Website Documentation
General Information
- Website Style Guide
- Subsites
- Subsite Standard Layout
- Subsite Landing Pages
- Setting Up A New Subsite
- Post-Launch Tweaks
- Directory Subsite
- Working with Documents
- Linking to Other Subsites
- Adding Events to the Homepage
Website Style Guide
The following documents comprise the MLC Web Style Guide for writers. Basically, MLC uses the Northwestern Publishing House Style Guide and Dictionary with additions specific to MLC.
The recommended way to use these guides is this way:
-
look to the MLC House Style Guide
-
look to the Northwestern Publishing House Dictionary for quick-look items
-
look to the Northwestern Publishing House Style Guide for additional items
-
use your judgement/look at other parts of the website/ask the MLC editor
MLC Specific Files
-
MLC House Style Guide (updated 2017-11-17)
Northwestern Publishing House Style Guide
-
NPH Style Guide (2014)
-
NPH Dictionary (2014)
Subsites
Subsites are the individual areas of the website that web editors have control over. The easiest way to think of a subsite is that it is a small, autonomous website that lives on top of the create WordPress installation. Most often, a subsite will be specific to one part of the college's work.
So http://mlc-wels.edu/library will be a subsite. So is http://mlc-wels.edu/network-serivces or http://mlc-wels.edu/graduate-studies. Someone who has editing privileges for the Library subsite does not necessarily have privileges for the Graduate Studies subsite.
They help us logically separate areas of the website along with providing a framework for permissions.
Styling
When creating your subsite, start with the least amount of design and then work forward. This means start with:
-
text
-
images
WordPress is really great at those two things. From there, work on the text and images you are using. After that is complete, continue to work on the text. When you are finally really REALLY happy with your text, have someone else take a look at it. When that is all said and done, it might be time to look at adding some visually-interesting widgets or color.
Remember, less is almost always more. Doing the least amount of work is preferable than starting with too much. Look for ways to clearly communicate using text and images first and only after that has failed (or you are EXTREMELY happy with what you have) is it time to look into what you might be able to do with the Advanced Editor.
Subsite Standard Layout
For most other pages within a subsite (besides the initial landing page), you must follow the standard layout.
The Standard Layout
The standard layout is made up of the following:
-
Page title above the content (pulled from the name of the page within WordPress)
-
Content area below the page title (on the left-hand side)
-
Navigation area for the subsite at the top of the right-hand column
-
Contact Us and Directory will be the final two links in your sub-navigation menu (if applicable)
-
No full-width widgets from the Advanced Editor
Subsite Navigation
Along with that, the navigation will be handled in the following way:
-
Name of the subsite will be on the top of the navigation (e.g.
Library
for the Library's subsite) -
Navigation items can be no more than three deep (otherwise it starts to look very messy)
-
You can choose to have the navigation created automatically or to create custom menus (recommendation is for custom menus)
-
The first link in the navigation will be
Home
and will link back to the landing page for the subsite -
The last two links will be
Directory
and/orContact Us
(if appropriate)
A Directory
and Contact Us
link will only be provided if it is meaningful for the area of the website. Contact Us
is meant mainly for contact information specific to a department/office and not to individuals within that office.
Customization Opportunities
Besides having complete control over the content within your subsite, you can also add widgets below the mandated navigation for the subsite.
Subsite Landing Pages
As a web editor you have the ability to create a landing page for each subsite. A landing page is nothing more than a page with a simplified styling using widgets to create a unique layout for that specific subsite. Here are some guidelines for creating your landing page.
Creating A Landing Page
-
Create a new Page (name it something that you will remember)
-
Go into the Enfold Theme settings
-
Choose your newly created page under
Frontpage Settings
(and clickSave All Settings
) -
Edit the page you created at the start
-
Change
Sidebar Settings
toNo Sidebar
-
Change
Title Bar Settings
toHide both
-
Save your page
Now you are free to use the Advanced Layout Editor to setup your landing page the way you like.
Items Each Landing Page Needs
Everything else is up to you but you will need a title and some sort of navigation so that visitors are able to get to the information they need. There are a number of options for navigation, so you are free to play around with those. Remember, pages in your subsite besides the landing page will be required to follow the standard layout.
Helpful Hints
Setting Up A New Subsite
This includes naming conventions, setting up ACLs, applying theme, and setting up menus.
Creating a New Subsite
-
tagline needs to be
Martin Luther College
Applying the Theme
-
log into the subsite dashboard
-
go to
Appearance > Themes
and activate the MLC Theme theme -
click on
Customize
or selectMLC Theme
from the sidebar (if you are not taken there already) -
click on
Import/Export
within the MLC Theme Theme Options page -
click on
Upload Theme Settings File
-
upload mlc_theme-settings-2016-2-12-v1.txt and click on
Insert Settings File
-
click on
Theme Options
and then choose the correct frontpage withinFrontpage Settings
-
click the
Save all changes
button -
check the site to see if the theme was successfully applied
After that is complete, note any issues with the styling that will need to be taken care of.
