eLanguages - resource

General

Resources are the building blocks of the eLanguages site. Resources are used to represent all the different system objects that can be put together to build a webpage on the site, from the page itself to a single paragraph of text.

All resources share a number of common properties. For example, they all have an owner, a name, a description and a content language. They may also have additional properties which reflect the nature of the resource itself. For example the forum type has a property which determines whether the forum in moderated or not, the image type has additional properties for height and width.

Page

A separate webpage for collecting together content and resources on a common theme.

Properties

page name: The page name that will appear in links to this page, the sitemap and in the breadcrumb trail.
metatext: Text and key words that can be used by search engines to catalogue the contents of the page. This will also appear as a tooltip on the link to the page.
language: The primary language for content on this page. You may add content in other languages identifying the language used on a resource by resource basis.
template: Templates determine the layout of content on the page.

Gallery

The gallery tool allows you to add a collection of photographs or images to your page. Visitors to your page will be able to browse backward and forwards through the image collection.

Properties

name: A name for the image gallery.
description: A short description of the contents of the image gallery.
display size: Uploaded images are automatically scaled so that they will fit in to different page layouts. Select the size you wish images to display at.

natural - show images at normal size
small (200px)
medium (400px)
large (600px)
thumbnail (100px)

Images

Links to edit the images that are currently in the gallery.

Add image

Use this button to add a new image to the gallery. This is described in the next section of this HOWTO.

Image

This resource type is used to embed an image to a page and to determine how it will appear. The resource type has properties which determine whether a caption is displayed, whether text flows around the image and also allows the image to be scaled.

Properties

Encompasses the most frequently used properties for an image.

upload file: Browse though your file system to select an image to display on one of your project pages.
rename file to: Allows you to change the filename under which the image is stored. This will be used if a user saves a copy of the image from your project to their own computer
MIME type: The type of file being uploaded. The system will recognise only the MIME types specified within this listing, however it does include most of the commonly supported image formats.
caption: A short description which will be used as "ALT TEXT" (a tooltip) and as a caption beneath the image.
caption language: Specify the language used for the image caption.

Additional Properties

These fields represent advanced formatting options for the image.

caption display: Specify whether you want the caption to be used only for "ALT TEXT" or beneath the image as well.
text flow: Allow text to flow around the image to either the left or the right-hand sides.
scale: Scale the image to better fit the column width. Expressed as a percentage of the image size. Note that images quality will deteriorate if the image is increased in size.
link to a URL: Make a hypertext link from this image to a URL. Remember to Include http:// at the start of the address.

Folder

You can add a folder to a page to collect together files and other content which share a common theme. A folder can contain any other resource type but is particularly useful for handling documents and other files for users to download.

Properties

name: A name for the folder.
description: A description of the contents of the folder.
language: The content language for the folder description.

Add File

Use this button to add a new file to the folder.

File

The file resource type is used for including additional documents within your project pages to share files with other users. In theory it would be possible to upload any file type to the system, however, we have restricted the file types that the system recognises to some of the more widely supported varieties as this will increase the likelihood that other users will have the correct software to open the file types.

Properties

filename: The name under which the file is stored.
MIME type: The type of file being uploaded. The system will recognise only the specified MIME types.
rename to: Change the filename.
description: A description of the contents of the file. This will appear as a tooltip on any link to the resource.
language: The language used in the description of the file contents.
upload file: Use this field to select a file from your local disk to upload.

Text

This resource covers text-only content such as paragraphs, headings and horizontal rules.

