PS: What's up?: Stories by Jim Meyer

Statistics

Jim Meyer — Tue, 03 Jul 2007 17:20:20 GMT

A nice thing about PublicSquare is the ability to show off your community's statistics. Here's a bit of liquid to pull up some commonly used statistics.

Most commented upon

Most commented shows people what's hot, what's contraversial. A great way to get more discussion flowing! This code lists the stories that have the most comments. You don't have to use tables.

 {% if current_site.most_commented != empty %}
   Most-commented Stories (past 60 days)
        
          {% for content in current_site.most_commented %}
                  
          {% endfor %}
        
          
            Title
            Comments
          

              
             {{ content.title | truncate: 25 }}
             
              {{ content.recent_comments_count }}
            
  {% endif %}

Title	Comments
{{ content.title \| truncate: 25 }}	{{ content.recent_comments_count }}

Highest Rated

Everyone wants to know what's the best-- let them find those stories easily!

  {% if current_site.highest_rated_stories != empty %}
Highest-rated Stories
      
        
          {% for story in current_site.highest_rated_stories %}
            
          {% endfor %}
        
          
            Story
            Rating
          

              {{ story.title | truncate: 30 }}
             
              
             {% for step in story.rating_steps %}{% if step.on %}
              
              {% else %}
              
              {% endif %}
              {% endfor %}
              
            
  {% endif %}

Story	Rating
{{ story.title \| truncate: 30 }}	{% for step in story.rating_steps %}{% if step.on %} {% else %} {% endif %} {% endfor %}

Most Active Authors

This can be useful if you have a group of regular authors, to spur a little competition, keep people writing...

  
    Most Active Authors
    
      
        {% for user in current_site.most_active_authors %}
          
        {% endfor %}
      
        
          Author
          Stories
        

            {{ user.link }}
            {{ user.stories_count }}

Author	Stories
{{ user.link }}	{{ user.stories_count }}

Most Active Contributors

You can call them commenters, or community members, but you want to reward the folks who make your community work with a little shout-out!

    Most Active Commenters
    
      
        {% for user in current_site.most_active_commenters %}
          
        {% endfor %}
      
        
          Name
          Comments
        

            {{ user.link }}
            {{ user.comments_count }}

More tips soon!

Name	Comments
{{ user.link }}	{{ user.comments_count }}

Dashboard and Workflow Changes

Jim Meyer — Fri, 17 Aug 2007 19:47:00 GMT

It’s hot here in Wilson, NC, where we’re spending the dog days of summer working on some improvements that will make a big difference in working with your publication.

First, a couple of small changes: * We’ve changed the story list on the dashboard to include all stories in the pipeline; this brings pending stories back in sight, back in mind. * Also, we’ve changed the Stories tab to default to all stories rather than just pending stories. We know this drives some of you crazy; now with one click you can see everything, then narrow it down with the filter links.

But the big news is the new ability to preview stories prior to publication. We’ve added a new “staged” state for stories which allows your publications’ staff to see what the publication will look like once the stories are published. There’s now a “Stage” button in the admin story view (just above the “Publish” button) and a new staging link at the top of the dashboard to take you to your soon-to-be front page.

Hope you like the improvements. Keep those cards and letters coming and stay cool!

Cocktail: Category and Story Iteration

Jim Meyer — Wed, 16 Jan 2008 08:00:00 GMT

(cocktail == recipe for liquid ... get it? ;)

{% for category in current_site.story_categories %}
  {% if category.label == category_label && category.published_stories != empty %}
    
      {{ category | link }}
      {{ tagline }}
      
        {% for story in category.published_stories %}
        {{ story | link }}
        {% endfor %}
      
    
  {% endif %}
{% endfor %}

Big Release: Something for everyone

Christina Wodtke, Jim Meyer, Fleur Dragan — Wed, 30 Jan 2008 04:18:19 GMT

Hello true believers in independent publishing everywhere! We’ve got goodies for you this week!