Importing Menus
Importing Menus
-
go to
Appearance > Menus
-
delete any menus titled
Action Links
,Main Menu
,Tools
, and/orResources
-
select
Tools > Import
, then click onWordPress
Main Menu
-
set
About
,Academics
,Admissions
,Arts
, Athletics, andDonate
as Mega Menu (check Use as Mega Menu box) -
check This column should start a new row for
About > About
,Academics > Academics
,Admissions > Admissions
,Arts > Arts
, andDonate > MLC Day
-
enable as MLC Theme Main Menu at bottom
-
click
Save Menu
Action Links
-
select
Action Links
menu fromAppearance > Menus
-
select MLC Theme Secondary Menu near bottom in Theme locations
-
click
Save Menu
Socket Menu
Setting Up the Footer
Footer - column 1
Text - No Title
<div class="noLightbox textaligncenter nomobile"> <a href="http://mlc-wels.edu"> <img src="https://mlc-wels.edu/wp-content/themes/mlc/images/mlc-logo-white.png" alt="Martin Luther College Seal" width="302" height="177" /> </a><br /><br /><br /><br /> <a href="http://wels.net/" target="_blank"> <img src="https://mlc-wels.edu/wp-content/themes/mlc/images/wels-logo.png" alt="WELS: Christ's Love, Our Calling" width="150" height="51" /> </a></div>
Footer - column 2
Custom Menu - Resources
Make sure you give it the title of Resources
.
Footer - column 3
Custom Menu - Tools
Make sure you give it the title of Tools
.
Footer - column 4
Text - Connect
-
check Automatically add paragraphs
<strong>Martin Luther College</strong> 1995 Luther Court New Ulm, MN 56073 1 (507) 354-8221 <strong>Need Help?</strong> <a href="https://mlc-wels.edu/contact" title="Click here to request information">Request Information</a> [av_font_icon icon='ue8f4' font='entypo-fontello' style='' caption='' link='manually,https://www.facebook.com/mlcwels' linktarget='_blank' size='50px' position='left' color='#e1e1e1'][/av_font_icon] [av_font_icon icon='ue8f2' font='entypo-fontello' style='' caption='' link='manually,http://twitter.com/connect2mlc' linktarget='_blank' size='50px' position='left' color='#e1e1e1'][/av_font_icon] [av_font_icon icon='ue8f0' font='entypo-fontello' style='' caption='' link='manually,http://vimeopro.com/martinluthercollege/promotional-videos' linktarget='_blank' size='50px' position='left' color='#e1e1e1'][/av_font_icon] [av_font_icon icon='ue909' font='entypo-fontello' style='' caption='' link='manually,http://instagram.com/martinluthercollege' linktarget='_blank' size='50px' position='left' color='#e1e1e1'][/av_font_icon]
Text - no title
<a href="https://mlc-wels.edu/streams" class="noLightbox"> <img src="https://mlc-wels.edu/wp-content/themes/mlc/images/mlc-tv.jpg" alt="MLC TV Streaming Video" class="border" /> </a>
"Little Things"
Setting Changes
General
-
go to
Settings > General
-
change
Tagline
to Martin Luther College -
change
Timezone
to Chicago -
change
Week Starts On
to Sunday -
click
Save Changes
Discussion
-
go to
Settings > Discussion
-
uncheck Allow link notifications from other blogs (pingbacks and trackbacks) on new articles and Allow people to post comments on new articles in
Default article settings
-
select Gravatar Logo as
Default Avatar
-
click
Save Changes
Post-Launch Tweaks
Website 2016.1
New Enfold Styles
There will be a new style file to upload to each subsite and enable with some style tweaks to make everything a little more readable. This will include removing the strong
styling from the quick CSS because it has been moved to the overall CSS file for the entire site.
Please make certain to set the following:
-
Frontpage Settings
-
And where do you want to display the Blog?
Take note of what they were set to before you apply the styling.
-
log into the subsite dashboard
-
click on
Customize
or selectMLC Theme
from the sidebar (if you are not taken there already) -
click on
Import/Export
within the MLC Theme Theme Options page -
click on
Upload Theme Settings File
-
upload mlc_theme-settings-2016-2-12-v1.txt and click on
Insert Settings File
-
click on
Theme Options
and then choose the correct homepage withinFrontpage Settings
and blog/news page withinAnd where do you want to display the Blog?
