents. There are also categories for policies and governors documents. |
| Description | This field is for an optional document description. |
| File Name | This is the file path name of the document on your computer you want to upload. The "Browse" button will pop-up a file selection dialog in order to choose the appropriate file. |
After the document has been uploaded to the system, it will be converted to the industry standard PDF format automatically. This will take a little time.
Showcase Management
The showcase system provides the ability to set up a showcase of pictures, with optional descriptions, for school events or pupils work. The admin facility provides the ability to view, add, edit and delete showcases.Each showcase has a title, a description and a date for the showcase. Adding a showcase is a two stage process. First you add the new showcase using the "Add showcase" operation, then you add sets of pictures to the showcase using the "Add Pictures" operation. When adding a new showcase you will be presented with the following fields:
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| Title | This field provides a title for the document. |
| Category | This is the category the showcase is in. |
| Description | This field is for an optional description. |
| Date | This field is for the date of the showcase. |
The "Add Pictures" operation is implemented using, what is called, a Java applet. This requires the installation of the Java system on your computer if not already present. The Java applet provides the ability to view and upload multiple pictures at a time from your computer in an easy manner. If the Java system is not installed on your computer you will still be able to upload pictures, but only one at a time.
The basic usage of this picture browser is as follows:
Click on the "Browse" button to bring up a file selection dialog. This allows you to pre-select a set of picture files for upload. You can use "CTRL-A" to select all of the picture files in a directory. Once the set of images is pre-selected, you are presented with a list of the pictures together with information on them. Clicking on the title of these pictures will show the actual picture in the top right hand side. Pictures can be removed from the selection or rotated at this stage. Once you are satisfied with the pictures you wish to upload and add to the showcase, click on the "Upload" button.
All of the selcted pictures will be automatically rotated and scaled to 640x480 resolution and then uploaded to the website.
Link Management
This facility provides the ability to view, add, edit and delete external website links. The actual links are mainly displayed in the Links and KidsZone pages on the website. All links with the category "KidsZone" are shown on the KidsZone page.When adding a link you will be presented with a form having the following fields:
| Field | Description |
|---|---|
| Title | This field provides a title for the link |
| Category | This is the category the link is in. "KidsZone" links will appear on the KidsZone page. |
| Description | This field is for an optional description. |
| Url | This field is for the actual Internet URL for the link. (Eg. "http://www.myschool1.org.uk") |
| Icon File | This is an optional field that is used to upload a picture to use as the icon for the link. The picture will be automatically rescaled to 128x96 pixels. |
Showcase Management
The showcase management facility provides an easy means of setting up showcases of pictures. It has a, simple to use, Java based image viewer and uploader that allows you to upload multiple images quickly and easily.Page Management
When an administrator, with an appropriate role, views a sites web page, the user can edit the web page directly.The left hand panel will present a list of actions they can perform on the page. This facility provides the ability to view, add, edit and delete HTML web pages on your website. This system uses a sophisticated, but simple to use, on-line web page editor to allow the user to easily manage their website pages. You can use the "Add Page" function to add a new page. If you do this you will be presented with a form to enter the pages name. This will create a new black page and add a simple link to it in the currently viewed page. You can then edit the new page as required.
The page editor works like a conventional word processor application and has menubar along the top that provides access to most of the features. The main features are:
Typing: Generally you can simply type in the content to the text editor.
Save: When you have completed the editing use the "Save" button (Looks like a floppy disk) to save the content.
Format: Use the format selection to change the format of an area of text. This can be used for headings etc. There is also Bold,Italic and underline buttons, Font selection and size fields and justification buttons.
Link: You can add a link to an internal page or an external website using the "Insert/Edit Link" button. This will bring up a dialog box to enter the links details. Use a protocol of "local" for local pages. The "Browse Server" button can then be used to select the internal page to link to.
Pictures: Pictures can be uploaded and inserted using the "Insert/Edit Image" button.
There is more information of the FckEditor that is used at: http://wiki.fckeditor.net/UsersGuide