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YORC Web Site Info

Posted: Fri Jan 12, 2007 10:00 pm
by davew
Seems to have been some confusion over the new web site areas, so I thought I'd better answer some "frequently asked questions".

The new forum does not use the old membership number/password system that used to give access to the member's area of the web site. Forget the password that was sent to you with your membership cards, it's not used any more.

To register on the forum, click on register and fill in the details it asks for. You can use anything you like for a username and anything you like for a password although the username might be better if it gave us a clue who you are ! One of the details it asks for when you register is your membership number, filling that in makes it easier for me and the other admins to give you access to the complete forum as we can tell who you are if it's not immediately obvious from your username :-) Once you fill in the registration you will be sent an email with a link to click on to activate your account, you can't log in until you do that.

If you're concerned about registering due to your membership lapsing, don't be, the web site has never been intended as some sort of "value added" thing for members only, lapsed members will generally be given member access.

Until your registered name has been put into the member's group by an admin, you will only see the "Public Area" containing 2 forums at the moment. Once in the member's group you will see the other 8 forums available to members. One of those forums is the "Suggestions" forum, if you have an idea for the site (or the club for that matter) post it there.

The new forum will, for the most part, replace the current web site. There will still be a "public" site to give some information on the club and to contain content that can't be presented in the forum.

The forum gives you, the members, the ability to add to the web site and, perhaps, get to know other members and organise events and so on outside the "formal" club organisation. I've tried a number of different technologies including "Content management Systems" but the trial sites have been clunky to say the least and you need a knowledge of web site design to use them which kind of defeats the object so I abandoned that idea for the moment.

The forum will also replace the email list in the long term which will make the admin of this list a lot easier ! One of the drawbacks of this email system is that the information is gone, anyone coming along in a weeks time and joining the club won't see this email, a similar post on the forum will be there for as long as we want it.

All events will be announced and/or discussed on the forum, allowing you to ask questions, volunteer to set out or marshal or simply sign up for an event as a competitor.

The new image gallery is now linked to the forum and gives members the ability to upload images to any of the club events as well as being able to create their own albums that you can make public or keep private. Having images hosted on the club web site rather than scattered around the internet is important for the club's historical record.

There are still areas that I am working on to complete the transfer, the main one being the results. Currently these are a real pain to add/update after every event and I am working on an idea that will work with or similar to the forum. Hopefully this will be working in the next couple of months.