-
click the
Save all changes
button -
check the site to see if the theme was successfully applied
Footer Changes
-
remove “beta.” from the link in the footer widgets (column 1) for the MLC logo
-
remove “beta.” from the link in the footer widgets (column 4) for MLC Streams
-
change link for
Calendar
in Tools menu to https://mlc-wels.edu/master-calendar -
add
Feedback
link in foot socket menu (very bottom-right) -
remove
Directions
and addPrint Services
to Resources menu (column 2)
Main Menu Changes
Will be uploading a new main menu structure, there are many changes to make.
-
add “Home ” before each of the repeated headings in each menu (except
Athletics
andDonate
)
Directory Subsite
Pictures
-
Should be a headshot of only the individual
-
The head of the individual should be centered (as much as possible)
-
Image size should be (in pixels)
255×300
or510×600
to match the rest of the images -
All images should be saved as JPEGs (*.jpg or *.jpeg)
Working with Documents
Working with WordPress and document files (think PDFs, Word documents, etc.) can be little disconcerting. You will find some simple instructions on this page to keep in mind when you want to load files for users to download.
What Format
Basically, it comes down to this:
-
Can the information be easily put into a webpage? If so, make it a webpage.
-
If it is a document that is not meant to be changed by the user, then use PDF.
-
If it is a document that is meant to be changed by the user, then use a Word document or appropriate editable format.
Those are simplistic terms, but you get the idea. Start by deciding if it could be a webpage, then if it should, and if it falls through … then choose your document format.
Where Does It Live?
In Plone it was easy to link directly to a document and just replace it in the future, preserving the URL so that anyone can have access to the latest document in the future just by virtue of changing the underlying file. However, WordPress does not have an easy or preferred way to do this, so a person needs to think about where the document needs to live and how it will be presented.
Documents should be linked to from a page that contains information about the document (context around why it is important, what a person can do with it, etc.), and then anytime someone needs to link to a specific document, they should be linking to that page with the context.
Example
You want to link to the Single Major Early Childhood Education program plan. It might be tempting to link to the PDF directly, but the next time that program plan changes and a new one is uploaded, that link will be bad and your user will get a 404 error message.
The better option is to use some verbiage similar to “You can find the single major Early Childhood Education program plan on the Program Plans page” and link the words “Program Plans page” directly to the Program Plans page. That way when a new program plan is uploaded, that link will still be accurate.
Uploading Documents
There are two options for uploading media (the end result is the same):
-
Through the WordPress Media Library (found under
Media
on the sidebar of your dashboard). -
Through the
Add Media
button within the editing interface.
In each case, the object is to upload the file(s) you want to use and then link them within a page or post.
Upload Using Media Library
-
Log into the dashboard of your WordPress subsite
-
Click on
Media
on the sidebar -
Click
Add New
on the resulting page -
Drag-and-drop files into the area where indicated or click
Select Files
and find the documents you want to upload
Now your files are uploaded into the Media Library of your WordPress subsite.
Upload Using Editing Interface
-
Log into the dashboard of your WordPress subsite
-
Edit a page or post (either an existing page/post or a new one)
-
Click the
Add Media
button on the editing toolbar -
Select the
Upload Files
tab on the resulting popup -
Drap-and-drop files into the area where indicated or click
Select Files
and find the documents you want to upload
Now your files are uploaded into the Media Library of your WordPress subsite.
Inserting Documents
Now that the files are uploaded, here are the basic steps to inserting links to documents within a page or post.
-
Edit a page or post (either an existing page/post or a new one)
-
Click the
Add Media
button on the editing toolbar -
From the
Media Library
tab, choose the document you want to link to (which should already be uploaded, for follow steps above) -
When the item is selected, give it a
Title
(which will end up being the words that are linked in the end) -
Click
Insert Into Page
to have it added to the page/post you were working on -
Do it over again for each of the other documents
That's it! Now when you publish your page/post, you will find that there is link and that clicking it will open/download your document.
Potential Problems
-
The
Title
attribute of a document is important because it directly controls what words will be linked within the page/post you are working on. Always check to make sure the title is meaningful and will help the user understand what they are clicking. -
Every time you upload a document, it is stored in a folder that is tied to the date it is uploaded. There is no way to overwrite a file, you will need to upload a new file and link to that instead. You can always go through the
Media Library
and delete old files that are no longer useful.
Linking to Other Subsites
A current list of subsites for the campus website are available in two different areas:
Adding Events to the Homepage
This documentation will help you add events to the feed on the homepage and the calendar of events found at http://mlc-wels.edu/calendar as well.
-
Log into WordPress dashboard for the homepage
-
Click on
Events
on the sidebar -
You can click on
Add New
to create a new event or edit exiting events similar to posts or pages -
Add any information you would like to the resulting event listing
From the Events
section of the dashboard your can also add information about different Venues
, Organizers
, and Event Categories
that are used often.