Articles
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What is an Article?
An article is the smallest unit of any issue. It contains the material that the public reads, thus it is the meat of the publication. It must be categorized under a department, column, featured or cover story. An article may be created by any user of the system with author capability.
Accessing Articles
To access existing articles, begin on the administrative home page. Select the “Articles” link in the side bar next to the pen and inkwell icon. This is the Articles page, where new articles may be created and existing articles edited or deleted. The field “Display articles from issue:” is a drop-menu that lists all the issues entered into the system. The most recent issue will be selected in the drop menu and the articles that have been entered into that issue will appear in a list below. To edit or delete an article, use the drop menu to find the issue, click on that issue, and then click on the “Go” button. Find the article in the list below and click on the Article title. Make changes to the article and click “Save” to save those changes or “Delete” if you wish to delete the entire article.
Creating a new Article
To create a new article, go to your Articles page and select the “Create a New Article” link next to the green plus sign arrow at the top of the page. Enter in the Title and Name of the article (these are usually the same).Select the author from the “Author” drop menu. If the author of the article is not listed, you must first create that author by going to your Authors page and selecting “Create a New Author.”
Article Type
The next step is choosing the article “Type.” The drop menu offers four choices: “Normal,” “Featured”, “Lead” and “Cover Story.” Selecting “Cover Story,” means the article will appear as the Cover Story on the online publication. Selecting “Featured,” means the article will be listed under Features on the online publication. Selecting “Normal,” means the article will not appear as the Cover Story or under Features. You must select an article “Type” for every article.
Article Category
Categorizing articles as Featured or Cover stories is a way of bringing additional highlighted attention to specific articles in the publication (whether the article is in a department, column, or neither). If you don’t want an article uniquely highlighted, then simply leave it as "Normal". Then select either a department or column to put it in from the “Department” and “Column” drop menus.
A Normal article can be either:
- In a Department
- In News
- In a Column
A Cover Story can be:
- In a Department
- None (It may stand alone in an issue)
A Featured Story may be:
- In a Department
- None (It may stand alone in an issue)
A Lead Story may be:
- In a Department
- None (It may stand alone in an issue)
A Column Article may be:
- In a Department
- A Featured Story
- A Cover Story
The system affords the option to make a Column article a lead, featured or cover story, although most column stories will never be either featured or cover stories.
An article may be a Department or a Column story but neither Featured nor Cover. To do this, select “Normal” from the “Type” drop-down menu. Select a department, column, or both for your article. If you leave both of these menus unselected, the article will not appear on your website, as the system will have no category under which to post it. It may be that an article fits into both Columns and Departments (for example: an author who writes a “Good Eats” column could write an article on organic produce that might also fit into a department called “Healthy Living”). In most cases an article will fit under one or the other. If an article fits under Columns but not Departments, select the appropriate column but leave the departments menu unselected, and vice versa.
A Cover Story may simultaneously be listed under Columns, Departments, or both, but it may not be listed under Featured. Selecting “Cover Story” from the “Type” menu allows you to select a category from the Columns and Department menus where appropriate. A link to that article will appear on your website in all the locations you have selected. Only categorize articles under the headings where you want the article to appear in order to avoid redundancy. Selecting “Cover Story” and leaving the Departments and Columns menus unselected, categorizes an article only as the Cover Story and not under other headings. Like a Cover Story, a Featured article may also be listed under Columns, Departments, both, or neither. A Featured article will be posted on your website under “Features,” and will only appear under Columns and/or Departments if they are selected from the Departments or Columns drop-down menus.
Selecting an Issue
Once an article is categorized, select its issue from the “Issue” drop menu. The “Order” number will automatically be selected by the system. Selecting the “Live” option, as with a new Issue, puts the article on your online publication. Selecting the “Auto Publish” option will make your article live at the date and time you select from the “Auto Publish Date” fields. If you wish, for example, to make your article live at midnight on January 15th, 2005, leave the “Live” option unselected, check the “Auto Publish” box, and select that time and date from the drop menus in the “Auto Publish Date” fields. If you leave both the “Live” and “Auto Publish” fields blank, the article will be saved as a draft until you make it live. An article will only appear on your website when the issue it is a part of is made live. If you make an article live while the issue is still a draft, it will go live when you make the issue live. If the issue is already live, the article will go live when the issue does.
Public or Private Status of Articles
Press Publisher gives offers the option to make articles available to the public or to makes them accessible only by subscribers. Select the “Public” option to make an article available to the public. Leave that option unselected to make your article viewable only to your subscribers.
Including an Image
To include an image with an article, select “Browse” next to the “Image” field and select a saved image from a disk or your hard drive in the same way that you would attach a file in an email. Include a brief intro or summary of the article in the “Summary” field or leave it blank. That summary will appear on your web page under the link to that article. Enter the text of the article itself in the “Content” field. An article may be composed directly into this field or copied from a word processing program and pasted into this field. Make all the necessary changes to this page and click “Save.”
