Introduction to Content Management using My Site

My Site is a web application that gives you a simple and friendly way to manage your website content. It has the following features:

• create and delete web pages
• preview pages
• edit web page content
• restore older versions of web page content
• maintain a library of images
• switch graphic design themes
• reconfigure the website name and description
• update your password

For small websites, these features encompass 95% of your daily website management tasks. When more advanced content management features are required, check out the Website Manager web application instead.

Control Panel

Your website control panel consists of:

• A listing of your web pages (on the left) with icons for performing specific operations on each of those pages. At the bottom of the listing are some additional special pages, such as image libraries, which are handled somewhat differently.
• A menu of other website functions (on the right).

You website includes numerous tools for working on your pages, or on the website as a whole. Simply click on the appropriate tool to activate it. You can click on the tools here for help on each of these functions:

Page Tools:	preview	edit page	rollback	publish	configure page	delete
Website Tools:	new page	change theme	publish	configure site	change password	advanced control panel	help	logout
Image Tools	update image	new image	delete image

Previewing Pages

To preview your web pages, use the preview icon, .

The page will pop up in a new window. As the site administrator, you will see the editable region of content highlighted by a dashed red line. At the bottom of the editable region is an edit button. Click this button to edit the content you see. (Regular website users will not see the dashed line or edit button.)

To return to the website control panel, simply close the preview window.

Editing Pages

There are two ways to edit a web page:

1. click on the edit icon in the control panel.
2. preview the page, and then click on the edit button at the bottom of the page.

In either case, the web page is displayed in a separate window, with the content region replaced by a full HTML editor, which you can type into to make your changes.

Warning: do not click reload, or navigate away from the page while editing, or your changes so far will be lost.

When done making changes, click on the "Submit" button below the editor. This will return to the page preview, and you should be able to see your new changes. If everything looks good, close the browser window, and you should find yourself back at your website control panel.

Publish Pages

All your edits and modifications are stored in a database until you are ready to commit them. When you are ready to go public with your changes, click on the publish button. This will write out your web page files.

You can publish web pages individually, using the publish button in the web page's listing. You can also publish all of your sites pages and files at once, using the "Publish Site" option in the right-side menu.

Configuring Pages

Use the page configuration tool to modify the definitions or behaviours of your web pages.

This tool lets you change the menu label, page title, page description, and keywords settings for the page. (Page description and keywords are used by some search engines.)

The page configuration tool also allows you to make pages private (ie. for members only), by setting the privacy option appropriately. If a member of the public attempts to view a members-only page, they will first be challenged for a login/password. By default, your website has only one member (that's you!), but if you have subscribed to a Members plug-in, you can create new members who can also view these pages. Note that member-only pages are never published, and are always rendered dynamically for the members. (Therefore, members always see the most recent version of the page content, and the warnings above about re-publishing pages after updating their content do not apply to member-only pages.)

The page configuration tool also lets you move pages around in your menus and site map, using the parent page and page rank settings:

Parent Page

If a page has a parent page defined, then it will be placed into a submenu unerneath the parent page. You can nest your submenus to any depth, but the generic menu-building tools will not usually display more than one level of submenu in menus. Some templates do not show any submenus by default. All submenu levels are displayed in site maps, however. Warning: do not try to place a page in a submenu of itself, or your menus will not build properly.

Page Rank

In a particular menu or sub-menu, pages are sorted in the order in which they were created. To change this order, you can assign page ranks to certain pages, to force them to sort differently with respect to each other. A page rank is just a number (typically from 1 to 9, although you can use other numbers if you wish - including negative numbers) that is used to sort the pages. A rank of 1 will be placed before a rank of 2, for instance. All pages are created with a page rank of 1 by default.

Rollbacks

To undo changes that were made to a web page, use the rollback tool, .

This deletes the most recent version of the content, and replaces it with the previous version on file. (There is no preset limit to how many versions are saved, or how far you can roll back.)

If the most recent version of the content had been published, you will also have to re-publish the page, or public viewers of the site will continue to see the old version.

Caution: There is no "redo" function to undo a rollback. Once you have rolled back, the content is permanently removed.

Deleting Pages

To remove a pages from your site completely, click on the delete tool, .

Note that you cannot delete your home page, since that page is required in order for the site to function properly. To replace this page, simply edit its content or reconfigure it's menu label.

Deleted pages are moved to the trash bin temporarily. If you accidentally delete a web page when you shouldn't have, it can be recovered from the trash (in the Advanced Control Panel). If you do not have access to the trash bin, contact the system administrator.

Creating New Pages

To add a new page to your site, click on the new page icon, .

The only information you will need to provide is a menu label for the new page. ExSite will use this label when it creates menu links to this new page. Click on the "Submit" button to create the page. Note that this does not publish the page, so the public will still not be able to view the page. First you must edit the page and then publish it.

If the page requires any special configuration, you can use the page configuration tool after the page is created.

Themes

If there are multiple graphical themes installed for configuring websites with, you can instantly switch to a new theme, by clicking on the Themes tool .

This will bring up a listing of the available themes. Click on the preview links to see what the theme looks like. Select the radio checkbox beside the theme you prefer, and click on the submit button to change your website over to this theme.

Your page previews will reflect the new theme immediately. Your published webpages will continue to display the old theme until you republish. (Even then, your browser may continue to cache the old version until you click "Reload".)

Repeat this procedure to restore the original theme.

Image Management

To easily insert images into your pages, you will want to upload the images into your image library, first. Your image library is shown at the bottom of your list of pages, under the Special Pages and Libraries section. Note that you can publish your library, just as you can publish a normal page; your images will load faster if they are published.

To view your image library, click on the edit library button, . Your images are listed with options to update or delete them. There is also an option to upload a new image into the library.

• To preview an image, click on its name.
• To update an image with a newer or better version, click on the update button, .
• To remove an image from the library, click on the delete button, .
• To add a new image to the library, click on the new image button, .

Your image uploads may be if they are too large or the wrong format. Some tips to keep in mind:

• only JPG, GIF, and PNG files are accepted. JPG is best for photographs. GIF and PNG are sometimes better for line art.
• keep the image sizes down to no more than 500 pixels in any dimension. Digital cameras generally produce very large images (thousands of pixels across), so these images will need to be shrunk before they are suitable for use on the web.
• you will need to use a graphics or photo manipulation program to reduce your image sizes before uploading them to ExSite.

Images are inserted into your web pages using the image tool in the HTML editor.

Configure Site

Your website title and description may be changed using the Configure Site tool, .

This information is used by some themes, which automatically incorporate the title and description into all pages of the site. Some themes use only the title.

Change Password

Use the change password tool, to choose a new password. It is a good idea to do this after you first set up your website.

Advanced Control Panel

Use the advanced control panel tool, to jump to ExSite's advanced administrator interface. This gives you more powerful content management tools, as well as control panels for each of the web applications you are running on your website.

Help

Use the help tool, to view this help documentation.

Logout

When you are done working on your website, use the logout tool, to exit ExSite Webware, and return to the public view of your website. (If you have not yet published your website, there may not be a public view yet, in which case ExSite may dump you in a non-existent location. This is nothing to be concerned about.)