Properties

text: A paragraph of text to appear on the page. Leave blank if you want to insert a horizontal line or line break. You may include a limited set of HTML markup within the text to achieve special effects. Examples are given below.
html entity: Select the HTML entity which defines the purpose of your text, e.g. as a header, normal paragraph, blockquote pre-formatted text, horizontal rule etc.
language: The language used for the text content

HTML markup

<b>bold</b>
<em>italics</em>
<center>text</center>
<a href="URL">name</a>

Link

This resource allows you to add a link to another webpage. The linked webpage can be either on the eLanguages site or a link to an external website such as your schools website

Properties

URL: The full URL of the link target. Include the protocol to be used either http://, https:// or ftp://
name: A short descriptive name for the link which will appear on the page.
description: An extended description of the link. This will appear as a tooltip when a user passes their mouse over the link.
language: The language used in the link description.
target: Determines whether the link will appear in the current browser window or will open another browser window.

Referenced URL

referenced?: Links can be represented on the page by items that are themselves links to images. Where a link points to an image the referenced image will appear within the current page. Note, there may be copyright issues with a referenced image.
referenced URL: Specify the URL for the image if the link points to an image on another webpage.

News

This resource is a simple component for displaying short headlines and stories intended to keep other users up-to-date with developments within your project. The scrolling browser keeps the most recent stories at the top of the list and also allows the stories to be time-limited so that they only appear between certain dates.

Properties

name: A title for the collection of news stories.
description: Describe this collection of news stories.
language: The content language for the news collection.

Stories

A listing of the stories within the news collection with links to editing the stories and a mechanism for changing the order in which the stories are displayed. The ID field serves as a link to editing the stories. An asterisk in the live column indicates that the news item will display, no asterisk indicates that the story has expired or has not yet reached its display date.

Story

The news resource is designed to provide a convenient viewing tool for collections of news stories. Stories are intended to be short articles to describe a single event.

Properties

headline: A title for the news story.
story: The content of the story. You may use the following HTML markup within the body of the story.
language: The language used for the content of the story.
dates: Optional start and end dates can be given to stories. The story will not appear in the news collection outside of these dates. Dates should be entered in the format dd-mm-yyyy.

Forum

A forum is an interactive resource which gives you the opportunity to start a discussion around a certain topic. Users can post messages to the system for discussion and reply to the postings of others. The forums are "threaded" which makes it possible for exchanges on a common theme to be grouped together with the responses made to a posting indented from the original posting. This graphically displays the flow of ideas and makes it easier for others to understand the progress of a topic. The forum also has a feature which allows you to moderate postings before they are displayed on the site to control the content that appears.

Properties

forum name: A short title describing the purpose of the discussion forum.
description: Extended description of the purpose of the discussion.
language: The default language for the forum. This may be over-ridden on a posting by posting basis.
moderate: Determines whether administrator intervention is required before postings are displayed in the forum.

No - all postings displayed immediately
External only - postings by non-members are queued awaiting administrator approval
Internal only - postings by members are queued awaiting administrator approval
External and Internal - all postings held awaiting administrator approval

Add posting

Create a new threaded discussion within a forum.

Properties

subject: A short descriptive title for the posting.
message: The main body of the posting. You may use the HTML markup to emphasise parts of your message or add links.
language: The language used for the subject and message fields.
name: Enter your name in this field. This field will to user who are not logged-in to the system.
email: Enter your mail address in this field. This field will to user who are not logged-in to the system. The email address will not appear on the site but will be used for private replies to the posting.
monitor: Select this to turn on email notification when someone replies to the posting or a subsequent posting within the same thread.

Reply posting

Respond to a forum posting. Replies can be either be made to the posting within the forum or sent as a private reply to the original poster. Replies into the forum will appear underneath and slightly indented to the posting to which it replies, private replies will not appear in the forum.

Properties

subject: A short descriptive title for the posting. For convenience, the subject of the original posting will be reused.
message: The main body of the posting. You may use the HTML markup to emphasise parts of your message or add links.
language: The language used for the subject and message fields.
name: Enter your name in this field. This field will to user who arebnot logged-in to the system.
email: Enter your mail address in this field. This field will to user who are not logged-in to the system. The email address will not appear on the site but will be used for private replies to the posting.
monitor: Select this to turn on email notification when someone replies to the posting or a subsequent posting within the same thread.

