News

Anchor Links

Posted on Categories Tips, Tutorials

Sample code:

< h2 id=”Anchor”>this is my Header on the page.
</h2>

<a href=”https://www.augsburg.edu/demo-page-for-augsburg-tutorials#Anchor”>This is my link in the email/website</a>

Image Slidershow (image carousels)

The following tutorial will display the operations for installing Image Slidershow (image carousels) to your wordpress site.

This is only a feature on Augsburg.edu sites.

Prerequisite:
Soliloquy Dashboard Example

Tutorial Video for Adding/Changing and deleting Soliloquy Slider for Augsburg.edu Pages

Launch tutorial via link in its own tab

Troubleshooting admin rights on wordpress (augsburg.edu or sites.augsburg.edu)

Hello editors. I have seen a lot of emails about losing admin rights and figured to provide clarity and a first level documentation.

If you think you lost administration to the site you manage follow these steps.

  1. Have you logged into inside.augsburg.edu or authorized access via Duo mobile app? If no, STOP AND DO SO.
  2. If yes, go to the page you are looking to update (type in the url into a fresh browser window).
    1. does a ribbon display at the top of the page? If yes, go to the top of the ribbon and select “edit page” it will take you to the backend editing side of the site.
    2. If no, go to the bottom of the website and select “Administrator Login”
      1. select “Augnet Login” button. Do you go to the back end editing page? if not, open a new browser window and type in the url.
    3. If you have tried all of these, one last effort. Open a new browser window and go to your page. Is the ribbon there? if yes, sorry, I am looking into a cleaner way.
  3. If all else fails contact me and we can figure it out

Show Posts Shortcode

There is a show_posts shortcode that is available to use only on sites.augsburg.edu pages. The shortcode does what it says, it shows your posts!

Usage

You can use it like this:

My Heading

The shortcode, as you can see, takes three attributes: ‘heading’, ‘category’ and ‘amount.’ The heading attribute can be simple text. The category attribute should match a “Slug” for a category that is already defined under Posts > Categories. If you go the Post > Categories page the Slug has its own column in the Categories table, so you can take the value directly from there. The amount attribute is a number and it will control how many posts are shown, if you leave the amount attribute out all posts of that category will be displayed. For example: 

My Heading

Output

When the shortcode runs on a page, it will output the posts in a grid that will adapt to the width of you page and display as many posts as will fit into each row. It looks something like this:

Reference

Three Attributes

  • heading: simple text – defaults to “Posts”
  • category: category slug – defaults to “uncategorized”
  • amount: number – defaults to show all

Examples

All attributes

My Heading

Show all posts in a category

My Heading

Web Accessibility training instructions

Posted on Categories Uncategorized

Since 2017, Augsburg’s web accessibility training has been available online and on-demand. It is required for all website content managers. Follow these instructions to complete the training.

  1. Join the Website Content Manager Moodle Website (must be logged in to inside.augsburg.edu)
  2. Click on “Enroll Me” to join the course.
  1. Click the “Accessibility Training” section to view its contents. Here you will find the video and quiz.
  1. Watch the video (you will need to be logged into YouTube using your Augsburg account)
  2. Take the Accessibility Training Quiz.
  3. Notify me when you pass the quiz, and then I will set up your website access.

Please contact me to request an alternate accommodation for the accessibility training.

See my Accessibility page for more information about accessibility.

Accessibility video on youtube (so you can reference for the knowledge check). 

Misspellings in Siteimprove

Siteimprove will tell you if your site has misspelled words, and it does this in two ways:

  1. Misspellings – These words are probably misspelled. Siteimprove is very good at figuring out a true misspelling.
  2. “Words to review” or “Needs Review” – These are probably not misspellings. Here you’ll find mostly proper nouns (surnames, brand names, etc.).

Here’s what you see in your Siteimprove reports. The important thing is to have 0 Misspellings. If that number is 0, there’s nothing you need to do. Don’t worry about the “Words to review” number.
zero misspellings, six words to review

How to fix misspellings

If you do have a misspelled word, just log into your website and fix it. Siteimprove will find the corrected text during the next scan (every five days) and update the reports to reflect that the misspelling no longer exists.

“Misspellings” that are not actually misspelled

If the actual “Misspellings” area (not “needs review”) lists a word that is spelled correctly, just let me know about it. There’s nothing you can do to tell Siteimprove it is correct. Instead, it’s something I have to do. Let me know the word and the page it’s on, and I’ll add it to our dictionary so that Siteimprove will not flag it as a misspelling in the future.

Occasionally check the words that need review

While the words under review are often not misspellings, sometimes they are. For that reason, it’s good to check them occasionally. You can do this by clicking on the “Words to review” circle (pictured above) from your email reports, or log into Siteimprove and use the left navigation to go to Quality Assurance > Spelling > Find Misspellings. There you’ll see a tab that says “Needs Review.”

screenshot of "Needs Review" tab

In this example, the words for review are mostly names,, but one of the words is “progressRetrieved.” This turns out to be a real misspelling. It’s the result of a missing space and period between two sentences, and should be “progress. Retrieved…” This is why it’s good to check the “Needs Review” section every so often.

The “3-Click Rule” is a myth

Posted on Categories Tips

“Repeat a lie often enough and it becomes the truth.”

This often-quoted maxim about the power of propaganda is attributed to some of history’s most notorious figures, its uncertain origin giving it a sort of meta irony.

Every few months, someone brings up the “3-Click Rule” to me. It’s the idea that some piece of information should not be more than three clicks from the home page. Usually they hear this as a recommendation from a speaker at a conference. Sometimes it comes from a more authoritative source, such as an accrediting agency, or is even presented as a legal requirement.

Like the quote above, no one knows who invented the 3-Click Rule, but it has been around for a very long time. It has been repeated by so many people in so many forums for so many years that it has become ingrained as a well-known truth. It sounds like a simple, reasonable rule to follow, but the truth is more complicated:

  1. The 3-Click Rule is not an actual rule of web design, not part of any official standard, and not backed up by data.
  2. The 3-Click Rule does not make information easier to find. Something can be three clicks from the home page and still difficult to locate.

Instead of following this arbitrary rule, we should have well-organized content, clear page titles and headings, and a logical navigational structure that makes it easier for people to find what they need.

For more information, read this article from the Nielsen Norman Group:
The 3-Click Rule for Navigation is False