_We’ve added image manipulation._ Wherever there are image links there are edit links now. Take a test drive, and resize, reformat and play! We do want to recommend though, that you create a copy *first* before you crop or resize. Those buttons apply immediately, so if you are a bit unsure about what you are doing, better to play with a copy (Christina found out the hard way!) Also, when a file is uploaded, a caption can now be specified along with the keywords. To see the caption used with a dropcap, the liquid template for a story will have to be modified. In liquid, the story image tag is

{{story.image.url}}

and there is now a

{{story.image.caption}}

tag available as well.

Finally, we’ve also changed the alt tag to show the caption rather than the keywords. However, if no caption is present, we’ll still show the keywords so your old stories will continue to work the same.

We now let you autopublish!

You notice now we’ve got two fields, one for internal deadlines (behaves the same way as the old deadline field but now also a “publish date” which will actually publish your story with or wihtout you! But don’t panic.. once you set that deadline, the story is marked publishable, just to warn you it’s on it’s way.

Never be seen without your makeup again!

And another much-requested feature: template staging. Planning a makeover? Don’t want to get caught wearing your curlers? Well now you can specify a theme to be “staged” that will show up as the theme on your own personal staging site. There is a link to the staging site available from the themes editing page (the “design” tab) on the theme designated as the staging site theme.

BTW, we've turned on the "forums" feature (another new and nifty feature, activated by clicking on "forums" under configuration) so you can tell us about bugs, issues, improvements and blow us kisses when we finally get it right....

We’ve got a few other little surprises planned… Watch this space!

Anonymous Comments

Christina Wodtke, Jim Meyer — Sat, 11 Oct 2008 22:48:55 GMT

Due to popular request, we've added the ability for you to allow your visitors to comment without having to register. Just remember, without the enticement of building reputation (or the deterrent of losing it) you may see a drop in quality of comments as well as an increase of quantity. Please let us know your experience with anonymous comments! How to turn them on: If you're using one of our pre-packaged themes:

Dashboard → Configuration → Click the "Allow anonymous comments" checkbox

If you're using a custom theme, you've got a little more to do:

Add conditional display of the anonymous poster info fields: Find this in your _comment_form.liquid:


{{ form.body }}

...and paste something like this above it:

{% if comment.show_anonymous_poster_fields? %}
  Name 
(required)


  {{ form.poster_name }}

  Email 
(required and never shared)

  {{ form.poster_email }}

  Website 
(optional)


  {{ form.poster_url }}


{% endif %}

{{ form.body }}

Only show voting controls on signed comments: Because anonymous users can not (and should not) gain reputation, you don't want to show the voting controls. You'll find something like this either in your _feedback.liquid or _comment.liquid:



[...]


or 
Flag as Offensive/Spam

[...]
{% if on.poster %}
  ·         
  Ban
{% endif %}

... and make it look like this:

{% unless on.anonymous_poster? %}


[...]

{% endunless %}

{% unless on.anonymous_poster? %}

or

{% endunless %}

Flag as Offensive/Spam

[...]

{% unless on.anonymous_poster? %}

  ·         
  
Ban

{% endunless %}

Show your comment form when it's okay to comment: Find this in your story.liquid:

...and replace it with:

{% if story.show_comment_form? %}
  {% include 'comment_form' %}
{% else %}

{% endif %}

Stylize the new bits: Add these styles to your screen.css:


.AnonymousCommentLabel {
  font-style: italic;
}

.comment_poster_name {
  width: 255px;	
}

.comment_poster_email {
  width: 255px;	
}

.comment_poster_url {
  width: 255px;	
}

.comment_body {
  width: 510px;	
}

.comments {
	font-weight: bold;
	padding-bottom: 2em !important;
}

.CommentInputErrorMsg {
  font-size: 1.1em;
  color: #c00;
  font-weight: bold;
  margin-bottom: 1em;
}