Quote posting

Respond to a forum posting. This function differs from "reply posting" by copying the original message into the body of the response. This is useful when you want to respond to a number of different points in the original posting with the quoted text acting as a reference point for the reader.

Properties

subject: A short descriptive title for the posting. For convenience, the subject of the original posting will be reused.
message: The main body of the posting. Quoted text will be indicated by indented lines starting with <. You may use the HTML markup to emphasise parts of your message or add links.
language: The language used for the subject and message fields.
name: Enter your name in this field. This field will to user who arebnot logged-in to the system.
email: Enter your mail address in this field. This field will to user who are not logged-in to the system. The email address will not appear on the site but will be used for private replies to the posting.
monitor: Select this to turn on email notification when someone replies to the posting or a subsequent posting within the same thread.

View posting

View the contents of a single message.

Properties

posted by: The full name or email address of the person who posted this message.
date: When the message was posted to the forum.
subject: The subject of the posting.
message: The main text of the message.

Edit posting

Edit the contents of one of your postings into the forum. Users can only change the content of their own postings.

Properties

subject: A short descriptive title for the posting. For convenience, the subject of the original posting will be reused.
message: The main body of the posting. You may use the HTML markup to emphasise parts of your message or add links.
language: The language used for the subject and message fields.
name: Enter your name in this field. This field will to user who arebnot logged-in to the system.
email: Enter your mail address in this field. This field will to user who are not logged-in to the system. The email address will not appear on the site but will be used for private replies to the posting.
monitor: Select this to turn on email notification when someone replies to the posting or a subsequent posting within the same thread.

Delete posting

The delete posting function removes a posting and any replies that have been made to it within the same thread. This feature is available on the edit posting page but the control is only active for users who have full administrative rights over the forum. Other site users may modify the text of their own postings but they cannot remove the posting entirely.

Move posting

This utility is only available to users with administrative rights over a forum. It allows a posting to be decoupled from its current discussion thread and made into a thread in its own right or allows it to be moved to an entirely different forum. Any replies to the moved posting will also be moved. This tool is useful when a posting either strays from the original purpose of a discussion thread or raises an issue of sufficient importance to warrant a thread of its own.

forum: Select the forum to which you want to move the posting.

Postings "moved" within the same forum become new threads.

Moderate posting

User with administrative permissions on a forum can control whether messages posted into the forum are queued for administrator approval before being displayed in the forum. The moderate posting utility allows the posting to be reviewed and a status flag set to allow the posting to be viewed publicly.

status: Change the status of the posting so that it appears to users of the forum.

Forum statistics

Displays a summary of activity within a forum, indicating the number of postings by different contributors and providing links to the postings on a per user basis.

Fields

last post: Date and time that the last message was posted into the forum.
threads: The total number of separate discussion threads within the forum.
frequency: The average number of postings to the forum per day.
postings: The total number of postings to the forum.
posters: listing of the users who have posted into the forum. Account names serve as links to a breakdown of the postings by an individual user.

Poll

The online poll is a quick and easy feature to add interactive questions to your page. Results of the poll are displayed after a user has submitted an answer.

Properties

poll name: A title to display above the poll.
question: The poll should ask a single question to which there may be more than one possible answer. Note that you cannot change the question after the first response has been made to the poll.
dates: You may specify optional start and end dates for the poll. No responses will be accepted outside of these dates. Leave blank to make the poll permanent.

Answers

A listing of the different responses that users can chose between. The ID field acts as a link for editing an answer. Note that once the first response has been made to a poll you cannot change or delete any of the answers.

Poll Answer

Define the options that will be presented as possible answers to the poll question.

question: A read-only reminder of the poll question.
answer: An individual response to the question. Note the answer cannot be changed or deleted once a response has been made to the poll.

