Here is a basic guide to the layout, design and function of this site.
HEADER is sometimes called the top section and consists of the following elements:
NAVIGATION
- Navigation on this website occurs primarily across the top of each page. It allows the visitor to view the site section by section. Current sections are the Home page, the About pages, the Event Calendar, the Resources pages, the Community page, the Donate page, the Contact page, the Sitemap and the JMN RSS feed. Each navigation section is described in detail below.
LOGO
- The JMN logo (with tagline) is displayed. Clicking it will always take you to the homepage.
SEARCH
- The site can be searched in the top area to the right (with the GO button). Type in a word, word combination or phrase and the site searches all posts (articles) in an attempt to find your request. If it finds your request, it lists each article found as a headline under a heading of Search Results. Clicking an individual headline will take you to the article. If it fails to find your request, it will list a search box underneath a heading of No Posts Found. Try a Different Search? Here you can make another search request.
ARCHIVES
- Below the logo are links to article archives categorized by name. The News Archive contains every article posted on the site and articles are listed from most recent to oldest. News items are selected by the site content editor or are submitted to JMN and reviewed for publication. If the content is deemed appropriate for JMN, the article is edited and posted. Other story archives such as the one categorized under Resources may appear.
HOME PAGE is the main page of the site and the first one we typically see.
HOME PAGE – SLIDESHOW
- On the left side, articles that are considered featured articles are displayed with an associated photo in a slideshow. Each photo has a description containing a headline and a few sentences describing the story. The headline on the photo is clickable and will take you to a page displaying the complete story. Below the photo is the assigned category on the left and the red icon on the right shows how many comments have been published by the readership.
HOME PAGE – ARTICLE EXCERPTS
- Continuing on the left side, below the slideshow, are excerpts of the 5 most recent stories on the site. Pictures here are optional and the excerpt will end with a plus (+) sign. Click the plus sign to read the full article.
SIDEBAR
- The right side of the Home page below the top section is called the sidebar. The sidebar is an area on the site that can be used for a variety of things . It usually contains one or more programmable ‘widgets’ that accomplish various functions. Wikipedia defines a widget as a ‘portable chunk of code’.
- A sidebar appears on every page except for the Event Calendar and Sitemap pages.
- At the top of the sidebar is a ‘widget’ listing three sections: Popular, Posts and Tags. Clicking Popular displays the most popular pages and posts read by visitors. Clicking Posts shows the 5 latest posts on the site. Clicking Tags lists the ‘tag’ associated with each article. Tags provide a convenient way to display articles listed (or tagged) under a specific subcategory. The tags are displayed in different sized fonts. The greater the number of posts associated with a specific tag, the larger the tag font.
- Below the Popular, Posts and Tags area is an event section containing Today’s Events and Upcoming Events (for 7 days). If there are no events scheduled for today, the Today’s Events section does not display at all. If there are no upcoming events for the next week, the Upcoming Events section does not display. Since there is an Event Calendar, the Today’s and Upcoming Events widgets appear only on the Home page sidebar.
- The next widget is an ad for the JMN Annual Retreat. When clicked, it takes you to the Retreat registration site.
- This is followed by an ad for the JMN poster which when clicked takes to the store where it can be purchased.
- Lastly on the sidebar is a gallery of JMN photos. The gallery randomly displays 9 photographs from the photo gallery. Click on the thumbnail and a full size picture will be displayed. You can navigate through each of the full size pictures. Please note that comments identifying individuals in a photograph are absent. There may be comments identifying the venue but no comments identifying people yet.
FOOTER is at the base of every page.
- This area contains the main navigation for the site pages and contains the JMN copyright information.
POSTS (ARTICLES)
- Mention should be made about two features for posts (articles). Posts are listed in several places on the site. They can be found on the Home page and in archives, like the News Archive.
- Every post has a headline. If you click the headline of the post (or from the Home page excerpt, the plus (+) sign), you are brought to a single instance of the post. Here you will see two small differences. First, a post can be retweeted to distribute a post to your Twitter community. Second, on this post page you can make a comment at the bottom of the post. To post a comment, enter your name, email address and your comment. Email addresses are not published or distributed in anyway. Currently, comments are moderated and are not available for instant publication.
OTHER PAGES
ABOUT
- The About page describes the mission of JMN and contains one sub-page with biographies of the current Board of Directors members and one sub-page with the information you are reading: How to Use This Site. These pages contain a sidebar supplying specific information.
EVENT CALENDAR
- The Event Calendar contains the Jewish holidays and listed events of interest. Current event categories include conferences, films, performances (music, dance), JMN events, speakers, general topics and Jewish holidays. These categories are color coded so the type of event can be identified more easily. These categories will expand as needed. Currently, event information is gleaned primarily from information submitted to the JMN Listserv which is a central bulletin board containing discussion topics, events and news items. More information on the JMN Listserv can be found here.
RESOURCES
- The Resources page contains online resources on issues important to our diverse community. These resources have been reviewed and recommended by our membership. Current categories are:
- Educational
- Organizations
- Synagogues
- Articles
- Books for Adult Audiences
- Books for Young People
- Film and Videos
- Music
- Each category has its own subpage devoted to recommended resources. If you have content suggestions or see the need to create a new category, use the Contact page to let us know.
COMMUNITY
- The Community page describes the online presences we maintain to foster community building among the membership. These include the JMN Listserv, our Facebook page and our Flickr page for photographs.
DONATE
- The next section is the Donate page where you can make a donation to support our work and organization. These donations are handled by the Groundspring service which guarantees safe and secure credit card transactions. There is also a form that can be used to print out, fill in and mail in a donation. References to donate are also at the bottom of the Event Calendar and the About page.
CONTACT
- The Contact page allows you to send us messages such as content recommendations, comments about the website and general messages. As noted on the contact form, your name, a valid email and of course your message are required fields. At the bottom of the form is a combination of letters and numbers. This is called a Captcha code and must be entered to send your message. This Captcha code is to confirm that a human entered the data and not the automated program of a spammer or hacker.
SITEMAP
- The Sitemap page displays every page and post on the site. The first entry, Jewish Multiracial Network, is the Home page, followed by a listing of posts by category. Note that the Events category is a subcategory of News. This posts list is followed by the pages after the homepage. All associated subpages, if any, are listed as well. Since these are clickable items, the Sitemap becomes a useful way to quickly navigate site content.
JMN RSS FEED
- RSS is an acronym for Really Simple Syndication, a technology that makes posts on this site automatically made available for syndication via a feedreader. Just what is a feedreader? Feeds are a way for websites large and small to distribute their content beyond the browser. Feeds permit subscriptions to regular updates, delivered automatically via a web portal, newsreader (such as Google Reader), or in some cases, email. Feeds make it possible for site content to be packaged into bite-sized technologies that make it easy to display blogs, podcasts and news just about anywhere.
- The JMN RSS feed provides a way to subscribe to our website. So as updates are posted to the site, the subscription feed is also updated. Click the link and you are taken to the Feedburner service where you can subscribe to our site either by email or by using a feed reader like Google Reader, Newsgator or MyYahoo.
- Currently only posts are sent to the RSS (Really Simple Syndication) feed. Return to the site for other information like calendar updates.