Page information

Page information tool is a mechanism for displaying project participants. It shows a listing of all site members who have editing permissions on a page and provides links to their hello pages. Aside from their name members can decide which details they would like to share with others.

Properties

title: The title you would like to see above the page information object.

Resource ownership

The user who creates a resource is deemed to be its owner and enjoys full control over the resource. Certain resource types (Page, Folder, Gallery) can contain other resources which we call child resources which inherit permissions from the parent.

In certain circumstances it might become necessary for a system administrator to assign the ownership of resources, and any child resources from one user account an another.

Scope

The scope over which the operation is conducted is controlled by the scope attribute.

This resource: The operation is restricted to the current resource.
Cascade: The operation is conducted on the current resource and ALL its child resources.
Universal: Change the ownership on this and all other resources currently owned by this user.
accountid: The accountid of the user to whom the ownership of resources should be reassigned. By default this is set to the accountid of the system administrator making the changes.

Resource membership

Access to resources is controlled by a permissions mechanism which associates user accounts with the resource and any child resources it might have. Accounts associated with a resource in this fashion are said to be "members" of the resource.

filter: Restrict the listings to accounts that match the entered criteria.
no access: User and team accounts without specific permissions to access this resource.
access: User and team accounts with permissions to access this resource.

Select user and team names from either column and use the >> and << buttons to move the accounts from one list to the other.

Resource tagging

Tagging is the process of applying descriptive keywords to resources to categorise them. Over time this will make it easier for users to search for relevant resources on the system. Tags are user defined and can consist of multiple words up to a limit of 64 characters for the tag.

When tags are displayed the popularity of the tag is indicated by the font-size used. More popular tags are displayed in larger fonts making it easy to discern the relative importance of the tag.

Related tags

This function displays a listing of other resources to which a particular tag has been applied. The resource name links to the resource itself.

Permissions

Members and Teams with permissions for a resource.

membership: Add new members or remove existing ones.
cascade: Cascade these permissions to all resources below this level.
don't inherit: Create a separate permissions list for this resource.
key to symbols: Owner; User account; Team account; Any logged-in user; Public

Permissions

READ - view this resource.
WRITE - add new content to this resources or respond to an interactive resource such as a forum or user poll.
CHANGE - modify the content and properties of this resource.
DELETE - delete a resource or cut it from a page.
ADMIN - change the access permissions on this resource.

Resource translations

Lists existing translations for an individual resource, a link for creating new translations and also provides system administrators with a mechanism for including the resource name and description within the translation management system.

Translations

Language: The ISO language name and language code.
Translated By: The user who provided the translation.
Edit: Make changes to an existing translation.

New

A link to the utility for adding a new translation for the resource.

XLIFF

This utility allows systems administrators to include the resource within the translation management system. The XLIFF export will contain data from the name and description fields for the resource.

Add or edit a translation

This utility allows the user to add a new translation for a resource.

Input fields

The input field names vary according to the type of resource being translated. The number of fields for translation will also differ depending on the resource type. However, the required translations will normally be for the display name of the resource and any additional description data that the user enters.

Method

Language: Select the language for the translation.
Name field: Overwrite the original version with the new translaton.
Description field: Overwrite the original version with the new translaton.

Resources HOWTO

Chapter Index

General

Page

Properties

Gallery

Properties

Images

Add image

Image

Properties

Additional Properties

Folder

Properties

Contents

Add File

File

Properties

Text

Properties

HTML markup

Link

Properties

Referenced URL

News

Properties

Stories

Story

Properties

Forum

Properties

Add posting

Properties

Reply posting

Properties

Quote posting

Properties

View posting

Properties

Edit posting

Properties

Delete posting

Move posting

Moderate posting

Forum statistics

Fields

Poll

Properties

Answers

Poll Answer

Page information

Properties

Resource ownership

Scope

Resource membership

Resource tagging

Tags

Related tags

Permissions

Permissions

Resource translations

Translations

New

XLIFF

Add or edit a translation

Input fields

Method